My Proposal for Paper Session

My Proposal for Paper Session

Shinichi Yamamoto, J. F. Oberlin University, Tokyo, Japan

Higher Education Reform: Why did it start and has never been ended?

~ An analysis of Japanese case for a useful reference for other counties~

Shinichi Yamamoto

Current higher education reform movementin Japan started in early 1990s and has progressed greatly until today. Japan had practiced higher education reforms more than several times since its modern higher education system was created in the late 19th century, but the current higher education reform is very different from the previous ones because: 1) it is not only country-wide systemic reform but also it concerns individual institutions to practice, 2) it is not only administrative and managerial reform but also it requires higher education institutions improve their quality of teaching and research, 3) it isever-growing reform that no one can stop to date.

The political, economic, and social backgrounds of the current reform can be explained as follows: 1)the Cold War ended around 1990 which changed domestic political power balance as well as world system, and it made the government reform higher education system much more easily than before, 2) the Bubble Economy in Japan was collapsed in the same period and higher education institutions must adopt new economic situation, 3) the 18-year-old population started to decline and thus many higher education institutions must reform themselves to attract students, which might drastically decline in the near future.

Another important reason for the reform was related to adaptation for globalization, knowledge-based economy, and growing science and technology influences. In spite of the growing role of higher education, however, financial deficit of the government become serious and this situation is not only in Japan but also other countries. As the theme of the General Conference of OECD/IMHE in 2010 was higher education in a World changed utterly, doing more with less, the reform of higher education with less money has become more serious.

In Japan, there are many policy documents which insist higher education reform. However the reform seems difficult to realize completely and thus it will never end. We need wider view for the solution. In my paper, several reform policy issues will be analyzed and they may be a useful reference for policymakers and university people in other countries.