On December 13, 2021, the University of Birmingham’s Institute for Research into Superdiversity and Waseda University’s Institute for Asian Migrations, in collaboration with Global Asia Research Center, Waseda University, organized an international joint workshop. This joint workshop mainly introduced the New and Old Diversity Exchange–NODE Special Issue Launch: Migrations and Diversifications in the U.K. and Japan.

NODE is a network of economic and social research conferences to connect researchers across the U.K. and Japan. The network aimed to discuss the migration policies and the current migration issues in the U.K. and Japan. The scholars in the network exchange different ideas and share a variety of social science research approaches.

First, Prof. Jenny Phillimorenarrated the development journey of the NODE until the publication of the Special Issue. The project aimed to create a sustainable research network between the U.K. and Japan to exchange perspectives for comparative research, data accumulations, theoretical, empirical, methodological elements. By creating collaborative research for publication, the project aimed to encourage scholars to observe Japan as the new place for migration research. Amidst the current pandemic, the NODE’s official website was established to maintain the network among researchers in a more sustainable way.

Next, Prof. Nando Sigona shared his experiences with NODE and guided the audiences through the newly developed NODE official website tour. He also introduced the existing papers on migration-comparative research, webinars and recorded videos of conferences, information of the NODE special Issue, and policy brief of NODE.

As a concluding remark, Prof. Gracia Liu-Farrer from Waseda University expressed her appreciation to editors and all the authors of the comparative migration studies. After fruitful discussion among authors and the audience, the joint workshop highlighted the potential development in the comparative analysis. The limitation of this research laid the foundations for further studies in Japan.