Challenges of Human Rights Education in Japanese Universities-Finding out the Weakness and Way of ImprovementMino Takahashi,
Tohoku University, Global Learning Center,
41 Kawauchi, Aoba-ku, Sendai,980-8576, Japan
minotakahashi@tohoku.ac.jp

ABSTRACTIn the globalized society, it is important for people to build a frindly relationship to coexist
with people each other, a universal concept, “Human Rights” (hereafter HR) could be thekey. In this paper, Education is considered as inevitable to learn about the HR.
The Second and Third Phase of World Programme for Human Rights Education(hereafter HRE) by the United Nations emphasize the importance of promoting HRE not
only in prmary and secondary education, but also in higher education. The purpose of thispaper is to find out the challenges that HRE in Japanese universities faces, and suggest a
way to improve them.
The author conducted an Internet survey to find the weakness of Japanese HRE
by checking syllabi of HR related courses of Japanese universities and visiting several
universities to hear about the practices in Japan. The results of the survey reveal thatJapanese HRE raises individual HR issues and discrimination more than universal
concepts and professors tried to make students be aware of the facts. This paper points
out the weakness of Japanese HRE and discusses the reasons why Japanese HRE focuseson the social discrimination. The finding of the survey reveals that HR are not only thecertain areas’ issues, but are also inherent to every person.
In the end of this paper, the importance of practicing HRE from not only fromindividual aspect such as particular discrimination but also from legal and universal
aspect such as history of HR is emphasized.
Key words: Human Rights Education, Discrimination, Individual Rights, Independent
Learning, Empowerment

11. Introduction
In this globalized world, we need a universal principle for us to create a good relationshipamong the people from different backgrounds. HR that are given to people equally could
be the principle for all of us to have and follow.
What are Human Rights? In United Nations Human Rights Office of the HighCommissioner, Human Rights (hereafter called HR) are explaining as follows:
Human rights are rights inherent to all human beings, without distinction as to race,
gender, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property,
birth or other status. All human rights, whether they are civil and political rights, such as
the right to life, equality before the law and freedom of expression, or economic, socialand cultural rights, such as the right to work, social security and education are indivisible
and interdependent. Universal human rights are expressed and guaranteed by law, in theforms of treaties, customary international law, general principles and other sources ofinternational law(https://europe.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Pages/WhatareHumanRights.aspx).
Universal Declaration of Human Rights was proclaimed in 1948 by the United
Nations General Assembly resolution 217A as a common standard of achievements for
all peoples and nations. Then, what is Human Rights Education (hereafter called HRE)?
The United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Education and Training (UNDHRET,
2011) explains that HRE encompasses education:a) About human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding
human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and themechanisms for their protection;b) Through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that
respects the rights of both educators and leaners;c) For human rights, which includes empowering people to enjoy and exercise
their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others.
In this paper, the author refers to this definition and considers HRE to be the actof learning widely about people’s lives and freedom, which means not only learning aboutrights and duties as a basis that are universal aspects, but also learning about specifichuman rights issues such as discrimination, gender, minority that are individual aspects,
and others in order for people to seek their happiness. Final goal of HRE is to empower
learners to provide the knowledge of individual rights for living and skills to think about
the surrounding problems, and decide the solutions based on their wills. In achieving thisgoal, the study environment of HRE is participatory where learners can express theirviews and they are heard in the classroom.
2Vienna Declaration and Pogramme of Action adopted by the World Conferenceon Human Rights in Vienna in 1993, states in the Article 80 as:
Human rights education（hereafter called HRE）should include peace, democracy,development and social justice, as set forth in international and regional humanrights instruments, in order to achieve common understanding and awarenesswith a view to strengthening universal commitment to human rights.
Since then, HRE has been developed worldwide. In 1994, the United Nations proclaimed
the UN Decade for Human Rights Education (1995-2004). After that, the World
Programme for Human Rights Education has started to promote a common understandingof basic principles and methodologies of HRE to provide a concrete framework for action
and to strengthen partnerships and cooperation from the international level down to thegrass roots. Here is the development and primary target in each phase of World
Programme:
The first phase (2005-2009) focused on human rights education in the primaryand secondary school systems. The second phase (2010-2014) focused on humanrights education for higher education and on human rights training programmes
for teachers and educators, civil servants, law enforcement officials and military
personnel. The third phase (2015-2019) focuses on strengthening theimplementation of the first two phases and promoting human rights training formedia professionals and journalists (OHCHR, 2020). The forth phase (20202024) makes youth as focus group, and emphasizes on education and training inequality, human rights and non-discrimination, and inclusion and respect fordiversity with the aim of building inclusive and peaceful societies, and to alignthe fourth phase with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development andspecifically with target 4.7 of the Sustainable Development Goals (OHCHR |Fourth phase).
As explained above, in the Second and Third Phase of its World Programme, one of thepillars to be promoted is HRE for higher education.
In this paper, HRE in tertiary education is examined whether this definition of
HRE and the goal are achieved in Japanese HRE. Since this paper targets HRE for
university students, HRE here is particularly aimed at bringing up the citizens who could
be aware of the global challenges and solve them by referring to the HR norms and takeaction to actually improve the situation.
To summarize the purpose of this paper in simple words; first, to find out the
weakness of Japanese HRE at university, and second, to find a way to improve thesituation. One of the obvious facts that Japanese HRE faces is that HR is not established3

as an academic field and there are no HR degree programs. This brings a lot of challenges
in practicing Japanese HRE at university, which are explained in the next section. There
are movements to start the degree programs by one of the organizations called theInternational Human Rights Institute in Osaka. They provide open HR courses in theevening for any people who are interested in as tertiary education, but the aim ofestablishing the degree courses have not been yet achieved (International Human Rights
Institute, 2020).
2. Literature Review
In the previous chapter, the United Nations emphasized the importance of HRE
in any educational level. From this chapter, previous research and situation of Japanese
HRE is discussed. According to the development of HRE in the world, there have been
discussions on HRE guideline for primary and secondary education from the Ministry of
Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in Japan, however, there has been no
guideline or policy for HRE in higher education. Therefore, the contents and methods of
HRE in Japanese higher education depend on either the universities or the instructors.
Previous research has revealed that there are other challenges that Japanese HRE faces.
First, Hirasawa (1991) mentions that the Japanese tend to divide people into two, such as
us and others, which makes it difficult to understand others and leads to a lack of HR
sense. In a western society, people have a mind that HR are protected under the universal
concept, and HRE in western countries tend to raise universal concepts that are applied
to any countries and regions, whereas in Japan people consider HR as to be the same andequal, which makes Japanese people consider themselves to be the same with others that
influences Japanese HRE, which focuses on individual issues and different from the ones
in western countries ‘pp. 18-19’. Mori (2005) analyzes the HRE at school in Japan andpoints out that there is a strong image that the educational movement against
discrimination is one of the main Japanese HRE movements. This influences Japanese
HRE encouraging a focus on the issues of discrimination, especially outcast peoples’
problems in the specific areas. These are called, “Buraku” problems in Japan, which
occurred in certain areas. The problems are discrimination towards them in finding jobs
and marriage. This encourages Japanese HRE to try to solve discrimination issues byraising awareness towards the problem in order for minority children to take action. He
also points out that since Japanese HRE focuses on the life of outcast people, there is alack of teaching it in relation to human rights law and international treaties as a basis ofHRE. Another characteristic and weakness of Japanese HRE is that teachers tend to be
involved in educational movements, which means that they are reflecting their own
4personal concerns, and thinking about their lives by comparing them with the lives ofoutcast people. Therefore, teachers have a mind towards the issues as the outcast people’sand not as their own. This makes it difficult for teachers and students to consider the
problems as their own, and solving them together with the outcast people ‘pp. 10-11’.
Ikuta (2005) mentions that there are 2 spheres in HR, which are moral and philosophicalaspect, and legal aspect. Japanese HRE lacks in teaching the latter side, which is the legal
aspect. Therefore, Japanese HRE seeks to cultivate students to protect HR, andemphasizes equality. This point is raised by Hirasawa (1991) as well. In addition, Ikuta(2005) criticizes that Japanese HRE is not aimed at learning individual rights from legal
perspectives, and solving them through the legal process, thus it fails to seek how toprotect individual freedom under the HR. Ikuta explains that this makes students unable
to gain the skills to critically think about the rights to be protected from the legal aspect‘pp. 18’. Ikuta also mentions that Japanese HRE tends to be moral education emphasizing
equality and the establishment of human relationships, which is influenced by Dowa
education that is to learn about Buraku problems and moral education (Ikuta’s HP:
http://mailsrv.nara-edu.ac.jp/~ikuta/homepge.html). Dowa education is to teachdiscrimination caused by Buraku-problems, and solve them.
Sowa (2008) analyzes the history of Japanese HRE and explains that it wasstarted from Dowa in order to solve Buraku-related problems, which is the discrimination
against people who were born, brought up, and living in the areas associated with the
Burakumin, or outcast people. This point is mentioned by Mori (2005) and Ikuta (2005)
as well, but in addition to that, Sowa (2008) points out that Japanese HRE focuses toomuch on specific issues in the certain areas, which makes other regions difficult to be
familiar with the issue and learn about HR, which has to be universal ‘pp.64’. Itayama(2018) explains that there have been different reasons of starting HRE in Japan between
primary and secondary education and higher education. In primary and secondary
education, long absences and not being able to go to school for outcast children was themain challenge in HRE while in higher education, discrimination was the main issue
making HRE important and necessary. He raises one example, such that a particular
discrimination incident related to Buraku actually occurred for an alumnus university
student in 1950. Since then, there had been frequent discrimination incidents related to
Buraku issues at the university and some students requested learning HRE. This kind ofcase was occurred in several universities in certain areas and was the origin and main
reason of HRE in higher education in Japan ‘pp. 64-65’. Itayama (2020) raises anotherexample to explain how HRE courses in Japanese universities started and why HR
Centers were established. He raises an example of Osaka City University, which is a5

Public University. There had been an incident of which a poster that contained
discriminatory language against the particular female student was occurred in 1961. Since
then, there has been a lot of similar cases occurred such as discriminatory graffiti on awall and desks. Therefore, Osaka City University and its research center need to raiseawareness of students and staff to solve these issues. Osaka City University started thecourse regarding Dowa education and HRE in 1973 in order to respond to students’accusation and request to deal with discrimination, however, the discriminatory incidents
continued. University established the committee to solve the issue and made the action
plan based on the policy for solving the issues in 1975 ‘pp. 6’. Kumamoto (2010) raises
problems of Dowa-related HRE in Japan from different angles; such that there are a lackof researchers in the fields of Dowa and Buraku-problems; there is a lack of collaboration
with other departments and fields within the university, therefore there are not enoughinstructors who could teach the issues, and the instructors are mainly part-time, whichcauses a lack of instructors who could regularly hold the courses. Moreover, she points
out that opportunities of outcast people to establish their own academic fields is notavailable. Like in women’s studies and gender studies, they listen to their voices andestablish their academic field for research and education, however, Buraku-problems are
not yet established as their own field ‘pp. 78-79’. Similarly, Ishimoto, Okuda, Kokubo
and Kano (2017) points out the problems of HRE in Japan such that, researchers at Human
Rights Center tends to be considered the issues are theirs, and makes other researchers
lack the awareness of HR as our own issues. Also, there is a tendency for people to try to
avoid the HR issues. People think outcast people’s issues are complicated and do not want
to discuss them with others. Also, there is a lack of researchers in HR areas, and therefore,
they belong to the HR Center as additional post. Moreover, there is a lack of collaboration
with the HR researchers of other HR Centers in different institutions. These situations
cause that the outcome of research has not been widely explored and utilized ‘pp. 17-19’.
Akuzawa (2007) has done the comparative research on HRE in Asia, and thePacific, and finds that there is research and education in HRE in the region, which offers
programmes at the graduate level. They cover various fields, such as law, philosophy,
ethic, theology, history, sociology, cultural anthropology, politics, psychology, andeducation. The programmes are organized around not only learning the HR concepts, butalso real situations. Therefore, they do not just teach lectures, but they also carry out
fieldwork, and introduce internships by collaborating with NGO, Internationalorganizations and other human rights organizations. She points out that it is important tointroduce HR degree programs in Japan by learning from other countries’ practices ‘pp.
39-49’.
6

Finally, Majiima (2010) points out that there are practices of HRE at Japanese
universities, but the research of analyzing them has not been done in this field. Then, sheraises her practice of HRE as one of the teacher training courses by using legal cases atuniversity and tries to analyze the outcome. This research is unique as a legal case wasused in practicing HRE. She carefully chose the legal case for the educational use byconsidering privacy issues, and made the study plan by thinking about study goals. She
finally decided to use a civil case because this kind of case is for learners to easily predictthe victim’s damage, and protect and recovery, which gives learners to think and decide
the equal judgment. She actually conducted the 15 classes based on the case study andanalyzed the students’ study outcome from the questionnaire that she distributed to thestudents. She found out that through the course, students changed their minds andperspectives by discussing the case and thinking about the judgment with others. She
emphasized that the material of legal cases could be a good educational material forstudents to analyze the issues and make equal judgment ‘pp. 120’.
As explained above, there are several challenges that Japanese HRE is facing.
First, Japanese HRE originally started from Dowa and Buraku-problems, and thediscrimination issues are raised in Japanese HRE as one of the main topics in certain areas.
This is because the origin of Japanese HRE in higher education started from thediscriminatory cases in the university, and HR Center was established from the voice ofstudents and staff, and HRE courses were started to offer. The origin of Japanese HRE in
primary and secondary education and higher education was slightly different, but both
has similarities that Japanese HRE is related to the outcast people’s problems. This does
not mean that the theme of HRE is only about discrimination, but Japanese HRE lacks inteaching from the legal aspect as a basis and this is the universal aspects, and tends toteach moral and equality that deals with the individual specific issues. As introduced
before, there was a case of one instructor who used legal case in practicing HRE wasintroduced, but this kind of practice was not widely shared among the instructors as goodpractice. Second, in Japan, people consider discrimination issues as others’ issues, and try
not to consider them as their own, which makes leaners difficult to understand the
problems deeply. This point is applied to all the levels of education in Japanese HRE.
Third, Dowa and Buraku issues are not considered as one academic field yet, whichmakes the issues difficult to research and educate. This leads to lack the academics in thefield, and making the connection to other researchers and other academic fields. This ends
up a smaller number of academics who are in charge of HR courses in Japan. Fourth, it isimportant to see other countries’ practices in order to review and improve Japanese HRE.
It is also mentioned to consider the HRE program with a wide range of fields, such as law,7

philosophy, ethic studies and others.
3. Situation of HRE at Japanese Universities
Based on the findings from previous research, the author tries to find out the current
practices of HRE at Japanese universities by conducting a survey. The result of the survey
provides us the weakness of Japanese HRE in detail. The outline of the survey is asfollows:
Target Universities: Universities in Japan except medical universities, nursing
universities, dental universities, technical universities, fashion universities, sports
universities, and junior colleges were targeted. The reason why medical
universities and others are excluded in this survey is that they offer HR courses
related to their specific areas of study, such as ‘medicine and HR’. It is difficult tocompare them under the General Education framework because their courses are
specialized and unique. Thus, in this survey, the courses are selected from the
aspect of General Education courses opened to any students. This kind of course
gives us insights into what needs to be taught in HRE for students in general.
Methods: Using Internet by checking the homepage of Japanese target
universities to search syllabi of HRE, which were found 392 courses related to
HR from 125 universities, and among them, visiting 8 universities all over Japanto hear about the practices such as teaching methods and evaluation. In searching
the syllabi, a keyword “Human Rights” was used. The reason why 8 different
universities were chosen is that their courses are unique as Japanese HRE in the
aspects of the themes raised in the courses. They also responded willingly tointroduce their methods. When visiting and observing the educational practices, asemi-structured interview for about 1 hour was conducted. The interviews
included: (1) the themes they raised in HRE, (2) Methods they took, (3)Assessment, (4) Challenges. Among the 8 results of the interviews, 2 cases are
introduced here as they are typical case of HRE in Japan. In the interview, theauthor took notes and wrote records on the day of visit, so that they were as faithfulas possible to the original statements in the interviews.
Period of collecting the syllabus and analyzing, and visiting universities: June2018 to March 2020
Limitation: Although the author tried to check all the syllabi of Japanese targeted
universities, there must be universities, which could not be found or hit in the webengine. Also, visiting the selected universities may not be the one which explains
the characteristics of all the Japanese HRE.
8

2-1. Result of Internet survey
The result of Internet survey of analyzing the syllabi confirms that there are no HR degree
programmes in Japan, but individual HRE courses are offered for undergraduate andgraduate students in Department of Law or as a General Education. In this paper, theauthor narrowed the survey to HRE offered as General Education, which is opened to all
the students, in order to find out what should be learned in HRE to all the students in any
fields as a basis of human beings and become global citizens.
Chart 1 shows the number of courses offered as General Education according to
the prefectures. The line chart shows the percentage of HRE courses among theuniversities in each prefecture. We could see that a lot of courses are offered in the Kansai
region, especially in Osaka, Kyoto and Hyogo. This is because those areas have immense
Buraku problems in the past and the problems are still ongoing. Of course, it does notmean that other prefectures and regions do not offer any HRE. The characteristics foundin the types of universities are; firstly, University of Education offers HRE as a part ofteacher trainings; secondly, National and Public University offers not many courses
compared to private universities, and thirdly, Private University offers variety of HRE
courses especially in Kansai region and Tokyo. This also implies that the practices ofuniversities do not influence to other universities. The result of the survey implies that
universities conduct HRE under their own curriculum, or instructors make the programs
and courses to teach HRE as their own specialties.
Number of universities with human rights classes
Percentage of total number of universities
20

100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%

15
10
5

TohokuKantounational univ.

Hokuriku

public univ.

Kansaiprivate univ.

Okinawa

Miyazaki

Saga

Chugoku Shikoku

Kumamoto

Kochi

KagawaYamaguchi

Tottori

Okayama

Nara

Shiga

Chubu

Osaka

Aichi

Gifu

Yamanashi

Niigata

Ishikawa

Tokyo

Ibaraki

Saitama

Fukushima

Akita

Yamagata

Hokkaido

0

Kyusyuuniversity of education％(Chart 1: Breakdown of practicing HRE in regions)Chart 2 shows the themes raised in HRE in Japanese Universities. This survey iscategoried by the key words found in each syllabus, and collected by multiple answers ofeach course. While reading each syllabus, the author and three research assistants who
9were graduate students in literature discussed and decided the key words in this survey.
NGO/NPO, adovocacy
American movies
Nuclear and nuclear power plants
Domestic violence
Resources, development, environment
Refugees and immigrants
Mass media
Town development, regional society
Self-determination, suicide, life
hate speech
medical treatment
religionInternet
Senior citizens
Death penalty, punishment, justice system
Peace
Diversity, coexistence
Companies and labor
PollutionLGBT
HistoryChildrenGlobal, International
thought,theory about human rights
Education site, moral, bullying
handicappedminority, Foreigner in Japan
International Human Rights Law, Constitution
Sex difference, gender
Discriminated community/hamlet
0univ. of education

5

private univ.

10

15

20

public univ.

25

30

35

40

national univ.

(Chart 2: Theme raised in HRE)
Of the themes chosen in HRE, the most common was ‘Discriminated community/hamlet,’specifically the ‘Buraku and Dowa problem,’ which is historical discrimination found incertain areas of Japan. This topic is actually raised at most in Kansai region. In otherregions, the following tendency was found; such that ‘Education site (teaching methods
at school), moral and bullying’ issue is raised in universities of Education, ‘Sex difference,
gender’ is raised in many private universities in Tokyo, ‘HR Law and Constitution’ israised in national universities, and ‘minorities and foreigners in Japan’ is raised in public
universities. Importantly, the “International Human Rights Law, Constitution,” “thought,
10

theory and Human Rights” and “Global and International,” are raised high in all types ofuniversities. In the previous section, the literature review reveals that Japanese HRE tends
to raise individual domestic issues, but this result implies the potential of changing theJapanese HRE by introducing not only individual discrimination issues, but also universal
and global aspects. Also, other characteristics found are that private universities tend toraise a variety of themes, while national and public universities have certain curriculum,
and their courses are organized under the curriculum. Universities of Education offers
courses for students who will become teachers after graduation, thus the focus wasdifferent. Next, Table 1 shows the HR Centers in Universities.
N/PU/P
N
N
PU

Univeristy

CenterMain research area

Hokkaido University

Center for Ainu & Indigenous Studies

University of Teacher Education

Research Center for Teaching Practice

Fukuoka

Human Rights and DOUWA Education

Osaka City University

Ainu culture, Ethnic discrimination

Research Center for Human Rights

Hiroshima City University

Hiroshima Peace Instituteholding symposiums and seminars, exhibition

Bullying

resarch about bullying, holding a seminar

Offerning various human rights

research, periodical publication, organize aclasses on campus.

lecture and seminar

World peace, Abolition of nuclear
PU

Activities
comprehensive research on indigenous people,

weapons
Community development

symposium, citizenship courses, bulletin andpublication of booklet, peace seminar

Research about Elimination ofP

Kansai University

Kansai University Institute of Human

Buraku Discrimination,

Rights Studies

race and ethnic issues, disability,

extension lecture, symposium, publicationand genderInternational Human Rights Security

P

Kinki University

Kindai University Center for human rights

P

Kansai Gaidai University

HUMAN RIGHTS RESEARCH INSTITUTE Practices of Human rights educationP

HANAZONO University

research center for human rightsP

KWANSEI GAKUIN University

Institute for Human Rights Research and
Educationand others

providing classes, annual bulletin issues
annual bulletin issues, resarch on humanrights, holding a workshop

US military base in Okinawa,

survey, research, enlightenment, library,Kagasaki investigation

periodical paper

Human rights issues in generalsurvey, research, archive collection, collegium,
publication, holding workshop

EU Discrimination elimination
directive, Elimination of disability

P

Osaka Dental Unviersity

Human Rights Education center

P

Otani University

Human Rights Center

P

Ritsumeikan University

Peace Education and Resarch InstituteP

Ryukoku University

P

Tenri University

discrimination and provision ofpresentation at a conference

reasonable consideration
Creating environmentlly suitable forworkshop for teachers, study group for humaneducation and researchrights, resource center

Social history research of the area
which has a military base and othersurvey, research, publication

Elimination of Buraku
Human Rights Issues Research

Discrimination

Committee

LGBT, research on human rights,

Human Rights Research Laboratory

Human rights in generalsurvey, research, publicationand different levels
study group, publication, holding a seminar,

Elimination of Buraku Discrimination
P

Kyoto Sangyo Univeristy

Human Rights center, harrsment,discrimination, Humanconsultation for harassment

rights violations
Discrimination and economic
P

Dosisha University

Center for Christian Culture

disparities by ethnicity, culture,holding a lecture

gender and religion
P

Himeji University

P

Kanagawa University

Humanities and Human Rights
Education InstituteInternational Human Rights Center

Universal "Life and Dignity"
International human rights law

publication, academic course (every year)
research and educatoin, connecting network inJapan and abroad, collecting information※N：National University, PU：Public University, P：Private University(Table 1: HR Center in the Universities)
Table 1 shows that the role of HR Center is mainly engaged in lectures,11

symposiums, publications, surveys, research, enlightenment activities, setting up a library
devoted to HR, and so on. Research areas in each center are different, such as theelimination of Buraku discrimination, race and ethnic issues, disability discrimination,
gender, international human rights security, the US military base in Okinawa, Humanrights issues in general, Ainu culture, ethnic discrimination, world peace, the abolition of
nuclear weapons, community development and others.
One characteristic is that the HR Center is aiming at researching certain HR issues
related to the local area of its center. This results in a lack of emphasis on making
connections with either other centers or regional or global organizations, such as theUnited Nations in order to solve the issues. Again, this leads to the weakness of Japanese
HRE, which focuses on domestic issues, especially the various forms of discrimination
which occur in the different regions, and lacks in connecting with other organizations.
Another feature is that not many national and public universities have HR Centers.
This is because since national and public universities are owned by central and local
governments, it is not easy to establish the center by the university-decision under thesituation that HR is not recognized as one academic field yet. Although Table 1 does notlist up, HR committees are found in both national and public and private universities todiscuss and solve the issues within the universities.
3-2. Practices of HRE at Japanese Universities
After searching the internet to unearth the situation concerning HRE in Japan, the author
chose 8 universities which offer HRE courses university-wide and visited them to ask
about their practices. The 7 instructors and 1 administrative staff of 8 different universities
were chosen including not only national and public universities, but also private
universities, and university of education. Also, the themes they raised were not only
Buraku issues, but also peace education, bullying, global society and others, which are
unique in Japan compared to other countries. The reason why I chose instructors and an
administrative staff for the interviews, and not to the presidents of the universities is that
this survey is not aiming at hearing about the university policy, but it is to hear about theactual practices of HRE, which could not be found from university HP and syllabi.
3-2-1. One of the Practices of Japanese National University
This university is located in a Peace City, Hiroshima, where an atomic bomb was dropped
for the first time in the world in 1945, and was established under the principle of ‘Freedom
and Peace.’ One of 5 mission statements by the university is ‘the spirit of peace.’ In orderto achieve this basic principle, there are many liberal arts subjects related to peace for 1st
12and 2nd year students, such as ‘Hiroshima and Peace,’ ‘Peace and Human Beings’ and‘Peace and Human Rights.’ The author asked about the practice of the third subject called,‘Peace and Human Rights-Perspective of Globalization and Gender,’ which is ‘acompulsory subject for 1st year undergraduate students.’ When the author started
questioning one of the instructors, it was obvious that the teaching method was decided
by the instructors. As a result, she could make a lesson plan by herself although theuniversity determined the curriculum and its mission. There are no guidelines on whatshould be included and how to teach peace and human rights education.
Therefore, the instructor chose the topic from the perspective of Gender becauseof her specialty. She made her own original notebook as a portfolio for students so thatstudents could use it during the class and keep it as their records. The number of students
who take the course is varied depending on the year, for example 95-300 students. The
method that she uses is lectures with discussions. Since the class size is big, she tries tomake small groups for discussion. She also sets a task for students to go to one of thepeace memorials either in Hiroshima or Nagasaki by themselves and write about what
they learn by visiting them.
In her lectures, she raises issues such as poverty, LGBT, children and women.
After learning about various topics, students think about which topic is the mostinteresting for them and make a group for searching information together. Then,
individual students write the report as a final product. Although the class is big with about
100 students, the instructor uses a technique to provide a task for students to learn bythemselves.
3-2-2. One of the Practices of Japanese Private University
The author also learned about the ‘Human Rights Courses’ from one
administrative staff member at one of the private universities. The university hasemphasized its commitment to solving the issue of Buraku, because discrimination
incidents occurred not only at the Engineering department in the university, but also inthe dormitories of Sociology and Economics and Business departments in 1970’s. In theengineering department, the instructor made discriminatory statements in the lecture. In
the dormitories, discriminatory graffiti were found. Since then, the students voiced theirrequest to offer HRE courses and hold the seminar to solve the issues. In response to their
voice, the university established the Human Rights Center, and research and education tosolve the problems have been started by the center.
The ‘Human Rights Course’ was started in 2009, and they offer about 14 courses
related to human rights. There are 4 themes in the Human Rights courses, such as the13

Buraku-issue, Sexuality, Disability and Women. The instructors who teach human rights
should choose any of the four topics for their courses. They are not compulsory for any
students, but they are one of the liberal arts subjects (similar to General Education), so
any students from any year and specialty can take them. There are several omnibus stylecourses, but one representative instructor of the courses should be the one who makes thesyllabus and does the assessment. Again, there are no guidelines for the contents andmethods of teaching, thus instructors decide by themselves.
The number of students in each course is varied from 10-100. The method ismainly lectures, but some instructors invite guest speakers or take students on field trips
to actually visit and learn from the sites. Assessment is mainly done by examination, butparticipation is emphasized as well. The instructor’s specialties are varied, such as
international law, minority, social welfare and others.
Besides the courses, this university conducts Faculty Development for teaching
HR courses once a year, and instructors share what the students find interesting in topics
and methods of teaching. Also, the university conducts training sessions for the staff andstudents twice a year. About 60-100 staff and students participate in this. There is anotherstaff training for newer staff in order to enhance the awareness of human rights for thestaff.
3-2-3. Findings from the visits
Because of space limitations, other courses are not explained in detail, but through hearing
about the practices, it was ascertained that professors chose the topics and found ways ofteaching that allow students to participate in the class actively, and become familiar with
HR issues by inviting guest speakers, using newspapers, and taking them to the field etc.
However, there are still many courses, which are taught in lecture style from teacher tostudents and assessed by a final examination. Here is the summary of 8 universities.
• Topics: The Dowa issue, The History of HR, The Movement for HR, Zainichi
Korean (who are the permanent ethnic Korean residents in Japan), LGBT, Global
society and HR, Children’s HR, Bullying, Handicap-related issues, women’s rights,
sexuality, etc..
• Number of students in class: 10-200 depending on the courses• Assessment: examinations, reports, short essays, etc..
• Outcome: Students become aware of discrimination and the facts.
• Teaching Methods: lectures, guest speakers, DVDs, Newspapers, Fieldtrips,
activities, etc.
The courses are intended to focus on learning the facts, and are not aiming at learning14

individual rights and developing the skills to take an action by solving the current
problems for a better society, which means lacking the intention to empower students.
3-3. Challenges of HRE in Japanese Universities
Some Japanese universities determine HRE a compulsory subject, but there are no
guidelines for teaching by the universities. The Kansai region where the Dowa problem
was highlighted is the most active in offering the HR courses for undergraduate students.
It is clear that Japanese HR Centers tend to focus on domestic HR issues, as can be seenin the narrow focus on the discrimination of Dowa, and as a result, lack the connections
to understand individual rights and contribute to their solutions. Also, instructors do nothave much chance to share their practices among them, thus their teaching is planned
mainly by themselves. One good example raised in this paper is a private university which
has conducted Faculty Development and Staff Training for raising the awareness ofhuman rights.
Note that internet search was used for collecting the information, and only
selected universities were targeted for hearing, thus there are limitations to reach to thegeneral conclusion, and further research and literature review is necessary.
4. Conclusions
Through analyzing the previous research and conducting the survey in this paper, thefollowing challenges and suggestions for Japanese HRE are also identified. First,
Japanese HRE tends to focus on individual issues, and lack the contents of universal
aspect. HRE should include not only local issues such as discrimination, atomic weapons,
and natural disasters and individual rights (the individual aspect) but also the history ofHR, and theory and philosophy of HR (the universal aspect). Second, Japanese HRE tends
to focus on the facts, but should be organized by learning about how to analyze theproblems and find the solution by themselves. Also, it is important to empower them byproviding the knowledges of their individual rights. Third, there is no HR degree
programs in Japan, but there should be HR degree programs at university level in Japan
as well. This requires Japanese universities to have more academics to research andeducate HRE, and HR itself will be recognized as one academic field. Also, it is important
to share the research outcome and educational practices among the universities, HR
Centers and even individual researchers. Lastly, it is important to provide a guideline for
HRE in higher education in Japan, so that university can follow in setting the curriculum,and instructors can make the programs according to it. This gives university andinstructors what to teach and include, which leads to promote HRE in Japanese15

universities.
Throughout the paper, the author explains the situation of Japanese HRE and find out
the challenges and weakness through the survey and find ways of improvement for them.
The conclusion summarized here may not be something particularly new, but if thesuggestions are taken into consideration among the Japanese universities, the Japanese
HRE in higher education will be changed. For the final goal of HRE is to provide people
with the knowledge, skills and behavior of HR through HRE so that people will beempowered to create a society where they can respect each other under HR principle.
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