A lot of paperwork is required for the naturalization process. Why is it considered difficult to obtain Japanese citizenship?

2022-09-01

The degree of difficulty of the naturalization process is an important factor in the decision to become a Japanese citizen.

If it were easy to obtain Japanese citizenship, many foreigners living in Japan would be more likely to want to apply.

However, if it is too complicated and difficult to obtain Japanese citizenship, many may give up the desire to do so.

Obtaining Japanese citizenship is often described as difficult.

Obtaining Japanese citizenship is often described as difficult. This article is about the reasons why this is so.

Japan does not allow dual citizenship

One of the reasons why it is difficult to obtain Japanese citizenship is that Japan does not allow dual citizenship.

Since Japan does not recognize dual citizenship, a foreigner who acquires Japanese citizenship through naturalization basically loses their original citizenship.

For example, if a foreigner who was born and raised in country A becomes naturalized in Japan, they must renounce their original citizenship, citizenship A.

Losing the citizenship of the country where you were born and raised can be a very serious downside for foreigners and a reason for hesitating to acquire Japanese citizenship.

You need to prepare a large number of documents

Obtaining Japanese citizenship is considered difficult because many documents must be prepared for the application.

To obtain Japanese citizenship, you must go through the naturalization process, but during this process you must collect many documents.

Some of the documents, such as a resume and a motivation letter, you need to prepare yourself, and just preparing these documents takes time and effort.

If it turns out that the documents are incomplete, you will have to rewrite and resubmit the documents that took you a lot of time to prepare, which can be very stressful.

In addition, some documents cannot be obtained in Japan and must be ordered from your home country.

It already takes time to get the documents from your home country, but you also have to translate them into Japanese, which takes even more time and effort.

Preparing all the required documents takes a lot of time and can be very stressful, making it difficult to obtain Japanese citizenship.

You need go to court several times

Another reason why it is said to be difficult to obtain Japanese citizenship is the fact that you have to go to the Legal Affairs Bureau several times.

In order to go through the naturalization process, you need to go to the Legal Affairs Bureau several times and complete one step at a time.

There is a preliminary consultation, a document review, a naturalization interview, etc., and you need to go to the Legal Affairs Bureau each time.

The fact that you have to visit the Legal Affairs Bureau several times without any assurance that your naturalization application will be approved is also a factor that makes it difficult to go through the process.