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Managing differentiation of higher education system in Japan: connecting excellence and diversity

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Abstract

This article presents recent reform processes in Japanese higher education, concerning the tensions emerging within the system regarding ‘excellence’ and ‘diversity’. The article particularly focuses on how Japanese universities have reacted to the recent ‘competition’ and ‘differentiation’ policy promoted by the government, drawing on recent survey results conducted with academic managers at Japanese universities. It is interesting to examine the case of Japan, a historically diversified and differentiated national system, which has been changing rapidly with recent national ‘top-down’ policy reforms, followed by more recent and new bottom-up institutional initiatives. The study shows that universities are trying to achieve excellence, fulfilling different functions at the same time, aspiring to be excellent in teaching, research and social contribution without having institutional capacity to meet these expectations. Appropriate internal governance and external mediation mechanisms need to be created at the institutional level to manage diversification of the higher education system as a whole.

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Notes

  1. As of 2008, there are 589 private universities, 86 national universities and 90 local public (municipal and prefectural) universities with degree awarding power (MEXT 2008).

  2. Furthermore, several for-profit universities have recently been approved on a trial basis by the government. For-profit universities mainly target the adult professional education market, such as legal professionals, business executives, and creative industry professionals.

  3. Trow (1974, 2006) illustrates the transformation of higher education systems in three stages: elite, mass and universal. Higher education in Japan today is facing financial as well as demographic constraints, which may be indicative of a ‘post-massification’ stage. Arimoto (1996) introduced the concept of ‘post-massification stage’ to explain the specific transformation from a mass to universal higher education system in Japan.

  4. The 18-year-population has fallen from 2.05 million in 1992 to 1.24 million in 2008.

  5. These include legal studies, accounting, medical studies, public policy, intellectual property management, technology management, public health and teachers’ training.

  6. In Japanese universities, faculties constitute the basic academic units offering undergraduate courses, which consist generally of several departments.

  7. Operating grants amount to 1.2 trillion yen; subsidies for capital expenditure amount to 1 trillion yen.

  8. Three major changes were proposed by the Toyama Plan: First, the reorganisation of national universities, including the merger of some institutions; second, the introduction of putative business methods to national universities through a process of ‘incorporation’, and third, the introduction of competitive mechanisms into the university sector, including national, public and private universities (Yamamoto 2004).

  9. See Currie (2002) and Eades (2005) for details of evaluation and criteria.

  10. http://www.jsps.go.jp/english/e-21coe/index.html. Accessed 30 September 2007. Each programme would receive an average of around 100 million yen per year for 5 years (the annual budget ranged from 26 to 330 million yen), with the budget for the final 3 years dependent on an interim progress review after 2 years (Eades 2005).

  11. In total, 63 research bases (32 research bases from former imperial universities) from 28 universities (21 national, 4 private and 3 local public universities) have been selected. http://www.jsps.go.jp/j-globalcoe/data/shinsa/sinsakekka.pdf. Accessed 30 September 2007.

  12. ‘World Premier International Research Center (WPI) Initiative’ http://www.mext.go.jp/english/wpi/index.htm. Accessed 30 September 2007.

  13. For example, the number of peer reviewers per project funded by Japanese Grants in Aid is only 0.05, while with the US NSF, the number is 6.1. (Takeuchi, 2007).

  14. University of Tsukuba is a research intensive NUC, established in the 1970s and located in Tsukuba Science City, near Tokyo.

  15. Commissioned research includes contracted research by the state and local authorities, and certain research programmes contracted by Japan Science and Technology Agency.

  16. Comments by the Head of NUC support unit, MEXT, recorded in Ronza (2006, July; p. 207).

  17. In the survey, we did not specify any time scale to fulfil these roles.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the two anonymous referees for very insightful comments. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 21st CHER Annual Conference “Excellence and Diversity in Higher Education. Meanings, Goals, and Instruments” held at Università degli Studi di Pavia, 11–13 September 2008. The authors appreciate comments and suggestions received during the conference, particularly, those from Ben Jongbloed, Rajani Naidoo and Rosemary Deem. The authors remain responsible for any mistakes still present in this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Innovation, Research and Competence in the Learning Economy (CIRCLE), Lund University, P.O. Box 117, Lund, Sweden

    Fumi Kitagawa

  2. Graduate School of Education, University of Bristol, Helen Wodehouse Building, 35 Berkeley Square, Clifton, Bristol, BS8 1JA, UK

    Fumi Kitagawa

  3. Research Institute for Higher Education, Hiroshima University, 2-2, Kagamiyama 1 chome, Higashi-Hiroshima, Japan

    Jun Oba

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  1. Fumi Kitagawa
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Correspondence to Fumi Kitagawa.

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Kitagawa, F., Oba, J. Managing differentiation of higher education system in Japan: connecting excellence and diversity. High Educ 59, 507–524 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-009-9262-5

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