Limited lifelines: International Friendship Associations bridging COVID-19 support gaps in peri-urban Japan

Abstract This Research Note analyses how volunteer-run International Friendship Associations (IFAs) in peri-urban Ibaraki bridged gaps in migrant support during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Fieldwork in Kōga and Toride combined twenty semi-structured interviews with IFA officers and volunteers, migrant residents (Specified Skilled Worker [SSW], long-term, family, naturalized), and municipal liaisons, with participant observation and organizational records. Routine activities became crisis infrastructure. IFAs performed three linked functions: language access, which translated shifting rules into actionable steps; administrative and legal mediation through trust-based accompaniment to schools, municipal counters, labour standards offices, Hōterasu, and immigration; and modest livelihood support, such as food parcels and school supplies, that stabilized households while paperwork progressed. These roles unfolded within a regime that prioritizes labour control through Technical Intern Training Program and layers SSW statuses without a universal, publicly funded Japanese-as-a-Second-Language baseline, producing marunage (丸投げ), delegation without resources, to municipalities and civic groups. The cases, typical of peri-urban ecologies beyond metropolitan cores, clarify limits (ageing volunteers, thin budgets, borrowed rooms, no mandate) and enabling conditions (municipal adjacency, trusted networks, multilingual capacity). Recognizing migrant support as a public good implies baseline funding for multilingual access and embedding professional mediators in city halls, with IFAs supplementing rather than substituting for public provision.