Subject: [he-forum 803] GE8 ユネスコ代表からの返事

From: Toru Tsujishita <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Apr 2000 16:31:41 +0900

北大の辻下です。

渡邊信久さんの提案[reform:02669]（cf [reform:02678])に従い、アドレスがわかった
GE8 出席のユネスコ代表とアメリカ代表へメールを送ってみました。のんびりしていた
ためGE8には間に合わなかったのですが、ユネスコの代表の Ms. Draxler, Alexandra
から励ましと思われる返事がありました：

>It seems to me that mobilizing opinion to reflect on the future of
>universities in Japan, at a point in history that is important for the
>future of higher education everywhere, is a healthy reaction.

（粗訳：「世界全域の高等教育の未来にとって重要なこの時期、意見を結集して
日本の大学の未来に反映させようとすることは、健全な態度と私には思われます」）

送ったメールの不正確で拙劣な英文のせいで、国立大学の独立行政法人化の問題点が
適切に伝わった
かどうか心元ないです（例えば、私の手紙の引用５行目に？がついている部分があり
ます）。
今後のこういう機会のためにも、国立大学の独立行政法人化問題を英文で詳しく説明し
たものが必要ではないはないでしょうか。すでにあれば是非教えてください、独立行
政法人
制度の解説だけでもいいのですが。

以下が返事の全文です。私の送ったものも添付されています。
-------------------
From: "Draxler, Alexandra" <[email-masked]>
To: "'Toru Tsujishita'" <[email-masked]>
Subject: RE: A crisis of national universities in Japan
Date: Wed, 5 Apr 2000 12:13:01 +0200
MIME-Version: 1.0

Dear sir,

Thank you for your message, which I received only after my return from the
G8 Education ministers' meeting.  UNESCO would not, in any case, have used
its participation in this meeting to give advice in public to a particular
country about how to establish its internal education policies.

Major changes always bring concerns about how they will work out in the long
run.  UNESCO's position is dictated by its constitutional mandate to
collaborate with countries but not to interfere in their domestic policies.

It seems to me that mobilizing opinion to reflect on the future of
universities in Japan, at a point in history that is important for the
future of higher education everywhere, is a healthy reaction.

Sincerely yours,
Alexandra Draxler
Director,  Task force on Education for the Twenty-first Century
UNESCO
7, Place de Fontenoy
75352 Paris 07 SP
France

tel.  33 1 45 68 11 23
fax. 33 1 45 68 56 32

<http://www.unesco.org/delors>

 <<A crisis of national universities in Japan>>

Message-ID: <[email-masked]>
From: Toru Tsujishita <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Subject: A crisis of national universities in Japan
Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 12:33:01 +0200
MIME-Version: 1.0
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0)
Content-Type: text/plain;
	charset="iso-8859-1"

Dear Ms. Alexandra Draxler,

I am a mathematician working in Hokkaido University and writing this letter
to ask you to pay attention to the deep difficulty confronting the present
and the future national universities in Japan.

As you might already know very well, the Japanese government is
planning to change the national universities system, ?making them into
so called Indepedent Administrative Agencies, new institution recently
designed to reduce the size of governmental organization. When the plan is
realized, the universities will have more administrative freedom but less
academic and educational freedom, as is seen clearly from the law called
"Common Law of Independent Administrative Agencies."

At first, most people feel puzzled to hear that such a clumsy plan is really
going to be carried out soon. The impetus originated from the pledge of the
present cabinet to reduce the number of government employees to 75% in ten
years. One of the most efficient and easy way to achieve this pledge is to
change national universities systems so that the 130 thounsands staffs cease
to be national employees.

This real politic motivation behind the plan made many people in university
angry with the government.
Partly to conciliate these people, the Liberal Democratic Party made a proposal
which tries to persuade them that the plan is a good one also for
universities and stress the following merits.

(1) The universities will have more independence in administrative
works. For example they can determine the salary of the staffs
according to their contribution.

(2) There will be severe competition among universities, among
faculties and among staffs, which will improve the quality of the
national universities in various ways. In fact, every five years, the
universities will be somehow evaluated so that the officers in the
authorities concerned can decide to reform and/or abolish universities
according to the performance in education and research as well as in
their contribution to industry.

(3) There will emerge various types of universities, e.g. community
colleges, graduate schools, medical schools, etc. which will improve
the efficiency of education and research in universities,
since some staffs will engage solely in research and others in education.

However, it is obvious that the point (2) will strengthen greatly the
control of the ministries concerned, even over the academic  activities.
This will damage the balanced evolution of academic research as well
as the mission of higher education giving the students not only the
expert knowledge but also deep and constant concern for the fates of
people, especially for the weaker ones.

Moreover the point (3) will block the movement of staffs among national
universities since most people do not  like to move to much worse
environment. The introduction of time contracts will not remedy the
situation but will work only as a mechanism to dismiss young researchers
when they are not necessary from the point of view of research bosses.

This possibly disastrous change of the Japanese national university system
would also give bad effects to the direction of world-wide higher education
system, since it is a strong movement against the WORLD DECLARATION ON
HIGHER EDUCATION FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY by UNESCO.

The present cabinet  however has no intention to pay attention to
our anxieties and are ready to realize the plan soon. I would like to
ask you to warn the Japanese government, in the occasion of G8 Education
Ministers' Meeting and Forum, about the misconception on the higher
education behind the plan and to spend more time to check the plan whether
or not it will cripple Japanese universities in many aspects.

With best wishes,

--------------------------------------------
Professor,  Department of Mathematics,
Hokkaido Universeity
Kita 10 Nishi 8, Sapporo 060-0810 JAPAN
Tel & Fax +81-11-727-3705
[email-masked]
--------------------------------------------

PS. The Faculty and Staff Union of Japanese Universities made the
following ad in New York Times:

---------------------------------------------------------
Say No to Free Ride on Academic Resaerch and Higher Education.
----------------------------------------------------------
In the first year of the third millennium we, the members of Japanese
universities, recognize our missions, The global ecology crisis, fear
of of nuclear weapons, regional wars and genocide, a terrible
imbalance in the distribution of economic resources, the collapse of
human values caused by wealth, the despair caused by poverty... we
believe that these and other difficulties can only be faced by relying
on human wisdom.

Universities and colleges always been centers of wisdom. And now,
thanks to the development of modern means of communication, we can
cooperate with each other closely.

Higher education and from one of the pillars human society. For
precisely this reason public investment to universities and colleges
is needed. In a world where globalization is advancing, no nation can
escape this responsibility.

However, on a plea of financial difficulty, the Japanese government is
about to shirk its responsibilities.  The result will be deterioration
in the educational circumstances of students and in our working
conditions. Japan's responsibility for promoting global co-operation
will be impaired.

According to estimates, the average tuition fee for higher education
in Japan would exceed 40,000 dollars per year if the government
withdrew its support for universities. This is equal to the average
income of a Japanese worker, Similar fees would have to be charged to
foreign students studying in Japan.

The withdrawal of government support would also meat that various
educational and research programmes that help to solve world problems
would stop. This means that the people of the world would be penalized
by the government's action.

We reject a free ride in education. We believe in global cooperation,
We protest against the Japanese government's proposal to reduce
spending on academic research and higher education.

For the brilliant future of the world's peoples,
For global solidarity
we send this message from Japan.
-----------------------------------------------------------
辻下　徹
北海道大学大学院理学研究科数学専攻
〒060-0810 札幌市北区北１０条西８丁目
011-706-3823(office)
[email-masked]
http://www.geocities.co.jp/CollegeLife-Cafe/3141/dgh
＊　政・官ダイナミックスへの盲従が大学を滅ぼし日本を滅ぼす　＊
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