PEOPLE
Why Conservation Management of Japan's Meiji Industrial Sites is needed?
Archaeologist and Heritage Conservation Specialist
Dr. Michael Pearson is an archaeologist and heritage conservation specialist who has held senior positions in Australian government heritage organisations and as a consultant. He has worked on a number of World Heritage nominations in Australia and Japan, and consulted on World Heritage nominations in China. He also works in Antarctica with archaeological teams in projects run by Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Brazil, and has been on 10 expeditions there. Michael is a member of ICOMOS and TICCIH, and is a former President of Australia ICOMOS, former Chairman of the ACT Heritage Council and of the Institute for Professional Practice in Heritage and the Arts at the Australian National University, and is currently President of the ICOMOS International Polar Heritage Committee. Michael has worked and published extensively on industrial sites and heritage, including mining heritage. He was awarded the Order of Australia (AO) for distinguished service to cultural heritage conservation and management, through contributions to professional organisations, and as an educator and researcher.
--- How did you come to be involved with Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution?
In 2008 the then Kyushu Yamaguchi Industrial Heritage Consortium, through Koko Kato, reached out to TICCIH and ICOMOS to help locate people with related industrial and World Heritage experience overseas, to potentially help in the development of a proposed nomination of ‘selected sites’ for World Heritage. I made a submission as a member of Australia ICOMOS and TICCIH with World Heritage experience, and was invited to an initial inspection. The initial inspection team in January 2009 was myself, with Barry Gamble and Stuart Smith of the UK (with, of course, Koko Kato), and we continued on as advisors to the process from that time onwards.
We had five inspection tours in 2009, and further 17 inspection and meeting visits to define and refine the serial nomination before the nomination was completed in 2013. Through that process the scope of the nomination was expanded to include sites at Kamaishi and Nirayama, outside the Kyushu Yammaguchi region, and the consortium of City and Prefectural government partners was expanded accordingly.
Our involvement has continued after the successful listing of the Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Heritage in 2015, providing advice on the management of the industrial World Heritage, particularly those that are still in active industrial operation, a context for heritage conservation not then familiar in the case of Japan.
--- What is the global importance of the heritage of modernization and industrial heritage?
I took some time to refine the approach to the nomination in how it characterised the industrial development of Japan in World Heritage terms. Many aspects of the modernisation of Japan during the Meiji era were unusual and important in Japanese history – but not all of them could be framed as having Outstanding Universal Value to the whole world, as required for World Heritage nomination. We looked at a range of the changes brought by modernisation - ceramics, transportation, lighthouses, post offices, railways and battle sites, but eventually identified the drivers of Japan’s industrialisation and world impact as being related to coalmining, steel production and shipbuilding.
These were central to Japan’s adoption and adaptation of the industrial revolution on its own terms for its own purposes, and marked Japan as being the first non-Western nation to successfully undertake industrialization. By the end of the Meiji era Japan was a world industrial power, and had succeeded in this while avoiding becoming a colonial outpost of Europe.
--- We’ve heard you have worked on a number of World Heritage nominations in Australia as an archaeologist and heritage conservation specialist so far. Could you please explain more details about your career to date?
My early career was as a manager of cultural heritage sites in national parks, then as Deputy Executive Director of Australia’s version of the Bunkacho, the Australia Heritage Commission. In 1993 I left the public service to establish a consultancy firm in cultural heritage management.
One of the projects Duncan Marshall and I worked on was the research and identification of the sites that would be assessed for the Australian Convicts Sites World Heritage nomination, as well as some work on comparative assessments internationally. I am currently a member of the Conservation Advisory Committee for Port Arthur Historic Suite, one of the component parts of the Convicts Sites series. I have also worked extensively for ICOMOS on World Heritage Technical Reports, nomination assessments and Monitoring Missions across Asia. My other passion is Antarctica, and I have worked as an archaeologist and heritage planner on explorer huts and early 19th century sealing sites, taking part in 10 field expeditions so far.
Former General Manager, Nagasaki Shipyard and Machinery Works, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd.
Chairman, Fujisankei Group
Executive Managing Advisor, Fuji Television Network, Inc.
Executive Managing Advisor, Fuji Media Holdings, Inc.
Advisor, Federation of Japan Port and Airport Construction Association
(Ex. Chairman of Specialists Center of Port and Airport Engineering)
Mayor of Nagasaki City
Former Director of the Sano Tsunetami Memorial Museum (currently known as Sano Tsunetami and the Mietsu Naval Dock History Museum)
Director of NPO Association for Thinking about Satoyama
Director of National Congress of the Industrial Heritage
Honorary Chief Priest Toshinari Ueda
Former Mayor of Omuta City
Archaeologist and Heritage Conservation Specialist
A fellow of the Japan Federation of Engineering Societies
Team Member of the Industrial Project Team Office for the Promotion of World Heritage Listing under Cabinet Secretariat
Governor of Kagoshima Prefecture
Mayor of Hagi City
Mayor of Uki City, Kumamoto Prefecture
The Former Employee of Nippon Steel Corporation
An Associate Professor of the Faculty of Science and Engineering in Iwate University
Chairman of the Tourist Guide Association of Misumi West Port
President of Kuraya Narusawa Co., Ltd.
Chairman of Izunokuni City Tourism Association
Director and General Manager of Gunkanjima Concierge
Producer of the Gunkanjima Digital Museum
Owner at Tōge Chaya
Chairman: Mr. Hidenori Date
President: Mr. Masahiro Date
Proprietor, Houraikan Inn
Representative Director of Egawa Bunko non-profit incorporated foundation
The 42nd head of the Egawa Family
Democratic Party for the People (DPP) Representative for Nagasaki Prefecture
President of the NPO, Way to World Heritage Gunkanjima
Representative Director
MI Consulting Group
President of Watanabe Production Group and Honorary Chair of Watanabe Productions Co., Ltd.
Member of the House of Councillors
Governor
Kagoshima Prefecture
World Heritage Consultant
Director and Dean, The Kyushu-Asia Institute of Leadership
Representative Director, SUMIDA, Inc.
Journalist, founder of the Shimomura Mitsuko Ikikata Juku School
Representative, Rally Nippon
Chairman, Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution World Heritage Route Promotion Council Director, National Congress of Industrial Heritage
Representative Director, General Incorporated Foundation National Congress of Industrial Heritage (Advisor, Public Interest Incorporated Foundation Capital Markets Research Institute）
Mayor of Nagasaki City
Policy Director at Heritage Montreal
World Heritage Consultant
Executive Director of Kogakuin University
Heritage Architect and International Consultant
Head of Data Acquisition at The Glasgow School of Art’s School of Simulation and Visualisation
Head of Industrial Heritage, Historic Environment Scotland, Edinburgh
Scottish Ten Project Manager, Historic Environment Scotland, Edinburgh
Mayor of Izunokuni City, Shizuoka Prefecture
Pro-Provost and Chairman of Council of the Royal College of Art. Heritage advisor of Canal & River Trust for England and Wales.
Dean of Tokyo Rissho Junior College
Professor emeritus of Keio University
Mayor of Kitakyushu City
At the 39th session of the World Heritage Committee convened in Bonn, Germany, from June 28 to July 8, 2015, the decision was approved to inscribe the Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution on the World Heritage list.
At a celebratory party held to mark the occasion, some of the primary promoters of the project spoke of their joy in achieving their goal and of the trials and tribulations to getting there.
Director and Managing Executive Officer, Hanshin Expressway Company Limited
Member, Board of Directors, National Congress of Industrial Heritage
Vice-Governor of Shizuoka Prefecture
Mayor of Hagi City
Chairman, Tokyo Metro Co., Ltd.
Mayor of Omuta City
Deputy Director-General, Lifelong Learning Policy Bureau, MEXT
Former Counsellor, Cabinet Secretariat
Mayor of Kamaishi City
Member, Board of Directors, National Congress of Industrial Heritage Counselor, Shimadzu Limited
Chairman of the Consortium for the World Heritage Inscription of Modern Industrial Heritage (Kyushu-Yamaguchi) and governor of Kagoshima Prefecture (as of 2015)