Awarded the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award

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The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the largest science organization in the world, comprised of scientists members from all over the United States and the world. They have a wide range of programs and projects, but one of their most well-known is the weekly scientific journal,“Science”.　The editor in chief is Dr. Bruce Alberts (1) who was the President of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) for twelve years.

The AAAS also gives out a number of awards.

The other day, there was a telephone call from the office informing me that I would be one of the awardees and I would be receiving the “Scientific Freedom and Responsibility” award. It was truly unexpected.

The reason that I will be honored with the award is explained on the official AAAS website.  Dr. Richard Meserve (1) and Dr. Sunil Chacko (1) have both given their comments, for which I am grateful and happy.

Dr. Sunil Chacko also wrote an article about the award in the Huffington Post.

It is also on the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) website.

Each year the award ceremony is held at the AAAS annual meeting, and this year it will be held in Boston in February.  Somehow, there has been a continuation of many fortuitous events.

This was possible because of everyone in Japan and abroad who worked at the National Diet of Japan Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission (NAIIC) and who supported us. Thank you.

 

Why not begin your global career by studying at OIST, it is already part of Global World

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I have introduced several times on OIST in this blog posting site.  OIST is now open for graduate students for 2013.  Read the attached brochure, visit its website, think of applying, contact the office, think of visiting OIST.  OIST is completely different from any other graduate university of Japan, beginning of your global career, it is already a leading Graduate University of Global World.

OIST Brochure English (PDF)

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Call for applications: PhD Program
 
The deadline for applicants living in Japan is December 31, 2012.
 
The deadline for international applicants is November 15, 2012.*

*The earlier international deadline is to allow time for visa processing.

The Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) Graduate University is now accepting applications for admission to the PhD program for the September 2013 intake.  We are looking across the globe for students who will flourish in an atmosphere of encouragement for discovery and innovation.  With over half of OIST students and faculty coming from outside Japan, OIST offers the highest level of graduate education while embedded in a truly international environment.  About 50 cutting-edge laboratories conducting research in a range of fields form the hub of the OIST Graduate University.  Based on a firm foundation in the basic sciences, we promote education that is highly interdisciplinary.  The graduate program features interactive teaching with tutorial-style courses providing preparation for thesis research.  Course design is customised to the unique needs of individual students.  From the beginning, students work side by side with world-class faculty and researchers in well-equipped laboratories.

We are currently selecting our next class of graduate students and we would like the opportunities for PhD study at OIST to be as widely known as possible.  Our intake is limited to about 20 students per year, and we aim to recruit excellent students.  All students receive an internationally competitive support package, health insurance, and subsidized on-campus housing.

More information about the program and how to apply on-line is available at:
http://www.oist.jp/graduate-school
 
Students who are interested in applying but have difficulty meeting the deadline should contact us for assistance at:
study@oist.jp

Jeff Wickens
Dean, OIST Graduate School

 

National Diet of Japan Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission (NAIIC) -4: The Report to be Sold at Bookstore

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We have submitted our NAIIC report to the Chairpersons of both houses of Diet, and also uploaded it on our website simultaneously.

However, because of its huge volume, I have a feeling that having the content read and understood by broad population would be quite difficult, if not unrealistic.

But now, I have a good news for you.

NAIIC report will be published as a book (in Japanese) from Tokuma Shoten.

The book will be sold at many bookstores from September 11th, a year and a half from the Accident.  They are also available on-line from Amazon, etc.  The price is 1680 yen including tax.  Reference documents including commission meeting reports are attached as CD-Rom.

I urge and ask you to read this report by all means – the contents based on what has actually happened, and think about what you can do to support our “7 Recommendations to Legislators” which we offered as the outcomes of our investigations.

This is our another step forward.

 

Young People at AIESEC

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I have reported several times on this web site that I support “AIESEC” , an organization working to promote university students’ internships at overseas.

When I participated in the AIESEC convention of last year, I was very much moved to hear the stories of Japanese university students who went to internships at India, Brazil, Philippine, and other countries, to overcome many obstacles and unexpected troubles.  This event of last year was postponed from the originally scheduled date due to the wake of the 3.11 disaster.  One of the speakers, a Chinese student, talked about her wonderful experience at a company in Sendai, a quake stricken area .  Her internship, she said, became a trigger for that particular company to consider expansion to China, and that she is now helping them make plans for the move. 

The AIESEC convention of this year (in Japanese) which took place this March was held at GRIPS, where I work.  More than 100 students and many supporters gathered again, and I was happy to be a part of them.  The program included a very energetic encouraging speech by Mr. Kan Suzuki, former vice minister of MEXT  as well as the presentations by the seven students who were selected from the participants of this year’s internships, describing their confusion, hardships, and sense of accomplishments which moved the audience very much.  After the speech was the announcement of the recipients of the “Global Internship of the Year” awards.

Then, we listened to the stories of the students who arranged the internship in Japan, trying to match foreign students with the Japanese companies, the difficulties they had to overcome, the growth and awakening which resulted from those experiences.  All the students in the venue, as well as the judges, representatives from the supporting companies, shared together this wonderful half day.  Awards were also presented to the students who worked to link the supporting enterprises with the potential interns, to express appreciation to the enterprises.

Next weekend, I went to an event which was held in part to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the AIESEC Asia-Pacific Chapter, spending a marvelous time with 250 or so young people from all parts of Asia Pacific.  In the closing speech of the second day, I commented that a true asset for them in the future, when they become the leaders of this rapidly changing, un-foreseeable world, is, for example, such experience as spending time together for a week in this camp.

I can tell you, Japanese youths are working to pave their ways, just like the youths in other nations.  I am truly proud of them and am looking forward to see the outcomes in the future.

The Committee of Parliament to Investigate the Accident at Fukushima Nuclear Power Plants -3

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I have posted two columns under this title since the New Year’s day.  Reports about this committee also appears in the English version of Japanese medias, so I received a number of messages and e-mails from my friends living abroad as well.

English reports appear on Yomiuri and Kyodo, for example.  I believe there are more, if you search for them….

I also intend to express my thoughts in English as much as possible.

Dr. Sunil Chako, a good friend of mine, recently contributed an article to the Huffingtonpost, a well known On-line English media.  I was very happy to read his article.

Your support is a great encouragement to us.

 

The Committee of Parliament to Investigate the Accident at Fukushima Nuclear Power Plants -2

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As I reported on the New Year’s day, the “Committee of Parliament to Investigate the Accident at Fukushima Nuclear Power Plants” (click here for videos) was launched officially on December 8th last year.  On this day, the nine committee members and I received the official notice of appointment at the Parliament from the Presidents of both the House of Representatives and the House of Councilors. This ceremony was followed by a session where the ten committee members made comments and representatives from all political parties expressed their thoughts and expectations towards this committee.

This whole event was broadcasted live from the Parliament and now the audiovisual record of all the comments of the committee members as well as all the requests from the members of the congress are uploaded at the  "Shugiin TV"  for public viewing.  My comments as the chair of this committee appears at the start of this session, and also in the end after all representatives from every political party have presented their “requests” to our committee.  By the way, it happens that 70 years ago on this day, the 8th of December, the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked Pearl Harbor to join in the World War II.   It was truly the beginning of the great tragedy of our nation.  I could not help touching upon this historical coincidence when I talked about the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident.

Mr. Yasuhisa Shiozaki, a representative of the Liberal Democratic Party who served as the Chief Cabinet Secretary, and one of the key persons to set up this committee, writes about this issue in his blog several times.  Mr. Shiozaki also wrote a record of the whole process of the making of this committee and published it as a book in mid December titled “ ‘The Committee of Parliament to Investigate the Accident of the Nuclear Power Plants’ – A Challenge From the Legislature (「国会原発事故調査委員会」立法府からの挑戦状)” (this book is published in Japanese only).

At any rate, we are now at the start of a very challenging year.

 

The Year 2012 Starts With a New Big Challenge

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A Happy New Year.

During the past month, i.e. since December 6th of last year, I have not written any new columns nor did send any messages via twitter.

The reason is, as you may already know, that I was suddenly appointed to chair the “Committee to investigate the accident at Tokyo Electric Power Company's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants”.  The relevant laws for creating a committee that is independent from the government and the parliament passed the Diet, as is described in media by words such as “organized by the Diet, totally independent”, or “the very first in the 60 some years’ history of our constitutional government”.  On December 8th, the nine committee members and I received the official notice of appointment at the Parliament from the Presidents of both the House of Representatives and the House of Councilors.

If you search my name on the “news” sites in the web, you will find various reports (Ref.1) (both links are in Japanese) on this  issue.

What a big unexpected challenge I was appointed to!  I used to be one of the members of the “nongovernment Fukushima nuclear plant accident investigating committee”(in Japanese) chaired by Dr. Koichi Kitazawa (in Japanese), former Director of JST, but I resigned from this position for this new responsibility.

I will gradually explain to you, from time to time, the various challenges this committee face, but I think the most important and great challenge is how we – the nine members and I – share the mission of this committee and perform our investigations and analysis.  Every member is extremely busy with their own work, and on top of that, we have to recruit all of the administrative staffs and create rules on how to conduct this investigation as a whole.  So, I had to withhold from making any comments in public until the basic rules were defined within our own committee.  I hope you will understand the situation I had been in.

The “gravity of ‘the very first in the history of Japan’s constitutional government’” is not just about the historical impact to the system of our democracy, but it also refers to the countless difficult issues derived from the fact that this sort of investigation has “never taken place before”.  Therefore, I must say, the operation of this committee is by itself a huge challenge to all of us.

After the official launching of our committee, we traveled right away on December 18th (Sunday) to the site of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident (covering ourselves with heavy protective equipments…), Okuma town located near the nuclear power plant which now looked like a deserted ghost town, and places where decontamination was in progress. On the next day, the 19 th (Monday), we visited the temporary housings of the evacuees and another decontamination site.  (Ref.1) (both links are in Japanese)

The year of 2011 ended with an unexpected big surprise for me, and now the new year of 2012 started.

 

Let the People Trigger “The Third Opening of Japan” ? The Start of a New Movement

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I think many people feel that the credibility of Japan has fallen sharply after the event of “3.11 Fukushima”.  I also regret to say that we do not see any signs yet of trust in Japan recovering.  Why is this so?  The recent issues of TPP or Olympus could be examples of reasons for such mistrust.

On the other hand, we witnessed how the people at the “3.11” stricken area have manifested their wonderful energy.  The whole world saw the fundamental strength embedded in the genes of the Japanese people.  But this is only one side of the coin, and if seen from the other side, we might also see the weakness of the Japanese people in being rather too quiet or obedient.

However, the local victims of the 3.11 Eastern Japan Earthquake and Tsunami are now taking actions towards recovery.  While the government sector is doing nothing much than reciting the mantra of “the third opening of Japan”, the series of concrete actions taken by the civilian section may, in the end, pave the way in the real word towards the true “third opening of Japan”

Recently my colleague and I wrote an opinion in  Japan Times.  Hope you will take a look at it.

 

 

 

 

Announcement of the November 11th (Friday) Conference

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The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a prominent Think Tank based in Washington DC,  is poised to release the final report of its ‘U.S.-Japan Partnership for Recovery Task Force after 3.11’   in Washington and Tokyo.   In Washington DC, the announcement was made today. In Tokyo, a symposium will be held next week in collaboration with Keidanren.

HGPI, the think tank in Japan which I chair,  had partnered with CSIS on issues of healthcare (Ref.1).

Upon this occasion, HGPI-CSIS will hold a conference for a dialogue between Japanese and U.S. experts, inviting Dr. Michael J. Green, CSIS Japan Chair, Dr. J. Stephen Morrison, CSIS Senior Vice President and Director of the CSIS Global Health Policy Center, Mr. Seiji Maehara,  Chairman of the Democratic Party of Japan’s Policy Research Committee, Dr. Mitsuru Sakurai, former Vice Minister of the Ministry of Finance, in the afternoon of Friday, November 11th, in Fukushima. 

If you have time, please come and join us.  For details on program, venue, and application form, please see here (for Japanese version, please click here).

I hope you will be kind enough to tolerate any inconvenience which you may experience at the venue, due to the circumstance in Fukushima.

A Sunday in Sendai – to TEDxTohoku

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Today is a beautiful autumn Sunday.  I left Tokyo for Sendai early in the morning to participate in TEDxTohoku. 

ImpactJapan has been supporting TEDxTokyo since three years ago, but it was a while since I met Patrick and Todd, the organizers, last time.  This particular event, TEDxTohoku, was initiated by the young people as actions to respond to the great disaster.  The venue of this event is the kawauchi Hagi Hall at the Tohoku University.  It is a very good hall.

By the way, quite surprisingly, I came across Mr Shinzo Abe, the former Prime Minister, in the Shinkansen bullet train. Mr Abe was on his way to the coast line of Iwate Prefecture to deliver a lecture.  I asked him “If it is all right with you, would you like to stop by at Sendai upon your return and give us a small talk?”, but of course, this sudden invitation did not suit his itinerary.  I wished he could come, though..

Each speaker told wonderful stories and these talks were broadcasted live on the Ustream.  I think you they will be posted on internet soon.  The speakers were actually quite good story tellers.  One of the presentations I particularly liked was the one by Ms Hideko Oikawa , the president of the Oikawa Denim (in Japanese)  of Kesennuma city, and the ordeal of her,three sons and the company  The story itself was very moving but the way it was told – in a simple stammering manner -  was another element that so much moved us. The last presentation was given by Mr Paul Bennett of IDEO, who came all the way from California.  It was a message to Japan in metaphor using four animals. Unfortunately, the powerpoint slides did not work smooth enough so it made the speech a bit distracting.

Sendai is indeed the city of forests.  I enjoyed the beautiful autumn daylight and refreshening air outside the hall.  I joined in the reception, and left the place earlier to go back to Tokyo.

I very much enjoyed spending the day with youths who are working together to make Tohoku, the disaster stricken area,  a drive force in bringing changes in Japan.