Go Forward

Yuichi Sasaoka

Messages from the Dean
 

One of the questions we are often asked is what specific field or fields of study the Graduate School of Global Governance covers. At the beginning, this concept anticipated new aspects of post-Cold War international relations envisioned by liberalism. Simultaneously, there was a change in public administration and other fields. Traditionally, research on public policy focused largely on the hierarchy of the administrative system. In the 1980-90s, however, it began to shed a new light on policy processes from the perspective of partnerships between administrative organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), thus creating the foundations of governance (or network) theories.
 

A closer look at the world today shows that globalization is bringing about not only affluence in the sense of economic development but also uneven development through cut-throat harsh competitive processes. There are also growing global issues that cannot be solved by individual countries alone, such as poverty, inequality, and environmental destruction. The emergence of these global issues reflects a relative decline in the governance capacity of the state. Therefore, solving these issues requires social management or governance through coordination among such actors as governments, International Organizations, Regional Organizations, NGOs, private businesses, and civil society.
 

To meet the need for sophisticated and sensitive professionals in public policy who can help solve these global issues, the Graduate School of Global Governance is designed to train not only researchers but also policy makers and practitioners, experts at International Organizations and NGOs, and other people who can play a part in problem solving and value creation in various international arenas. With this in mind, the School offers its doctoral program entirely conducted in English.
 

The School established for these purposes has the following three pillars for its education.
 

The first pillar is an interdisciplinary approach. The School comprises three programs: Public Policy, International Development Policy, and Community Management. Specific focus is placed on crucial and pressing challenges facing the world, such as the fostering of sub-national organizations, capacity development for government employees, corruption prevention, citizens’ participation, e-government, crisis management, environmental administration, development cooperation, community development, and poverty reduction. Across these three programs, the School intends to adopt an interdisciplinary approach that cuts across and connects the existing fields of study.

The second pillar is practical problem-solving. Although the School is primarily designed to train talent that is capable of conducting research based on theory and analysis, it also places focus on training practitioners who can capitalize on such capabilities to solve real problems. To this end, the faculty includes many former practitioners. This feature, which sets the School apart from traditional doctoral courses, highlights the commitment to training advanced professionals who will become researchers or work in the government, private, and non-profit sectors as well as at International and Regional organizations.
 

The third pillar is quest for diversity. The rapid growth of human networks at the global level can be taken as an opportunity for value creation. The School characteristically maintains diversity by accepting students from countries around the world on a doctoral course that is offered entirely in English. Faculty and students will have in-depth discussions to discover new values and act on them.
 

The School was founded in the 2014. For the ninth year of its foundation, the School has further improved the variety of its faculty. Students who will challenge themselves to aim for policy innovations are most welcome. We look forward to studying global policy-making research together with you at the School.

Dean, Graduate School of Global Governance 
Yuichi Sasaoka