Policy Analysis
135 items
Insights & Analysis
What does the EU ban on nonconsensual sexual AI content cover?
Insights & Analysis
Gennai OSS: Is Published Code Enough for Deployment?
Insights & Analysis
Can majority support alone bring about Security Council reform?
Insights & Analysis
Does Implementation Under Way Mean a Transport Gap Is Resolved?
Insights & Analysis
After an AI bear alert, who handles checks and safety measures?
Insights & Analysis
A stronger bridge pier still needs a checked foundation
Insights & Analysis
In the Year the National Museum of Art's Grant Rose, the National Film Archive of Japan's Share of the Grant Fell Sharply. That Same Year, More Than 5,500 People Gave the Archive Over ¥150 Million
Insights & Analysis
Of the 690,000 People Who Visited the National Museum of Western Art's Collection Galleries in FY2024, the General and University Student Categories Facing the Fee Rise Made Up 26%
Insights & Analysis
Five National Art Museums Will Charge ¥1,000 for Their Collection Exhibitions. The Fee Rise Was Written into the Medium-Term Objectives the Education Ministry Set in February
Insights & Analysis
Japan Post Failed to State Terms to 167 Freelancers. The First Day of the Violation Period Is the Day the Law Took Effect
Insights & Analysis
Fukushima Holds About 14 Million Cubic Metres of Removed Soil. Reuse Outside the Prefecture Began With Flower Beds at Two Government Buildings
Insights & Analysis
Japan's Refundable Tax Credit Starts in FY2029 — the Registration Rate for the Public Benefit Account It Rests On Is About 50%, and the Rest Still Need Their Consent Confirmed
Labs
Japan Cut the Default Speed Limit on Residential Roads to 30 km/h — a Nationwide Noise Measure Enacted Without Noise as an Objective
Insights & Analysis
Foreign Parties Acquired 175 Hectares of Japanese Farmland, 0.004% of the National Total — and Not One Hectare Went to a Foreign Corporation or a Foreign National Living Abroad
Insights & Analysis
1,218 Retrial Applications Concluded in Five Years and 7 Orders to Reopen — 115 of the 121 Dismissed in 2023 Had No Examination of Facts at All
Insights & Analysis
Overseas Sales of Japanese Content Tripled in Ten Years to ¥5.8 Trillion, and the Cool Japan Fund Will Not Request Funding for FY2027
Insights & Analysis
Permanent Residence Will Require Income Above the Average for Japanese Households — 61.5% of Japanese Households Fall Below That Average of 5.752 Million Yen
Insights & Analysis
3,772 Medical Incidents Reported in Ten and a Half Years, About 356 a Year — the Design Estimate Was 1,300 to 2,000, and the Clause Requiring a Review Within Two Years Has Sat Expired for a Decade
Insights & Analysis
Vote-Weight Disparity Passes 2x in 16 Districts — Japan's Last Redistricting Started at 1.999
Insights & Analysis
Before Restricting Children's Social Media by Age — How to Establish Age Is Still Sitting in the Open-Questions Column
Insights & Analysis
Fraud Losses in Japan Rose 98% in a Year While Cases Cleared Stood Still — Most Reports From People in Their 30s, Most Money From Those in Their 70s
Insights & Analysis
Japan's National Pension Payment Rate Hits 79.6%, Rising for a 14th Year — Yet Fewer Months Are Actually Being Paid
Insights & Analysis
Toward a Right Not to Have Your Voice Used — Japan's Copyright Act Protects the Performance, Not the Voice
Insights & Analysis
28 Firms Raided Over Suspected Bid Rigging in Condominium Repairs — Japan Named the Method Nine Years Ago and Published the Going Rates From 944 Projects
Insights & Analysis
A Religious Corporation's Assets Come into View Only as It Nears Dissolution — 83.4 Billion Yen at Liquidation and the Three-Stage Design of Disclosure
Insights & Analysis
For a Distant Tsunami That Brings No Shaking, Only Trust in the Warning Drives Evacuation — the Dilemma of False Alarms and Misses
Insights & Analysis
Ten Riot Police, Twenty Minutes, a House That Had Not Collapsed — False Rescue Requests Went from 1 in 573 to 104 in 1,091
Insights & Analysis
The Linear-Shizuoka Agreement Now Carries a Clause to Halt the Work — How a Century-Old Memory of Water Loss Became Procedure
Insights & Analysis
While a Work-Injury Claim Waits, Nothing Bridges the Bereaved — Six-Month-Plus Backlog Doubled to 2,329 in Five Years
Insights & Analysis
46% of New Vets Go to Pets, 11% to Livestock — Japan Isn't Short of Vets, They're Maldistributed
Insights & Analysis
Bear Injuries Hit a Record 216 in Japan — Depopulation Has Emptied the Hands That Tended the Boundary
Insights & Analysis
Kumamoto's Car Society Cannot Be Solved by Roads — Transit's Downward Spiral and Planning Backward from Where People Live
Insights & Analysis
Trucking's "Appropriate Cost" — Can a Legal Floor Stop Rates Thinning Toward the Bottom of Multi-Tier Subcontracting?
Insights & Analysis
Repairs Keep Surfacing After You Buy a Kominka — The Information Gap Born of Inheritance and Aging
Insights & Analysis
Inherited Forest Land Without Clear Boundaries — Negative Assets and the Making of Owner-Unknown Land
Insights & Analysis
School Pools Are Disappearing — How Fiscal Gaps Between Municipalities Become Gaps in Learning to Swim
Insights & Analysis
Farm Machinery That Runs Only Days a Year — The Structure That Keeps Individual Ownership Locked In
Insights & Analysis
Mental-Disorder Workers' Comp Awards Hit a Record 1,082 (FY2025): How Japan's Occupational Injury Shifted from Overwork Death to Psychological Strain
Labs
The intersection of shrinking society and epistemic justice / Extracting structural patterns via 5-lab integration
Labs
Operationalizing the Six-Field Integration Model — A Four-Stage Mapping from Theory to Practice
Labs
Quantitative Comparison of Noise Ordinances Across Tokyo's 23 Special Wards — Implementation Divergences in Penalties, Time Restrictions, Source Categories, and Resident Petition Protocols
Labs
The Five-Layer Methodology of Meaning Inversion for Shrinking Assets — A Draft Evaluation Framework for PPP Projects
Labs
A Proposed Industry Responsibility Clause for the Municipal Soundscape Ordinance Model
Labs
WHO 2018 Environmental Noise Guidelines vs. Japan's Standards — What a Gap of Up to 25 dB Actually Means
Labs
The Learning Curve of Nine Noise Lawsuits — From the Tolerable Limit Doctrine to a ¥5.9 Billion Verdict
Insights & Analysis
Japan's Second-Hand Smoke Law Seven Years In — The Revised Health Promotion Act and Regional Variation in Indoor-Smoking Rules
Insights & Analysis
Chemical Management and SDS Compliance: Legal Reform and the Burden Structure on Japanese SMEs
Insights & Analysis
Kamakura Overtourism: Treating Tourist Destinations as Public Goods
Insights & Analysis
Time Asymmetry in Pediatric Care: How Japan's 71.9% Dual-Income Reality Collides with Medical Access
Insights & Analysis
When Sick-Child Care Fails on the Day of Fever: Japan's Social-Security Gap
Insights & Analysis
Bound by the Phone: The Structure That Distorts Nursing Labor Quality and Time Allocation
Insights & Analysis
Japan's April 2026 Welfare Reform: What Changed, and What Didn't
Insights & Analysis
Japan's Bicycle Blue Ticket: One-Month Review of 2,147 Citations, 7 Zero Prefectures, and the Logic of a 'Visibility Device'
Insights & Analysis
Japan's 2025 Births Fall to 671,000 — 15 Years Ahead of Projections, Even as Marriages Rose
Insights & Analysis
The Fragility of 'One Million Furusato Residents': Can Numerical Targets Qualify as EBPM?
Insights & Analysis
What Are the Seven Axes of SDI (Social Design Index)? — A Guide to Scoring Logic and Interpretation
Insights & Analysis
The Day Digital Textbooks Became Official: Decoding Japan's 2026 Cabinet Decision
Insights & Analysis
Japan's 2026 Social Insurance Burden Rush — ¥4,800 More a Year at a ¥6M Income
Insights & Analysis
Where Did 1.3 Trillion Yen in Hometown Tax Go? — The Redistribution That Never Reaches 'the Regions'
Insights & Analysis
Japan's Working Pension Threshold Raised to ¥650,000: Who Actually Benefits?
Insights & Analysis
353,970 Non-Attending Students: What Japan's 12-Year High Conceals
Insights & Analysis
The Reality After Japan's Digital Textbook 'Formalization': How the Three-Option System Entrenches Regional Inequality
Insights & Analysis
Four Furusato Tax Reforms: Who Is the Redistribution Engine Really For?
Insights & Analysis
The End of Real Estate Tax Avoidance: Japan's Inheritance Tax '5-Year Rule' and the Structural Closure of Intergenerational Wealth Transfer Routes
Insights & Analysis
The Emergency Revision of Long-Term Care Reimbursement Rates and Its Structural Limits: The Government's Own Confession That the Ordinary System Can No Longer Keep Up
Insights & Analysis
The Blind Spot of Japan's Minimum Wage 'Effective Date Disparity': Real Wages Diverge by 181 Days Within the Same Year
Insights & Analysis
Who Gets the ¥9.5 Trillion? — Questioning Japan's 'Tourism Nation' Without Residents
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Structural Analysis of Foreign Aid Budget Allocation: Does the ODA vs. Domestic Welfare Tradeoff Hold?
Insights & Analysis
Regional Revitalization 2.0 and the '10 Million Related Population' Target: Are Means and Ends Reversed?
Insights & Analysis
Kyoto's Vacant House Tax and Its National Ripple Effect — Can Tax Policy Reduce Empty Homes?
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The Disappearing Workforce of Local Government — What Halved Exam Ratios and Surging Youth Resignations Reveal
Insights & Analysis
The Year of the Fire Horse 2026 and the Truth Behind Japan's Declining Birthrate: When Superstition Has No Room Left to Move
Insights & Analysis
The Core of Japan's Declining Birthrate Is Not Childcare Support: Interrogating How 140 Trillion Yen of Social Expenditure Is Split
Insights & Analysis
Corporate Tax as Indirect Tax — How the Defense Surtax Reaches Citizens' Wallets
Insights & Analysis
Japan's 1.13 Fertility Rate — The 2015 Turning Point When Married Couples Stopped Having Children
Insights & Analysis
Is Japan's Childcare Levy a 'Bachelor Tax'? — The Political Reason Social Insurance Was Chosen Over Tax
Insights & Analysis
The Structure of Japan's 55% Inheritance Tax — What the World's Highest Rate Really Means
Insights & Analysis
The Polypharmacy Problem in Japan's Elderly — Why 40% Take 5 or More Medications
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The Structure Behind 9 Million Vacant Houses — Why Japan Can Neither Demolish Nor Utilize Them
Insights & Analysis
Japan's ¥135.5 Trillion Social Security Breakdown — Pensions 41.6%, Healthcare 33.6%, and a ¥65M Generational Gap
Insights & Analysis
A Country Where Politicians Win Without Elections — 26% Uncontested and 2,000+ Seat Shortfalls Question the Meaning of "Representation"
Insights & Analysis
Japan's Consumption Tax Regressivity Depends on the Lens — Effective Burden Rates and the Social Insurance Blind Spot
Insights & Analysis
High School Tuition Gaps by Prefecture — Osaka ¥630K, Tokyo ¥490K, Rural Areas ¥457K
Insights & Analysis
Why Wages Don't Feel Higher Despite 5%+ Shunto Gains — The Structure Behind Four Consecutive Years of Negative Real Wages
Insights & Analysis
Japan's 2030 Digital Textbook Mandate — Three Forces Behind the Cabinet Decision
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Industries Where Wages Rose or Fell Over 30 Years — Real Wages by Industry in One Chart
Insights & Analysis
The Paradox of Population Decline and Record Tax Revenue — How Much Has Per Capita Tax Burden Increased?
Insights & Analysis
A Data Analysis of the 744 'At-Risk' Municipalities — The Structure That Tokyo Siphons
Insights & Analysis
Generational Pension Disparities Visualized by Birth Year — What Differs Between Those Born in 1940 and 2000
Insights & Analysis
Tokunoshima TFR 2.25, Higashiyama 0.76 — Mapping Birth Rates Across 1,741 Municipalities
Labs
Methodology Note: 'Reading the Structure' — The Theoretical Foundations of ISVD's Three-Section Frame
Insights & Analysis
Causes of School Non-Attendance in Japan 2023 — 1 in 15 Junior High Students, 346,000 by Grade and Region
Insights & Analysis
30 Years of Social Insurance Premiums — How Much Has Take-Home Pay Fallen for a ¥300K Monthly Salary?
Labs
Literature Map: The Lineage of Social Policy — Tachibanaki, Kenjoh, Miyamoto, and ISVD's Intersection
Insights & Analysis
Who the Welfare System Is Not Reaching: The 12-Fold Prefectural Gap
Labs
Literature Map: Positioning Among Prior Institutions — Graduate School of Social Design, Rikkyo University, and ISVD
Labs
Literature Map: The Lineage of Participatory Design — Arnstein → Sanders → Manzini → ISVD's Methodology
Labs
Literature Map: The Genealogy of EBPM — Evidence-Based Policy Making and ISVD's Data-Driven Approach
Labs
Literature Map: Social Design vs Service Design vs Transition Design
Labs
Literature Map: The Genealogy of Civil Society Theory — Tocqueville→Habermas→Putnam→Salamon→Japan's NPO Movement and ISVD's Theory of Citizens
Insights & Analysis
"Is ¥5.9M Annual Income Low-Income?" — Visualizing the Gap Between Perception and Policy
Labs
The Intellectual Coordinates of Social Design — Six Academic Roots Decoded
Insights & Analysis
Is "Half Your Income Goes to Taxes" True? — The Reality Behind Japan's 46% National Burden Rate
Insights & Analysis
How Many Income Walls Are There? — The Break-Even Points at ¥1.03M, ¥1.30M, ¥1.50M, and ¥2.01M
Insights & Analysis
The Cost of Zero Waitlists — Record 3,190 Childcare Accidents Reveal the Simultaneous Collapse of Quality Amid Quantitative Expansion
Insights & Analysis
Five Structural Reasons Why "Freedom to Transfer" Won't Work Under Japan's New Training and Employment Program — Is It Just Relabeling the Technical Intern System?
Insights & Analysis
The Structural Problem of Japan's Bicycle Blue Ticket System — Can Penalty Enforcement Be Justified When Only 3.6% of Cycling Space Is Separated Bikeway?
Insights & Analysis
The Structural Risks of Zero Food Tax — What a 5-Trillion-Yen 'Simple Solution' Obscures
Insights & Analysis
The Four Layers of "Stealth Tax Increases" — How the End of Flat-Rate Cuts, Rising Social Insurance, the Invoice System, and Defense Surtax Erode Take-Home Pay
Insights & Analysis
Why Japan's Labor Law Reform Was Shelved — 7 Key Issues in the First Major Overhaul in 40 Years
Labs
Social Design Lab
Labs
Six-Field Integration Model — How Social Policy, Agnotology, Epistemology, Participatory Design, EBPM, and Civil Society Theory Intersect
Insights & Analysis
Structural Problems in Agriculture and Food Security——Reading the Meaning of 38% Self-Sufficiency
Insights & Analysis
Is Noise 'Invisible Violence'? — Health Risks Warned by the WHO and Japan's Regulatory Vacuum
Insights & Analysis
Why Japan Cannot Advance the Right to Disconnect — Three Structural Barriers: Legislation, Culture, and Enforcement
Insights & Analysis
The Structure of Gasoline Double Taxation — The 'Tax on Tax' Problem That Persists After Provisional Rate Abolition
Insights & Analysis
The Structural Contradiction of the 1-Meter Overtaking Rule — Can 'Safe Clearance' Be Achieved on Roads Only 3.5 Meters Wide?
Insights & Analysis
How Much Is Japan's Child Support Levy? The Burden on Singles and Childless Households
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Who Decides 'Fitness'? — Japan's Security Clearance System and the Tension Between Economic Security and Civil Liberties
Insights & Analysis
A 'Unification' That Isn't Unified — What the My Number Insurance Card Reveals About Japan's Digital Governance
Insights & Analysis
What 'Tuition-Free' Doesn't Cover — The Education Gap Hidden by Japan's High School Tuition Subsidy
Insights & Analysis
The Beginning of the End for 'This Is Not Immigration Policy' — What the Ikusei Shuro System Reveals About Japan's Foreign Worker Structure
Insights & Analysis
Structures Preserved in the Name of 'Women's Empowerment' — What the Revised Act Reveals About Japan's Gender Gap
Insights & Analysis
Why Did the Henoko Boat Capsize Kill Two? Okinawa's Base Burden and Structural Violence
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Proving Innocence in a Country with a 99.9% Conviction Rate — A Structural Analysis of Japan's 'Hostage Justice'
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Dissolution Ordered, Yet Nothing Truly 'Dissolved' — The Structural Incompleteness of Japan's Unification Church Case
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15 Years After 3/11, 2 Years After Noto — The Structural Limits of Japan's ¥41 Trillion Recovery
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The Day the Strait Closes — Japan's Structural Vulnerability in Energy Security
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The Day One Complaint Erased 2,100 Meals — The Iwaki Sekihan Disposal Incident and Structural Vulnerability in Public Administration
Insights & Analysis
Population Decline and the Concentration in Tokyo — Reading the Mechanics of Regional Disappearance Through Structure
Insights & Analysis
The Economic Rationality of Preventive Medicine: Social Design in the Era of 48 Trillion Yen Healthcare Costs
Insights & Analysis
The Structure of ¥48 Trillion in Medical Expenses — A Turning Point for Sustainability Toward 2030
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Dismantling the '1.06 Million Yen Wall' — The Social Insurance Turning Point Facing 2 Million Workers
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Public Assistance 'Capture Rate' 20% — The Invisible Gaps in Japan's Safety Net
Insights & Analysis