The Asian Plaƞorm for Global Sustainability & Transcultural Studies
Kyoto University

AGST Newsletter

Featured in this issue:‐ International Collaborative Course at the GSE“International Human Resource Management” and “Report from GSE”

‐ Workshop Report from the GSL‐ International Collaborative Courses at the GSA“The Making and Implementing of European Union Policies in the Field of Sustainable Development” &“Food Economics and Nutrition Policy in Developing and Transition Countries”‐ AGST Spotlight Interview
Dr. Mai Kobayashi , Assistant Professor and Dr. Wanxue Lu, Assistant Professor,
Center for the Promotion of Interdisciplinary Education and Research, (Graduate School of Economics,)
Kyoto University

Published by The Asian Platform for Global Sustainability & Transcultural Studies (AGST)
Edited by AGST Head Oﬃce (Graduate School of Economics)

AGST Newsletter | Autumn/Winter 2022

Graduate School of

Economics: International Collaborative CourseF

rom May 12th to June 30th, 2022, Dr. Jie Li, an associate professor fromInternational Human Resource
Xi'an Jiaotong‐Liverpool University, oﬀered an intensive course entitled"International Human Resources Management(IHRM)" in the Graduate
Management
School of Economics, Kyoto University, which is sponsored by the Asian Plat‐
form for Global Sustainability and Transcultural Studies. The purpose of thisBy Dr. Li Jie
course was to help students develop an understanding of key concepts con‐Xi’an Jiaotong‐Liverpool University
cerning human resource management in an international context, including
how external and internal environments are aﬀecting human resource man‐agement and its impact on organizational performance. He delivered eightlectures during those periods and taught students in an easy‐to‐understand way. During class, students learned a lot from the discussion
and questions. Professor Jie Li took this class in international collaboration with Professor Sekiguchi of the Graduate School of Economics
from Kyoto University.

The class covers various international topics ranging from (1)national and organizational culture,(2)Cross‐cultural HRM, (3)International talent acquisition and management, (4)Diversity andmulticulturalism, (5) Language in MNCs & Expatriate, (6)Performance management and rewards,(7 Working with labor unions & Integrating global HRM practices to (8)new research trends in
IHRM. Due to the seminar‐based nature of the course, each student presented their pre‐assigned
journals during each class except the first. During each class, students read cases, many writtenby the professor, and discussed recent business events, such as Sony's collapsing down, a Chinese
Factory operating in the United States, a cross‐border M&A deal, and its HR integration. Afterreading cases, we had a group discussion and answered the questions each case asked. Finally, the professor presented the main topics insummary. In the last class, each student presented their own research proposals and got feedback from the professor and other participants.
According to the class profile of participants, there were ten people in total, including the professor and a teaching assistant. Two were Japa‐
nese, one was Korean, and the rest were Chinese. Additionally, there was a student from Osaka University in the class. We can therefore saythat our class is located in a diverse and multinational environment.
Due to Covid 19 pandemic, all classes were held through zoom. Although many classes are now being taught face‐to‐face, online courses arestill beneficial to people who cannot attend in person. During the class, the professor was in China. In this online courses, professors andstudents could teach and learn from a distance. There were some technical issues, such as access authorization to the Panda system , allow‐
ing only Kyoto University professors and students to access it. In this case, the admin staﬀ managed all problems in a timely manner, andthe teaching assistant worked on other technical issues such as how to use the Zoom recording function and others. All classes were con‐ducted smoothly without any interruptions.
Throughout the course, students developed an understanding of both internal and external factors that aﬀect human resource management
and how to apply those factors to their own research.

Won Junsung
Doctoral student, Graduate School of Economics

Report from GSE
Global Course certificate
In March 2022, two undergraduate students received the Global Course certificate. The Global Course is an undergraduate certificate
programme oﬀered at the Faculty of Economics that aims to train the next generation of active global citizens.
To get the Global Course certificate, students must complete their bachelor’s degree, study abroad for at least one semester and obtain
credits from a university that has a student exchange agreement with Kyoto University, earn credits with high grades from courses
taught in foreign languages at Kyoto University, and have an adequate level of English.
For more information about the Global Course, please visit this page https://agst.jgp.kyoto‐u.ac.jp/global‐course

AGST Top Global Course
It is a pleasure to announce that eight students completed the AGST Top Global Course on September 26,
2022. They come from the Graduate School of Economics and Graduate School of Letters. This brings thetotal number of students that have completed the programme to 57 since it was launched in March 2017.
More information about this programme can be found here.

AGST Newsletter | Autumn/Winter 2022

Graduate School ofT

Letters: Workshop Reporthe 15th Next‐Generation Global Workshop (NGGW) took place on
24‐25 September. Held annually by the Kyoto University AsianStudies Unit (KUASU), the NGGW has been serving as a stage forearly career scholars to share their research findings and receive profes‐
sional comments from veteran experts, both from all over the world. The
15th NGGW, themed “Making Care Visible and Sustainable: Imaginations
for the Future”, was held by Zoom meeting due to the influence of COVID‐19 for the third year.

The 15th Next‐Generation Global
Workshop(2022/9/24‐25)

Even before the COVID pandemic, the care crisis resulted from the systematically undervaluing of care labor has long been among the list ofsocial issues requiring critical reconsideration. Adopting “care” as its theme, the workshop this year attracted a large number of applicants,from which 17 presenters were selected from 10 universities in eight countries, including
India, USA, France, Singapore, China, UK and Nigeria. The workshop started from the af‐
ternoon considering participants' time diﬀerence so that those from EU countries can par‐ticipate as long as possible. Presentations were divided in to five sessions based on thefields of focus, which included "Care as Gender Issue and Performance", "Care in Discourse
and Representation", "Care and International Migration", "Care under Social Policy andRegime" and "Care as Labour and Practice".
The workshop this year also included a Keynote Speech & Round Table part on the firstday, which is held via Webinar in order to involve a wider range of audience. The partstarted with the welcome address given by vice president of Kyoto University, Dr. Kono
Group Photo of Keynote Speech & Roundtable Addressers
Yasuyuki. Next, Prof. Ochiai Emiko addressed a Keynote Speech with the title "Embracing
Life and Care in the Society and Social Sciences". The speech started with the empiricalresearch regarding the influence of the pandemic on Japanese citizens, focusing on its
unequal significance on family members. According to the result, female are more likely to be the caretaker and thus run a higher risk ofbeen infected. By critical review of the 20th century social reproduction system and the social thoughts behind it, Prof. Ochiai suggested thatsocial science nowadays should eﬀort to increase the visibility of care, so as to aid the conceiving of a more sustainable social system. The
keynote speech is followed by the roundtable by three renowned scholars in the field. Prof. Teppo Kröger, Prof. Rajni Palriwala and Prof.
Barbara Hobson addressed inspiring and informative speech respectively regarding issues including care poverty, super‐aged society, de‐familialism, etc. After that, the four professors responded to the questions raised from the audience.
During the wrap up session at the end of the second day, many participants left positive feedbacks. One of them from a presenter major in
philosophy expressed that “the workshop give me a chance to learn from other’s researches, from which I got more details about the carework in real practice. This widened my horizon and will help me to think more concretely in the future studies.”
The 15th NGGW will also be the last workshop before Prof. Ochiai’s retirement from Kyoto University. The organizing committee of theworkshop shared with the participants a digital album named “Memories with Ochiai‐sensei”, which collects photos within Prof. Ochiai at
the workshops annually. During the wrap up session, Prof. Ochiai talked about the original
intention of why she started the project 15 years before, which is to provide a platform foryounger scholars in their early stage career, especially for those in Asian countries and regions,so that they could reach out for a wider intellectual community from all over the world.
Among the participants, Prof. Pekka Korhonen and Prof. Michèle Forté, who attended as advi‐sors in two of the sessions, recalled their memories with the workshop and Prof. Ochiai per‐sonally. Both of them expressed their admiration of the latter for all her contribution to thislong‐lasting annual project. Regarding her constant eﬀorts on extending and maintaining rela‐tionship with scholars worldwide, not only by herself but also for the next‐generations, Prof.
Ochiai practiced the ethic of care in the meaning of Carol Gilligan’s classical work In a Diﬀer‐
Group Photo of the 15th NGGW participants
ent Voice(1982), which inspired all the following discussion on the topic and established theresearch field of care.
After the workshop taken place, presenters will revise their papers based on the comments they received from the advisors. Submitted pa‐
pers will be registered as proceedings in KURENAI, an open access platform to Kyoto University’s research and educational achievements.
NGGW has annually provided generations of young scholars with a series of skill development opportunities, from preparing presentations,participating in international conferences, to submitting papers to English‐language journals. The organizers hope that these experiences
will help participants learn to harness their full potential and build successful academic careers.
JI Chenjia
Researcher of Kyoto University Asian Studies Unit (KUASU)

AGST Newsletter | Autumn/Winter 2022

Graduate School of

Agriculture: International Collaborative Courses

B

etween July 26 and August 2, 2022, we are honored to join in thelecture themed “The Making and Implementing of European Un‐
ion Policies in the Field of Sustainable Development (SD)”. The
instructor was Dr. Eric Ponthieu, the Head of the Unit “Agriculture, Ru‐
ral Development and the Environment”, European Economic and Social
Committee (EESC). Fortunately, due to the ease of the pandemic re‐striction, the course was held oﬄine, and we can directly communicate
with Dr. Eric Ponthieu face to face.

The Making and Implementing ofEuropean Union Policies in the Fieldof Sustainable Development
By Dr. Eric Ponthieu
European Economic and Social
Committee

The lecture assessed how the EU is applying the principles and is aiming
at the targets of the 2030 UN Sustainable Development Agenda. It high‐lighted a certain number of key policy developments such as the Europe‐
an Green Deal, the Farm to Fork strategy, the EU Circular Economy Ac‐tion Plan, and the structural involvement of civil society and youth in decision‐making processes. At the beginning and the end of every class,
Dr. Eric Ponthieu gave us some minutes to express our thought about the class.
The first class introduced some detailed information about the EU approach to the 2030 SD Agenda. However, we are soon at the mid‐term of
the agenda, and a new narrative and vision based on resilience and well‐being are needed to engage the whole society. The second class intro‐
duced the EU food system about the Farm to Fork Strategy. Dr. Eric Ponthieu thought this strategy paves the way for a more sustainable andcomprehensive food policy. It is a much‐needed move in the context of climate change, biodiversity loss, and material resource depletion.
In the third class, we learned the Circular Economy Action Plan for a cleaner and more competitive market in the EU. It is an irreversible, glob‐
al mega trend but much is still needed to scale up action at the EU and global levels. In the final class, Dr. Eric Ponthieu introduced how the EU
integrates youth in SD policymaking. The EU has a long history of public consultation and there had been some good practices in the SD areaat the UN level such as The UN Youth Strategy 2030 and the YOUNGO.
At the end of the whole course, Dr. Eric Ponthieu let every student talk about his thoughts about the SD agenda and youth participation. It not
only enhanced our participation in this class but also encouraged us to consider more about the future of the world.
Li Jinze
Master’s Student, Graduate School of Agriculture

Food Economics andNutrition Policy in De‐
veloping and Transition
CountriesT

he course started at the middle of July and the topic is “Food Economics
and Nutrition Policy in Developing and Transition Countries”. Although
it was unfortunate Professor Yu could not come to Kyoto to give a inperson course due to Covid‐19, the enthusiasm we felt was not aﬀected.
Also, this form gave us the opportunity to discuss and express our opinions ineasiness, which made this class more vivid and “noisy”.

The main focus of the course was on nutrition in developing countries, butmore than that, we were reminded of the changes in the world and how theseby Prof. Xiaohua Yu
events are linked to diﬀerent regions and class of people, such as the 4C prob‐
lems (conflict, covid, climate change and currency depression) are relevant toUniversity of Göttingen
all of humanity which partially leads to the food crisis in 2022. Therefore, at the
beginning of the course, Prof. Yu emphasized that the purpose of this intensiveclass is to build common sense. We focus on from the world's large countries whose population is more than 1 hundred million, to nutritionindicators and hunger measurement, and finally about the UN's Development Goals and Plans (like SDGs). In the process, Prof. Yu led us todiscuss many related issues, such as whether a carbon tax should be imposed on meat and rice, whether AI can help reduce poverty, how tothink about genetically modified crops and technologies, and also the nature of human is inequity aversion or equity aversion, how to explore
the thinking logic of people below the hunger line.
Karl Marx said, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it”. It is natural that agri‐
cultural economics is never isolated from the real world. People construct identities, explore theories in order to guide practice and improve theterrible world. It can’t be denied we’ve observed significant improvements in anti‐poverty and hunger in some countries, but there is so much
more that people need to do compared to this low‐ level situation now. The problem of food shortage in the world is no longer a shortage of
production but a deficiency of distribution mechanism. Therefore, more people need to care about agricultural problems and participate in thediscussion in order to promote the birth of more realistic theories and change the world, which I think is the meaning of this course. It intro‐
duces some common sense and encourages people to participate in discussion and thinking, so that one day the seeds of ideas and relevant
practices can take root in the vast land.
Gan YuMaster’s Student, Graduate School of Agriculture

AGST Newsletter | Autumn/Winter 2022

AGST Spotlight Interview
Dr. Mai Kobayashi , Assistant Professor and Dr. Wanxue
Lu, Assistant Professor
Center for the Promotion of Interdisciplinary Education andResearch, (Graduate School of Economics,) Kyoto University+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Dr. Kobayashi was appointed as the KUASU Project Assis‐
tant Professor in 2021, and Dr. Lu was appointed an AGST
Project Assistant Professor in 2022. Since then, they havebeen playing an active role in building and developing a col‐laborative partnership between the Graduate School of Agri‐culture and Economics at Kyoto University.
Q1. The Coronavirus (COVID‐19) pandemic, since 2019, hastriggered a series of social, economic and environmental
transformations across the world. What are your perspec‐tives on those transformations and how do you look at the
impacts they bring about?
Dr. Lu: In recent years, the East Asian region has wit‐
nessed revolutionary innovations in various fields, the digitaltransformation in particular. Under the pandemic, measures
such as lockdowns and social distancing have accelerated
the trend towards digitization of public services, for in‐
stance, the digital financial services. The market share ofdigital financial services has increased rapidly along with theimplementation of infection prevention measures. A generaltendency toward the digitalization of financial services isobserved.
The mobile money, online banking, and fintech services
are being developed to meet the urgent financial needs of
low‐income households in remote and rural areas with un‐derdeveloped financial infrastructure. These digital lending
services have contributed to fund raising for micro and small
enterprises and informal sectors and promoted women's
economic participation. In addition, along with the accumu‐
lation of user data and the development of a novel methodof credit analysis by Fintech enterprises, the possible eco‐nomic eﬀects of digital finance are of massive interest interms of the evolution from digital payment to digital lend‐
ing. These new transformations in East Asian markets haveimportant implications for the Sustainable Development
Goals, regional economic growth, and poverty reduction inparticular.
Meanwhile, the rapid expansion of digital public services
also reveals new challenges, such as equity disparity in theuse of digital infrastructure and the monitoring and regula‐tion of digital technology‐related risks. Therefore, the fair‐ness in digital infrastructure usage and improving digital
literacy of low‐income groups are urgent issues.

these services are increasingly reliant on under‐valued work
done by people with less job security. Take the food system,
for example. Travel restrictions prevented many seasonallaborers from crossing borders to work on farms, leaving
unharvested food to rot in the fields, while those migrantlaborers were left without a means of earning much needed
income. As a result, people who lack the economic and phys‐
ical means to procure food increased. We also witnessed
multinational corporations use the pandemic as a means tomake enormous profits, or governments increasing austerity
measures, increasing the bur‐den in already struggling
populations. Such challenges
made us question what kindof society we want to have inthe future, to question thestatus quo, and not assume
that going back to “normal” isneither sustainable or desira‐ble.
Q2. The issues triggered by the pandemic has exposed
many weaknesses of the current socio‐economic system andchallenged the fulfillment of Sustainable Development
Goals. What are your perspectives on those challenges?
What are your messages to our students in this regard?
Dr. Lu: As the international community tackles the SDGs,
there is a growing recognition that social problems such as
poverty, education, and environment are intricately inter‐
twined. Therefore, an integrated and multifaceted approachfor students to incorporate aspects such as economy, politics
and culture is required to solve these increasingly complex
problems. By acquiring the basics of those disciplines andfield research skills, students are expected to explore various
issues related to the development of emerging countries on
their own and deepen their knowledge of sustainable eco‐nomic development.
Dr. Kobayashi: As I mentioned above, the pandemic ex‐
posed a lot of weaknesses in our society. While many were
hoping to go back to “normal” as quickly as possible, thepandemic was an extremely valuable opportunity to re‐evaluate what was wrong with the “normal” we had, and try
to imagine, re‐value and re‐structure our societies to one
that is more resilient and just. In that sense, we need toquestion what we are trying to sustain, when we talk aboutsustainability. Who are we trying to sustain it for? For who’s
benefit? The urgent need to image and build a diﬀerent so‐
cial, economic, and ecological balance is becoming evermore urgent as we feel the climate already changing aroundus. Challenging the status quo may be scary and daunting,but this is an unprecedented opportunity as well.

Dr. Kobayashi: For me, the COVID‐19 pandemic has andcontinues to expose and aggravate social and economic ine‐qualities around the world. We witnessed the importance aswell as the fragility of our access to essential goods and ser‐vices, such as healthcare and food. We also witnessed how
AGST Newsletter | Autumn/Winter 2022