This article introduces COVID-19 research that has taken place at the Japan Association of Regional and Community Studies (JARCS), and the articles of this special issue. Since the pandemic began in Japan at the beginning of 2020, the JARCS has organized two symposia and five research meetings on the theme of the impacts of the pandemic on urban and regional societies and neighborhood communities in Japan. At the 45^th Annual Conference Symposium in November 2020, urban and community researchers discussed the theme, “Can Communities Survive?” In May 2021, the symposium titled “City and Region under the COVID-19 Pandemic” was held at the 46^th Annual Conference of JARCS. In five research meetings held from February 2021 to February 2022, various aspects of Japanese cities, regions, and local communities under the pandemic—for example, the challenges of holding traditional festivals in a local town, current status of population movement from urban to rural areas, and difficulties of minority groups and discrimination—were discussed. Moreover, special sessions were also organized to discuss challenges in field research, face-to-face interviews, and field education practices. This special issue, “Cities and Regions under the COVID-19 Pandemic,” comprises three articles based on the lectures at the 46^th symposium in 2021. Ryozo Matsuda, an expert in public health and health policy, reviews Japan’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and argues for a societal response that incorporates the uncertainties inherent in emerging infectious diseases. Takashi Machimura, a researcher of sociology and urban studies, discusses the effect of the pandemic on urban life by examining infectious disease control by the Japanese central government and the Tokyo Metropolitan government. Hiromi Koyama, a community sociologist, looks into the current condition and challenges of developing urban community activities in a suburb of Tokyo. It is hoped that this special issue will lead to research on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Japanese cities, regions, and local communities.

　This paper describes unsteady and inconsistent policymaking against COVID-19 in Japan. It also tries to draw lessons from its initial experiences to develop epidemic preparations against radically new infectious diseases. After briefly reviewing concepts of public health, and legal and administrative pandemic preparations in Japan, it points out two shortcomings in Japanese responses against COVID-19 in 2020: insufficient consideration on scale of responses necessary for massive epidemic and reluctancy to face lack of sufficient knowledge or incompetency in providing evidence-informed policy at the beginning of epidemic. The paper focuses on the latter point and argues that we need to weave unsteadiness into public health preparedness against radically new infectious diseases by introducing the following four planned actions: recognition of intrinsic uncertainty in policy making at the initial period of such epidemics, preparation for effective and rapid development of scientific knowledge to convert uncertainty into measurable risks, scientifically competent organization for collecting, synthesizing, and distributing new knowledge, and development of human resources for such activities.

　COVID-19 and its countermeasures have caused large-scale state intervention as a “disaster” to which the Act on Special Measures for New Influenza is applied. The institutionalization of “emergency”, which was introduced in the form of diverting measures to respond to the preceding nuclear disaster and military crisis, had the following characteristics. First, the “emergency” declaration distinguishes “peacetime” and “emergency” temporally and spatially. Secondly, after setting the level of three layers of country, prefecture, and municipality, a “countermeasure headquarters” was set up for each layer to make comprehensive adjustments. In the case of COVID-19, the prefectural layer occupied the core in particular. Third, departments and organizations such as police, fire department, medical care, public health, welfare, and transportation were linked through the headquarters, and the headquarters put individuals, private companies, residents’ organizations, NPOs, etc. into the “emergency” system, and aimed to mobilize them. The politics of the new intervention evolved as a dual-meaning event for neoliberalism, which faced a serious inequality problem. The new corona measures have resulted in a rapid expansion of state intervention, exposing the limits of neoliberal policy management. On the other hand, it contained elements that resonated with neoliberal claims such as “self-responsibility.” Furthermore, infectious disease control was merged with the policy of promoting digitalization, which was linked to the creation of a new accumulation base for capitalism. However, inadequate “intervention” has created abandoned individuals and territories within the community. It is becoming more meaningful to focus on cities and regions as a stage for analyzing various aspects of transformation caused by COVID-19 as a process of both conjunctural and structural events.

　Many community activities have stopped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this is not the case for the community development activities in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo. This paper examined in detail an intermediary organization and two civil society organizations. The intermediary organization held online symposiums to discuss problems of civil society organizations caused by the pandemic and provided a fund in response them. One of the civil society organizations established an online room to alleviate the loneliness of the participants, and it consequently allowed the participants to interact with people from other regions. Another organization had started food pantry in response to the newly emerging problem of poverty caused by the pandemic.

　As a result, it confirmed that the activities not only actually continued, but also developed in a way that was responsive to the impact of the pandemic. The following factors were considered to have contributed to this flexible response to the crisis: 1) Each organization develops initiatives to deal with new issues in their daily activities and has a lot of experience, 2) The region has a multi-layered network and a variety of intermediary organizations. The flexibility of these activities and intermediary organizations can be considered to characterize horizontal community governance.

　This study is a case analysis of the reconstruction of the lives of evacuees from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident and their relationship with the areas from which they evacuated. Based on the author’s ten-year research and study in Iwaki City, it examines the current status and issues in the reconstruction of lives and community revitalization after the disaster. Evacuees have different living experiences depending on the evacuation distance and the evacuation destination area. To clarify such differences, this paper discusses how to relate to the evacuated areas and the evacuation destination areas in the four ideological typologies based on the evacuation destination and return status. Iwaki City is an area that has hosted a large number of evacuees since the disaster occurred, and many evacuees are rebuilding their lives while traveling back and forth from their hometowns because they are located near the evacuated areas. The findings revealed that even among evacuees who have not returned to their hometowns, some maintain their base in evacuation areas and continue to regularly visit their hometowns, while others retain their ties to their home community by returning to their hometowns on special occasions or through community activities. From the above analysis, it is clear that many of the victims of the disaster are rebuilding their lives while maintaining relationships with multiple communities, widening their living areas and seeking opportunities to participate in their identity as townspeople and the reconstruction of their hometowns, regardless of the area in which they rebuilt their homes. The findings indicate that it is important to promote reconstruction and community building from a long-term perspective while viewing the “community” as a unit of damage, reconstruction and humanitarian support from a broad and multilayered perspective, and preparing various ways for evacuees to be involved with their homeland.

　This paper discusses the reconstruction progress and future of local communities in tsunamiaffected areas after the Great East Japan Earthquake. Mental problems have been cited as a long-term issue affecting victims in the areas. At the same time, these areas have also seen the withdrawal of supporters. These withdrawals are unavoidable as reconstruction progresses because most of the supporters come from outside the region. Therefore, the local communities must build a foundation to support victims’ lives. Thus, we must ask, what kind of process has been followed? I would like to focus on the loss and regaining process of “ikigai” (=the reason for existence) of victims, based on the contents of my book, The Sociology of Post-Earthquake Reconstruction and of the reason for existence. This paper will discuss three cases in Iwanuma City and Watari Town.

　In the case of farmers in Iwanuma, the damage caused by the tsunami and the reconstruction policies of building “strong agriculture” changed the area’s industrial structure. Most elderly farmers accepted the policies and decided to retire, but were troubled by the loss of their daily habits, and having “nothing to do.” To overcome this, they restarted farming as a way of life, which was opposite to the planned policy.

　However, not all victims could address loss of livelihood by themselves, therefore, the support activities conducted by non-profit groups (NPOs) were successful. The “Healthy Agriculture” program in Watari provided an opportunity to overcome the loss of the way of life.

　However, when supporters withdrew in 2016, after 5 years from the disaster, the continuation of the activities became problematic. Another NPO led by residents then took over, and a sense of community was created among the inland and coastal residents, who had little to do with each other before.

　Based on these results, I would like to suggest discussion themes for future research on regions and communities.

　The Great East Japan Earthquake and the Fukushima nuclear accident had caused long-term and wide-area evacuation nationwide, and the issue of how to support people who “want to return but cannot return” emerged in various places. In this paper, while comparing Saitama and Aichi prefectures, the achievements and issues of wide-area evacuees’ support over the past 10 years have been clarified.

　The two prefectures have some common characteristics. In both the prefectures, private organizations have held exchange meetings, legal counseling / mental care, individual visits, and published information magazines in cooperation with prefectural offices, municipalities, and experts. While providing such support in multiple layers in both the prefectures, it has been also aimed to provide support with as wide a frontage as possible to the evacuees of various backgrounds and positions. The biggest issue, common to both the prefectures, is how long and till when to continue the support for the evacuees.

　However, different local governance was formed depending on the initial response of the prefectural office and the number of evacuees. In Aichi Prefecture, with the background in traditional disaster response and collaborative rule making, support such as establishment of public-build and private office, utilization of evacuee lists, and individual response had been developed. On the other hand, in Saitama Prefecture, in the absence of these conditions, support groups had restrictions on the use of personal information. Another difference is that in Aichi Prefecture, under the scale of about 1,200 evacuees, the construction of macro-meso-level network and micro-level individual support were developed in tandem. In contrast, in Saitama Prefecture, there were more than 7,000 evacuees at the maximum, and it was difficult to discuss the macro-meso-level and micro-level support at the same place.

　This study focused the innovation and succession of an accommodation behind the Nagoya Station. To this extent, it explores this renovation project as “production of space” that has risen in the gaps of the maglev line development. It does so by seeking to answer the following questions—first, why did the real estate owner rent out the accommodation to the entrepreneurs; second, what was the purpose and aim of the entrepreneurs’ renovation of this accommodation; and third, what kind of innovation and gentrification did the encounter between the real estate owner and entrepreneurs cause in this space?

　This paper focuses on the emergence of a “new urban social movement”. It is different from the urban social movement in Keynesian cities (Castells 1983). In the midst of neoliberalizing cities, grassroots entrepreneurs are emerging as leaders in the restoration of “use-value”.

　It was seen that civic entrepreneurs were able to restore the social relations inherent to the accommodation, and create social and spatial innovations. They have created “service hubs”, where community building is linked to entrepreneurial activities (Dear and Wolch 1997). Behind the Nagoya station, safety nets emerged for those who had been socially excluded as a result of neoliberal gentrification. It is on the basis of these service hubs that a non-profit organization is connecting with local entrepreneurs and generating profits from the city, to make the “new urban social movement” a sustainable one.

　In the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, disaster victims have already moved from temporary housing to permanent housing. It is a few years after this movement that especially in the tsunami-affected urban areas, middle-aged and middle-income victims in disaster public housing came to be replaced into low-income and unaffected people owing to the income cap. In the course of time, it was questioned whether disaster public housing should be for victims or for needy people. Thus, residential associations were becoming weak year by year, and the community generation is required again in disaster public housing.

　Since the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, Japanese sociologists have not sufficiently argued the community generation in disaster public housing in contrast to temporary housing. Moreover, trends of sociological studies changed from descriptions of the community generation based on the qualitative investigation into analyses of the residents’ sense of their recovery based on the quantitative one. Now that the number of disaster volunteers was decreased and that the very disaster public housing is becoming like a welfare institution, sociologists should explore another way of the community generation.

　This paper takes up a disaster public housing complex “Tago Nishi Saigai Kouei Jutaku” in Sendai-City, Miyagi-Prefecture and illustrates the process of supporting the community generation in the past decade by neighborhood associations near the complex, by the community center and by the land developer. The development project of Tago Nishi district, started in 1990s but to be stagnant, was accelerated by the reconstruction from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. In Tago Nishi District, there were four blocks provided for disaster victims, and Tago Nishi disaster public housing complex was built in one of those blocks.

　Thinking of this case, we can divide three subjects and logics of supporting the community generation. One is the support network organized by neighborhood associations before victims moved into the complex. This network constructed human relationships inside the complex to form a residential association. Another subject is the community center, which holds hobby and sports activities to facilitate relationships among people in Tago Nishi district. The other is the land developer, which opened a free space to interact with each other in order to promote relationships between people in Tago Nishi district and those in its outside.

　The community generation seen in Tago Nishi disaster public housing complex is summarized as the multiple-layered, medium- to long-term one. Neighborhood associations made a formal organization during an early stage, and both the community center and the land developer are, based on this foundation, trying to create various informal groups. It is true that the approach of neighborhood associations is different from that of the community center and the land developer; the former is instrumental and the latter consummatory, but both approaches are complementary in the community generation of disaster public housing.

　This paper presents a perspective on the sociological study of “areas with border changes.” Border change is a phenomenon prevalent worldwide. In this paper, the author considers it as an independent variable in sociology. Further, this study examines how local life as a dependent variable is affected by the border changes over mid-long term. It also investigates what happens when border change occurs in a multi-ethnic area. The author analyzes this theoretical issue through a case of Brussels and its periphery. Consequently, four analytical categories have been established: (1) The category suggested as the object of research for sociology of region and community comprises cases in which residents have only relatively small migratory experiences but considerable cross-border experience due to border changes; (2) those who have the experience with relatively long distant cross-border movements (studies of cross-border migrants); (3) those who have no experience of cross-border movements but have relatively long distant domestic movements (studies of domestic migrants); (4) and those who have no experience of cross-border movements and have relatively short movements (studies of stable residents). This paper aims to expand the field of research by categorizing issues on areas with border changes in sociology of region and community and examining the application of methods from sociology of region and community to the categories indicated in this paper.

　Housing is a major key to increasing the sustainability of local communities. Particularly, rented accommodation can become commons that can be used temporarily by many people over several generations. However, the Japanese government encouraged the acquisition of owner-occupied houses and provided insufficient support for moving into houses to rent. Conversely, during the 1970s, many reformist local governments were born with the aim of expanding social welfare, including housing. This article examines the position and characteristics of the housing policy of the city of Yokohama during the period of the Asukata-led city government (1963-1978).

　During this period of rapid economic growth, the city of Yokohama faced the dual problems of soaring land prices and excess burden in expanding the quality and quantity of public rental accommodation. While the central government was reluctant to introduce subsidies, the Yokohama City local government managed to replace the housing problem with a “housing land” problem and secure land for public utility through the application of the housing land development guidelines. Furthermore, community development as the realization of social welfare was aspired to, but it was not linked to concrete projects or policies. Additionally, due to the spread of high-rise and high-density development and problems in the administration of the guidelines, the concept of “housing as a commons” was not developed and achieved by the Asukata-led Yokohama City government. If we consider that the path from housing development to community development was initially aborted due to the increased financial burden, it is necessary to strengthen the cooperation between the departments of housing and social welfare policy in a way that is relatively free from financial constraints.