Anti-Trash Society? What Our Garbage Says About Us

Travel to any park, museum, or public space in Japan, and I challenge you to find a trash can. It's possible, but you never seem to find one when you need it. 

The official "reason" is the 1995 Sarin gas attacks in Tokyo, when a religious cult turned terrorist group hid the deadly substance in public rubbish bins. However, I suspect Japan used this as a convenient excuse to remove bins across the country, lowering costs by eliminating cleaning crews. 

It didn't matter to Japanese people because they grew up cleaning their own schools - more on that later. But for international visitors, the lack of public garbage disposal remains a major complaint about the country. Japan's perspective on rubbish says a lot about the culture and philosophy of the country, though.

Explaining 'No Trash Cans'

First, I always explain that Japan is clean BECAUSE of its lack of trash cans, not despite them. Because people know they cannot find bins, they plan ahead by bringing plastic bags. They also take responsibility for the garbage they create rather than relying on finding easy disposal. And, they create less waste in the first place by packing light or preparing a bento box. They already know they have to carry everything out. It's like the hiking principle, "Leave No Trace," only applied daily. 

In Western cities or developing countries, removing bins would create a public health crisis. It works in Japan, though, because of a unique mentality and because people follow rules.

I describe the opposing worldviews regarding disposal like this: In Japan, trash is not considered a public service. The one who created the waste is responsible for it. That's why society still functions without public trash cans. 

The city where you pay taxes is the only place that accepts your waste. In addition, any place charging admission provides access to garbage disposal. Train stations, highway rest areas, hotel rooms, convenience stores, and restaurants are all strategic disposal sites. However, even these come with a stern warning against "household items." Throwing away trash is a challenge in Japan - perhaps intentionally. Seinfeld would probably call them "trash Nazis."

Encountering Japanese Trash Rules

My mom describes living in the countryside of Japan as an American family. One of the trash rules was that everyone had to write their name on the city-issued bags. That way, anyone disposing of the wrong type of garbage (for example, trying to throw away plastics on a burnable trash day) would be easily found and reprimanded. 

Whenever someone failed to inscribe their name and deposited contraband, the neighborhood association came knocking on our door first. That's because they assumed it was the foreign family who committed the infraction. But my mom knew the rules and stood her ground. In fact, she was extra careful because she didn't want to be seen as the rule-breaker, knowing we would be outed immediately.

In my own experience, garbage disposal strategy was a challenge during my guiding days. I was often gone for a week or two at a time, so I could not leave perishable items or kitchen waste to rot. However, if the collection day for burnable trash was Tuesday and I had needed to go on Monday, I was out of luck. I either had to sneak attack a 7-11 with "household items" and buy enough to mentally justify the misdemeanor, or visit an adjacent community, whose collection day happened to correspond with the day I needed to dispose of it. 

Even though I was paying taxes in the same city, I had to stealthily deposit my ill-fated contraband if it was the wrong day. Don't even get me started on bottles and cans, which were collected once a month. I had no hope of being home on the exact collection day, so highway rest-stops and bullet trains were my go-to places.

Making It Work

Rubbish disposal continues to be one of the biggest challenges for my Airbnb business. We produce too much waste to utilize the community collection site since it would be meiwaku - a nuisance - for the regular residents. But we produce too little to justify paying for a daily pickup service like the large hotels and ryokans. So for now, we chuck it all into the shed out back and have a dump truck collect it every few months. The smell is as bad as you imagine.

One common contrary observation is the amount of plastic Japan produces. Indeed, when every vegetable in the grocery store is shrink-wrapped in plastic, it makes me cringe. Bringing my Trader-Joe's bag only does so much, though, when each avocado comes plastered. 

However, looking at the numbers, I am encouraged by Japan's frugality. Japan actually produces some of the lowest municipal solid waste of any country in the developed world. Plastic use might be uncommonly high, but other countries also have something to learn from Japan.

What Works and Why?

All this leads me to Japan's interesting relationship with waste. First, there is the word mottainai, meaning "what a waste." Although the word is often used for wasting money, it's also used for food. A friend once told me she patches up her old socks because it would be mottainai to buy new ones. Kids are told to eat all of their bento boxes because wasting food is mottainai. 

In a country where rice is sacred and you thank the gods before every meal by saying itadakimasu, wasting food is as close as Shinto comes to having a concept of sin.

Next, there is the school system. Japan intentionally excludes janitors from schools, making the kids responsible for cleaning everything. Westerners might say it's an inefficient use of the school day, but Japanese would argue that cleaning IS the education. 

In the West, the purpose of school is to produce independent thinkers. But, in Japan, the education system exists to make good citizens. In that light, having citizens who are responsible, clean, and able to work well with others is a vital outcome for Japanese schools. Cleaning together is a great way to instill those values from a young age and is what makes Japan so clean.

Society's Collective Role

Finally, there is societal pressure. I have heard that during Japan's booming economy, the air was polluted and trash littered the streets because reducing litter was not on anyone's radar. But when Japan collectively decides to move, no nation on earth rallies around a cause faster. Having a clean, trash-free Japan became a value, and now, rebelling against societal pressure would be almost unthinkable. 

Cleanliness is such a value that Japanese sports fans are famous for cleaning entire stadiums after matches - in other countries. Indeed, when I took my wife to a baseball game in Texas, we bought the requisite ball game peanuts. I told her to throw the shells on the floor because the janitors would clean it at night. Aghast at such barbarism, she could not bring herself to commit the act, even when everyone around her was tossing away.

Like everything, there are good and bad things about Japan's trash culture. Because of societal pressure and education, people have a mentality of conserving and producing less waste. At the same time, the need for everything to be antiseptic and perfect means wrapping everything in plastic and creating more than necessary. 

Pressure to be clean also prevents people from going barefoot in a park or jumping in the river on a hot summer day because they care too much what people think. "Who cares", should be the answer, but not in Japan. 

Living the Positive Side

As an American, I think about my unique place in Japanese society, trying to see what positive values I can implement from each culture. I shop as much as possible at the local farmers' market, where not everything is wrapped in plastic. If I feel like it, I also go barefoot in a park, and tell my son that he can too. At the end of the day, it's a free country, and only societal pressure prevents freedom. 

But then again, positive pressure produces positive outcomes for society, such as reduced waste. It's not always such a bad thing.

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Author: Daniel Moore

Learn more about the wild side of Japan through Daniel's essays.