Metascience in Japan

In October 2024, RoRI’s James Wilsdon visited Kyoto and Tokyo for a week of meetings and workshops with policymakers and research funders across the Japanese research system.

His trip began at the STS Forum, the largest and most influential annual conference on science policy in Japan, where James also caught up with several of RoRI’s partners, including the National Research Foundation of South Africa and the Volkswagen Foundation.

While in Kyoto, James also gave the opening keynote at a workshop at Kyoto University on responsible research assessment and university reform, and met with Professor Nagahiro Minato, President of Kyoto University, to discuss recent developments in Japanese and international research policy and funding.

Heading then to Tokyo, James was generously hosted by Professor Takayuki Hayashi, Director of the Science, Technology and Innovation Policy Program at GRIPS (National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies), where he spoke about developments in metascience worldwide, and explored with GRIPS colleagues how these debates are also moving up various agendas in Japan. 

This was followed by a workshop with the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED) and Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) on insights from a recent flurry of experiments with novel research funding and evaluation methods in Europe and the US. James also met with senior colleagues from NISTEP (National Institute of Science and Technology Policy) to discuss their ongoing work on the science of science and the development and responsible use of STI indicators, as well as emerging priorities that are likely to feature in Japan’s Seventh STI Basic Plan, which will be published next year for the five-year period from 2026 to 2030.

James ended a packed week in Japan with a final seminar back at GRIPS on research assessment. From a RoRI perspective, it was exciting to get a richer sense of the range of activity, engagement and enthusiasm for metascience across many parts of the Japanese system, and we hope there will be opportunities to extend and deepen our cooperation with Japanese researchers and research funders over the coming year.