Our Goals
The origins of Kobe University can be traced back to 1902, when the Kobe Higher Commercial School was established as Japan’s second national institution for higher learning in commerce. In 1929, it was renamed the Kobe University of Commerce, and in 1944 became the Kobe University of Economics. In 1949, under the new educational system, it merged with other institutions to become Kobe University. It has gone from having a single social science faculty at the start to now having five (four graduate schools and one research institute), with more than 220 full-time members of teaching staff, making Kobe University one of Japan’s leading institutions for research in the social sciences. From the start, there has been a strong academic tradition of practical learning at Kobe University. However, as the field of research has become increasingly fragmented while the progress of research in the social sciences and the economic and social issues facing the world have become increasingly complex, society demands that researchers from various fields come together and consciously promote high-level, interdisciplinary research. As a center for putting such research into practice, the Kobe University Interfaculty Initiative in the Social Sciences (IISS) was established in April 2012, where the five social science organizations have worked together to carry out a range of cutting-edge, interdisciplinary projects.
In April 2016, the IISS was reorganized and the Center for Social Systems Innovation (CFSSI) was created in order to frame this type of inquiry as comprehensive research on social systems innovation and give it even greater emphasis. The center is continuing to carry out the interdisciplinary work started under the IISS, and is working in collaboration with other research organizations within the university, including the Graduate School of Science, Technology and Innovation established in FY2016, to promote research that utilizes a social systems innovation approach and integrates the arts and sciences in order to help find solutions to social issues.
CFSSI seeks not only to produce research papers, but also to broadly disseminate the findings through symposia, research seminars, and other events, and to offer policy recommendations and socially implement these recommendations in society in order to encourage real innovation in social systems.
Organization
| Director, Center for Social Systems Innovation | ENOMOTO Masahiro |
| Assistant Director of the Center; Head of Agriculture, Environmental and Resource System Innovation Section | KINUGASA Tomoko |
| Head of Health and Welfare System Innovation Section | FUJIOKA Yoshihide |
| Assistant Director of the Center; Head of Finance System Innovation Section | SUZUKI Kazumi |
| Director of the Center; Head of Market Research Section | ENOMOTO Masahiro |
| Assistant Director of the Center; Head of Social System Research Section | YAMAMOTO Kenji |
| Head of Entrepreneurship Research Section | KUTSUNA Kenji |
| Head of ICT and Big Data Research Section | KAMIHIGASHI Takashi |
| Assistant Director of the Center; Sustainability and Risk Management Research Section | YUKA Kaneko |
| Project Professor (Graduate School of Economics) | OTSUKA Keijiro |
| Project Professor (Graduate School of Business Administration) | KAGONO Tadao |
| Project Professor (Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies) | SURUGA Terukazu |
| Project Professor (Research Institute for Economics and Business Administration) | NISHIMURA Kazuo |
| Project Associate Professor (Graduate School of Law) | MURAKAMI Kayo |
2-1 Rokkodai-cho, Nada-ku, Kobe 657-8501 Japan
Tel. +81(0)78-881-1212
E-mail: cfssi-office@edu.kobe-u. ac.jp
http://cfssi.kobe-u.ac.jp/index-e.html
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