Educational Background
1979 University of Tokyo B.A. Education (Sociology of Education)
1981 University of Tokyo M.A. Education (Sociology of Education)
1988 Northwestern University Ph.D. (Sociology)
Career Background
1988 Assistant Professor, National Institute of Multimedia Education
1988-1991 Associate Professor, National Institute of Multimedia Education
1991-1992 Tenured Lecturer, Faculty of Education, the University of Tokyo
1993-2000 Associate Professor, Graduate School of Education, the University of Tokyo
2000-2009 Professor, Graduate School of Education, the University of Tokyo
2008 October-present
Professor in the Sociology of Japanese Society, Department of Sociology and Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, University of Oxford
Major Publications
Education Reform and Social Class in Japan, (2013), Routledge.
Education, Equality, and Meritocracy in a Global Age: the Japanese Approach (2020), Teachers College Press, Columbia University (co-authored with Jeremy Rappleye, the first author).
Book co-edited:
Challenges to Japanese Education: Economics, Reforms, and Human Rights, co-edited with June Gordon, Hidenori Fujita, and Gerald LeTender, Teachers College Press, 2010.
The State and Higher Education, co-edited with Roger Goodman, John Taylor, 2013, Symposium Books.
The State and Higher Education, co-edited with Roger Goodman, John Taylor, 2013, Symposium Books.
Journal Articles:
"Self-Selection in Japanese Junior High Schools" (the first author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), Sociology of Education Vol. 60, No.3, 1987.
"From High School to Work: Market and Institutional Mechanisms in Japan," (the second author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 94, No.6, 1989.
"Market and Network Theories of the Transition from High School to Work: Their Application to Industrialized Societies," (the second author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum, Rick Settersten, and Tony Maier), Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 16, 1990.
"Do School Achievements Affect the Early Jobs of High School Graduates? Results from the High School and Beyond Surveys in the US and Japan" (the second author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), Sociology of Education, Vol.64, No.2, 1991.
"Institutional Linkages between Education and Work as Quasi-Internal Labor Market" (the first author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), Research in Social Stratification and Social Mobility, 1995, vol. 14, pp.99-134.
"Bright Flight: Unintended Consequences of Detracking Policy in Japan, (the first author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), "American Journal of Education, vol. 107. No.3, pp.210-230, 1999.
“The Twisted, Unintended Impacts of Globalization on Japanese Education,” (the first author, co-authored with Jeremy Rappleye), in Research in Sociology of Education, Volume 17, pp. 17–63, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2010.
“Credential Inflation and Employment in ‘Universal’ Higher Education: Enrolment, Expansion, and (In)Equity via Privatization in Japan”, Journal of Education and Work, Vol.24 No.1-2, pp.69-94, Routledge, 2010.
“Japanese solutions to the equity and efficiency dilemma? Secondary schools, inequity and the arrival of ‘universal’ higher education”, Oxford Review of Education Vol. 37, No. 2, April 2011, pp. 241–266.
“Is everyone capable of becoming a ‘good citizen’ in Japanese society? Inequality and the Realization of the ‘Good Citizen’ education”, Multicultural Education Review, vo.4 No.1, April 2012, pp.119-146.
Chapters in books:
"From High School and College to Work in Japan: Meritocracy through Institutional and Semi-Institutional Linkages," in Yossi Shavit and Walter Mueller edited. From School to Work: A comparative Study of Educational Qualifications and Occupational Destinations, Clarendon Press Oxford, 1998, pp.311-336.
“Japan’s Postwar Experience in Education and Labor Market : Rapidity of Social Changes and Institutional Arrangement in Youth Labor Market” International Research Center for Japanese Studies，Japan in a Comparative Perspective INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM 12，1998，pp.203-222.
"Institutional Embeddedness in Japanese Labor Markets", (the second author, co-authored with Mary C. Brinton), edited. by Brinton, M C. and Nee, V., The New Institutionalism in Sociology，Russell Sage Foundation，1998.
“Transition from School to Work and Career Formation of Japanese High School Students” edited by David Stern and Daniel A. Wagner, International Perspectives on the School to Work Transition, Hampton Press, 1999.
“Stratified Incentives and Life Course Behaviors”, (the first author, co-authored with James E. Rosenbaum), edited. by Jeylan T. Mortimer, Michael J. Shanahan) Handbook of the Life Course Kluwer Academic / Plenum Publishers pp.51-78, 2003.
“Japan at the Meritocracy Frontier: From Here, Where?” (the first author, co-authored with Ronald Dore), The Rise and Rise of Meritocracy, edited by Geoff Dench, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, pp.134-156, 2006.
“From Credential Society to ‘Learning Capital’ Society: A Rearticulation of Class Formation in Japanese Education and Society,” in Social Class in Contemporary Japan, edited by Hiroshi Ishida and David H. Slater, Routledge, 2009.
“The End of Egalitarian Education in Japan?: The Effect of Policy Changes in Resource Distribution on Compulsory Education,” in Challenges to Japanese Education: Economics, Reform, and Human Rights, Edited by June A. Gordon, Hidenori Fujita, Takehiko Kariya, and Gerald K. LeTendre, Teachers College Press, 2010.
“Reimagining Self/Other: ‘catch-up across Japan’s three great education reforms”, Co-authored with Jeremy Rappleye (the second author), in Reimagining Japanese Education, edited by David Blake Willis and Jeremy Rappleye, Symposium Books, pp.51-83, 2011.
“The State’s Role and Quasi-market in Higher Education: Japan’s Trilemma” in The State and Higher Education, edited by Goodman, R., Kariya. T., and Taylor, J., , Symposium Books, pp.217-214, 2013.
“Resource allocation, historical background of egalitarian education and its changes in Japan: A silent revolution and its unintended results”, in Education in East Asia (Series Education around the world) edited by Pei-Tseng Jenny Hsieh, Continuum Books, 2013.
“The two lost decades in education: the failure of reform”, in Examining Japan's Lost Decades, edited by Yoichi Funabashi and Barak Kushner, Routledge, 2015.
“Understanding structural changes in inequality in Japanese education: from selection to choice,” in Social Inequality in Post-growth Japan, edited by David Chiavacci and Carola Hommerich, Routledge, 2017.
“Education and Social Disparities in Japan.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. Ed. George Noblit. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018.
“Inequality and Realizing the Education of a ‘Good Citizen’” in Handbook of Multicultural Education Research in Asia Pacific, edited by Yun-Kyung Cha, Seung-Hwan Ham, and Moosung Lee, Routledge, 2018.
“Meritocracy, Modernity, and the Completion of Catch-up: Problems and Paradoxes” In Japanese Education in a Global Age - Sociological Reflections and Future Directors. Edited by Yonezawa, A., Kitamura, Y., Yamamoto, B., and Tokunaga, T. Springer, 2018.
Main Publications in Japanese (titles are translated in English)
Who killed Japan’s Modernity? What comes after Catch-up?, Iwanamishoten, 2019
Education and Equality, Chuōkoronshinsha, 2009
Academic Achievement and Social Class, Asahishinbunshuppan、2008
The Century of Education, Kōbundo, 2004（Suntory Academic Award）
Education in Crisis in Stratified Japan, Yushin-dō, 2002 (Asahishinbun Osarakgi-jirō Rondan Award Shōreisho)
Illusion of Education Reforms, Chikumashobō 2002
The Rise of Mass Education Society, Chuōkoronshinsha,1995
A Sociology of School, Occupations, and Selection, The University Press of Tokyo, 1991
Others
Graduate Study Grant, Fulbright Program, 1984-1986
Dissertation Year Grant, Northwestern University, 1986-1987
Research Fellowship, Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research, Northwestern University, 1986-1987
Abe Fellow sponsored by The Japan Foundation and Social Science Research Council, 1997-1998.
The Best Book Award on Labor Relations in 2000, Japan Labor Institute, 2000
Osaragi-Jiro Rondan Shō Promotion Award 2002, Asahi Shinbunsha (Award given for debate-provoking academic works by Asahi Newspaper Company)
Suntory Gakugei Shō, Academic Award, 2005, Suntory Foundation.
