Vol.68 No. 3 (2016)
Contents
Article
SATO Hirotaka
The Restructuring of the Management Bases of Yama-Hoko Events of Gion Festival in Kyoto: Succession of Urban Festivals in the Current City (273)
Review
A Survey of Geographical Studies in Japan, 2015 (297)
Research Note
OKADA Shintaro
Sustainability of Nonprofit Organizations and Designated Administrator System:The Case of Kyoto Prefecture (355)
Book Reviews (374)
Meeting Report (382)
News (384)
Abstract
The Restructuring of the Management Bases of Yama-Hoko Events of Gion Festival in Kyoto: Succession of Urban Festivals in the Current City
SATO Hirotaka
Graduate student, Graduate School of Letters, Ritsumeikan University
In 2015, the Agency for Cultural Affairs, Japan, decided to re-propose “Yama-Hoko-Yatai Events” for a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage. The Agency sees the events’ values in the fact that people in local communities all together commit to the events, wishing for their communities’ peace and disaster-prevention. The events have been gathering momentum for their registration all over Japan. On the other hand, dynamics of populations in cities these days make the passing down of urban festivals more difficult. This paper, therefore, investigates the management bases of urban festivals from social, economic and locational aspects in order to suggest how to pass them down to following generations. As an example, the paper takes the Yama-Hoko Events of the Gion Festival that takes place in the center of Kyoto City every July. My fieldwork and statistical analysis reveal the current situation of management bases of 33 Yama-Hoko floats and their historical changes. The districts which own the floats in the city center are different from each other in terms of demography and land use. So are their management bases, reflecting the differences of the districts. What my research finds out is that such historical changes in demography and land use resulted in restructuring of each float’s management base. Changes in urban structure led to restructuring of the management bases of urban festivals, which affects how urban festivals are passed down from generation to generation. This paper, therefore, insists that we need to pay more attention to the restructuring of the management bases when considering the succession of urban festivals all over Japan.
Key words: urban festivals, management bases, dynamics of populations, center of Kyoto City, Yama-Hoko Events of the Gion Festival
Sustainability of Nonprofit Organizations and Designated Administrator System: The Case of Kyoto Prefecture
OKADA Shintaro
Graduate student, School of Letters, Kyoto University
The purpose of this paper is to examine how nonprofit organizations (NPOs) ensure sustainability through using the Designated Administrator System (DAS) to obtain public funds. The subjects in this study are 16 NPOs using DAS in Kyoto Prefecture, and interview surveys with representatives of these organizations were conducted. Consequently, it was found that the circumstances of the NPOs using DAS are different between Type A NPOs (i.e. existing organizations using DAS) and Type B NPOs (i.e. new organizations established to administer public facilities and thus just beginning to use the system). Since it is difficult for an NPO, whose financial standing is typically weak, to acquire enough money for its activities, the financial, human and physical resources obtained through DAS give the NPO a basic advantage and an important resource that enables it to control initial costs and to start/expand its activities. Through this system, NPOs can ensure sustainability by practicing various strategies, both within the individual NPO and among different organizations, aimed at increasing advantages by using DAS, reducing disadvantages by using DAS, and sometimes converting disadvantages to advantages. It’s particularly noteworthy that Type B NPOs regard adjustment strategies between NPOs and local authorities as more important than do Type A NPOs, presumably because the former tend to be more dependent on DAS than the latter.
Key words: nonprofit organization (NPO), Designated Administrator System (DAS), sustainability, public facilities, local authorities