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Understanding and Promoting Gender Diversity Among Senior Faculty at the
University of Tokyo: A Student Action Project
Maximilien Berthet, The University of Tokyo, Japan
Saeko Kawataki, The University of Tokyo, Japan
Kozue Okamura, The University of Tokyo, Japan
Mizuki Ishida, The University of Tokyo, Japan
Karthik Varada, The University of Tokyo, Japan
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Abstract
Despite active efforts by the University of Tokyo (UTokyo) to promote women's
academic career development, the ratio of females remains low throughout the
UTokyo community. In particular, the large drop in gender diversity from student
level (20% female undergraduates) to senior faculty (8% female full professors),
suggests the existence of a “leaky pipeline” along the academic hierarchy. In March
2019, a team of 9 UTokyo students initiated a Student Initiative Project (SIP) to
support ongoing efforts within UTokyo to promote gender equality. The objectives
were: (i) to understand causes and solutions for low female faculty rates, and (ii) to
foster a change in campus culture via gender mainstreaming. The methodology
included interviews of female and male researchers at UTokyo, followed by feedback
to two Executive Vice-Presidents and the Office for Gender Equality. In parallel, a
trilogy of interactive workshops involving panel discussions and documentary
screenings were delivered to over 40 UTokyo students and faculty. This paper
provides an overview of major findings from the project. Key lessons learnt are that:
(i) the leaky pipeline is caused by intersection between gender and wider systemic
issues such as job precarity for young faculty; (ii) solutions can be achieved through
synergies with top-level university priorities such as international research ranking
targets; (iii) student-led initiatives offer an effective means of supporting institutional
change on gender equality.
Keywords: Gender Equality, Higher Education, Leaky Pipeline, Student-Led
iafor
The International Academic Forum
www.iafor.org
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1. Introduction
The University of Tokyo (UTokyo) is actively promoting women's participation at
both student and faculty levels. Promising efforts to support women's academic career
development include the UTokyo Vision 2020 “Fostering Diversity” initiative
(Gonokami, 2015) and the UTokyo Future Society Initiative (UTokyo, 2017). Figure
1 shows some of the major ongoing gender equality (GE) initiatives at UTokyo.
Figure 1: Major gender equality institutions and projects currently active at UTokyo.
However, the ratio of females remains low throughout the UTokyo community,
including among undergraduate students (19.3%) and full professors (7.8%)
(UTokyo, 2018), as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Ratio of females along the academic hierarchy at UTokyo (UTokyo, 2018;
UTokyo, 2019).
On one hand, gender imbalance among teaching staff in tertiary education is a
systemic issue in Japan, as can be seen in Figure 3. On the other hand, gender ratios
among full professors differ between leading Japanese universities, as shown in
Figure 4, suggesting that there is still room for improvement at UTokyo even on a
domestic level.
Figure 3: Ratio of female teachers in tertiary education by country (OECD, 2020).
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Figure 4: Ratio of female full professors in major Japanese universities (Tokyo
Institute of Technology, 2019; Kyushu University, 2019; Tohoku University, 2018;
Kyoto University Gender Equality Promotion Center, 2019; UTokyo, 2018; Nagoya
University, 2019; Osaka University, 2019; Waseda University, 2018; Keio University,
2019).
A 2017 econometric (non-peer-reviewed) study by Shibayama and Geuna (2017)
attempted to identify the main contributors to the present low levels of female
researchers in Japanese academia, specifically in the fields of Science, Technology,
Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). The large-scale study tracked the career paths
of over 100,000 Japanese PhD holders who graduated between 1985 and 2005. On
one hand, cohort effects were found to play one role in explaining the lower rates in
STEM of senior female researchers compared to PhD holders. In other words, the
combined effects of (i) the time delay between graduation with a PhD and promotion
to senior researcher level, and (ii) the increase in the proportion of female STEM PhD
graduates over time, means that the ratio of female senior academics has lagged
behind the pool of junior researchers.
On the other hand, the proportion of female researchers actively continuing academic
research after PhD level has not increased in step with the rate of female graduates. In
fact it has reduced in some fields, such as science, where the odds ratio (i.e. likelihood
of a female researcher leaving an active research position compared to an equivalent
male counterpart) was around 2 at the time of the study. This study, though not
focused specifically on UTokyo, suggests there is a leaky pipeline of female
researchers in Japanese academia. The expression “leaky pipeline” refers to a
phenomenon where the ratio of women gradually decreases between entry-level and
senior positions, due to barriers against employment and promotion (OECD, 2012). In
the context of this study, senior faculty are defined as tenured researchers with a
permanent research contract provided by UTokyo.
The objective of this work is to evaluate the causes of the leaky pipeline at UTokyo,
and to propose concrete and actionable solutions to improve the situation. To the
authors’ knowledge, no prior investigations have examined the leaky pipeline
phenomenon at UTokyo. Another original feature of this work is that it was fully
initiated and led by students, as part of a UTokyo Student Initiative Project (SIP).
This paper is organised as follows. Section 2 presents the student initiative framework
within which the study was conducted. Section 3 explains the interview-based
research and development method, followed by key insights gained on causes and
solutions for the leaky pipeline of female researchers at UTokyo. Section 4 introduces
outreach activities for gender mainstreaming conducted within the project, in response
to findings in Section 3. The paper concludes in Section 5 with perspectives for
improvement and further extension of the study.
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2. Student action project
One original feature of this project is that it was fully initiated and conducted by
students, within the framework of the Global Leader Program for Social Design and
Management (GSDM) at UTokyo (GSDM, 2020). GSDM is one of 62 Programs for
Leading Graduate Schools (JSPS, 2015) offered at 33 Japanese universities, funded
until FY2019 by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology
(MEXT). GSDM’s SIPs provide graduate researchers (mainly PhD students) with
mentorship and funding to launch multidisciplinary initiatives of their design, with the
purpose of reframing and addressing cross-cutting social issues.
This one-year SIP consisted of 9 students from 6 countries and 5 graduate schools,
including 5 female and 4 male members, spanning Master’s and PhD levels. The main
advantages of this diverse membership were access to a wide variety of stakeholders
within the university, and complementary skillsets and time schedules. The project
timeline is shown in Figure 5.
The SIP consisted of two streams: (1) research and development (R&D), and (2)
outreach. In the R&D stream, the emphasis was on analysis of causes of the leaky
pipeline and development of solutions, mainly via interaction with mid-career or
senior academics and executive decision-makers at UTokyo. In the complementary
outreach stream, the focus was on sharing findings from the R&D stream, receiving
feedback, and raising awareness of GE with a wider audience, including non-UTokyo
students as well as external organisations. The method adopted and results obtained in
the two streams are now presented in more detail.
Figure 5: Project timeline.
3. Research and development
The research and development stream formed the main part of this project, and
consisted of three steps as shown in Figure 5: (i) background research on GE in
academia, (ii) interviews along the leaky pipeline, and (iii) feedback from key
stakeholders at UTokyo in order to draft proposals for improving the situation. The
methodology adopted and results obtained in each of the three steps are briefly
summarised in this section.
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3.1 Background research
In order to build capability on GE at UTokyo, our SIP team mobilised three main
resources: a literature review on GE in academia; stakeholder mapping around GE
within the university; and consultation with the UTokyo Office for Gender Equality
(2020). The literature review was accompanied by: completing online training courses
on GE offered by UN Women (2020), attending the 3rd Gender Symposium of the
Engineering Association of Japan (EAJ) (2020), and joining the GE team at the 2019
Forum for Leading Graduate Schools (2019). The main outcomes of this step were:
improved understanding of who to consult with on gender issues within UTokyo, and
what questions to ask. This knowledge was used in the next step.
3.2 Interviews along the leaky pipeline: Identification of causes
In order to evaluate causes and solutions for the leaky pipeline of female researchers
at UTokyo, an interview-based approach was adopted. Seven researchers, spanning
the length of the leaky pipeline (1 full professor, 1 associate professor, 1 assistant
professor, 1 project associate lecturer, 3 PhD students) were chosen as interviewees.
The small sample size was mitigated by sampling from multiple graduate schools, as
well as including a combination of female (6) and male (1) researchers.
The questions centred on two main topics: in your opinion, what are the main causes
of the leaky pipeline? And what are the most promising and realistic solutions? The
interviews were recorded (when permission was granted by the interviewee) and
transcribed. The most frequently recurring keywords and themes were extracted and
used to identify five main causes of the leaky pipeline at UTokyo.
The results are summarised in Figure 5. In the figure, the causes are ranked from
highest impact (cause 1) to lowest impact (cause 5). This ranking is based two factors:
the mention frequency of the causes in the interview transcripts; and their qualitative
severity, estimated by the interviewees. One important finding is that the causes often
overlap with systemic issues within the university, as will be discussed.
Figure 5. Top 5 causes of the leaky pipeline of female researchers identified in our
SIP.
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The relation between each cause and outflow from the leaky pipeline can be
summarised as follows:
- Cause 1: A lack of critical mass of female researchers is apparent along the
entire academic hierarchy (see Figure 2), but is especially pronounced at senior level.
The low proportion of senior female research leaders contributes to the leaky pipeline
in three main ways, by: (i) limiting career consulting and networking opportunities for
junior female researchers, with a potential negative impact on promotion; (ii) making
it difficult to reduce (potentially unconscious) bias and discrimination (for example,
we were told of a robotics laboratory at UTokyo adorning robots with pink colours
during an open day in order to attract new female researchers); and (iii) limiting the
number of “realistic” female role models who are representative of the average
(related to cause 2). This cause has high impact because it is connected to all
subsequent causes.
- Cause 2: Female researcher role models who are usually given the most
attention at UTokyo are not representative of the average. Consider the case of a
female researcher who is on maternity leave. She would be hailed as a “super-
woman” role model if she promptly responds to work-related matters even during the
days just after childbirth and returns to full-time work very quickly. This relatively
narrow conception of a role model does not provide room for the inevitable and
natural variability between individual experiences of childbirth. An equally dedicated
female researcher may simply not be able to return to work immediately after
childbirth given her health and family conditions. As a result, female researchers may
experience impostor syndrome when comparing themselves to exceptional cases. In
addition, peer pressure (associated with Japanese cultural norms of endurance and not
letting one’s work unit down) may be exerted by colleagues on female researchers
who take longer maternity leave.
- Cause 3: Female researchers are more likely to be responsible for a greater
share of household work than their male colleagues. Among our interviewees, no
female researchers had a househusband, while they reported that most of their male
colleagues were supported by a housewife. Our female interviewees stated that they
are responsible for at least 50% of household-related tasks, which may include
housework, and caring for elderly family members. On one hand, overwork is a
systemic issue at UTokyo, related to the lack of highly-skilled administrative support
staff for academics, as well as heavy reliance on paperwork and time-consuming
administrative procedures. On the other hand, intersection with patriarchal gender
norms means that female researchers are more likely to experience increased pressure
on their academic time schedules, placing them at a potential disadvantage for
research output.
- Cause 4: There is severe competition at UTokyo for tenured positions and
young researchers aiming to acquire a tenured position are expected to produce
significant amounts of research output, which often requires them to be fully
dedicated to their work around the clock during early career years. This timing
usually coincides with major life events like pregnancy for female researchers who
decide to start a family. This is another example of intersection between gender and
systemic problems which affect all UTokyo researchers. The university provides a
relatively short maternity leave called “ikukyu” (alongside state-provided maternity
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leave) to non-tenured faculty, usually lasting around 3 months depending on the
contract (UTokyo Office for GE, 2018). As a result, female researchers may face
psychological or regulatory pressure to exit their job if requiring unexpectedly long
maternal leave. In addition, researchers who avail of maternity leave may face less
favourable assessment for promotion, since drops in academic output due to major life
events are usually not considered during performance evaluations.
- Cause 5: Despite the number and variety of GE initiatives at UTokyo (see
Figure 1), their cross-linkage remains low. Moreover, due to restricted budget and
human resources, the scope of the Office for Gender Equality is limited: for example
at present, there are no dedicated services for career counselling, or for provision of
practical advice for work life balance (related to cause 3). This is one reason for the
current slow progress on improving GE.
After the interviews and post-processing, the findings were shared with key UTokyo
decision makers in order to receive their feedback. This involved discussions on the
relationship between university policy and causes of the leaky pipeline, in view of
developing solutions.
3.3 Feedback to and from key stakeholders: Development of solution proposals
In the final step, meetings were held with two Executive Vice-Presidents of UTokyo,
one professor in the Graduate School of Public Policy, and two representatives from
the Office for Gender Equality in order to formulate concrete and actionable solution
proposals.
The top five priorities identified are summarised in Figure 6. In the figure, the
solutions are ranked from highest impact (solution 1) to lowest impact (solution 5).
The ranking is based on the number and impact of the causes addressed by each
solution. Each solution is linked to several of the causes identified in Section 3.3, as
shown via the icons in the right-hand column, which also appear in Figure 5.
Each solution is presented in detail below, including its: (i) justification, (ii) expected
benefits, (iii) method of implementation, and (iv) major challenges.
Figure 6. Top 5 solutions for the leaky pipeline of female researchers identified in our
SIP.
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- Solution 1: To create a synergy between UTokyo’s research ranking goals and GE,
via hiring of foreign female full professors.
(i) At present, GE is not given high priority status at UTokyo, as mentioned in Section
3.2. Therefore, cultivating links with top priority items is important to catalyse
change. Since UTokyo is a research university, one strategy is to emphasise the
mutual benefits which GE will bring both to members of the UTokyo community, and
to the university’s international research rankings. Based on our discussions,
increasing hiring of foreign female full professors (especially from the US and
Europe) may benefit UTokyo’s research performance in two ways. Firstly, by
providing a web of contacts at world-leading universities for international
collaborations. Secondly, by increasing the proportion of senior female research
leaders. Both points may boost UTokyo’s position in modernised international
research rankings, one of which now provides options to compare universities’
performance on the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (Times Higher
Education World University Rankings, 2020), including goal number 5: GE (although
UTokyo is not yet on the list of participating institutions).
(ii) Foreign female researchers are (usually) not imbibed with gender bias related to
Japanese cultural baggage, and are therefore more likely to challenge established
norms. The three main expected benefits within the UTokyo community are therefore:
reduction in gender bias among senior decision makers, bolder leadership on
promoting GE, and an increase in positive role models for junior researchers. On the
other hand, a great deal of research indicates that diversity within a group may
actually increase conflict within the group members, unless the group has an
environment that embraces diverse voices (Kravitz, 2006). Therefore, a co-
requirement is to develop an enabling environment for diversity, which may not
currently exist at UTokyo.
(iii) In order to increase hiring of foreign female researchers at UTokyo, an attractive
offer is required. Potential measures could include providing: language and childcare
support, research assistants, and stimulating research opportunities. In some regions
such as Scandinavia, the proportion of female researchers in areas like science is
already near parity (UNESCO, 2019), which means that one option is gender blind
recruitment on merit. On the other hand, hiring for domestic female researchers
should continue to include affirmative action (which has been supported by UTokyo
since at least 2009 (UTokyo GE office, 2009)), due to the present lack of critical
mass.
(iv) GE initiatives at UTokyo suffer from limited budgets, which may also impact
overseas recruitment. Therefore, one option is to focus on hiring researchers who
value non-monetary qualities of UTokyo such as novel research themes.
- Solution 2: To extend childcare leave for non-tenured female faculty.
(i) As mentioned in cause 4 in Section 3.2, maternity leave provided to non-tenured
junior faculty is usually 3 months, potentially causing outflow of female researchers
from the university. However, since UTokyo has authority over this policy, it can
feasibly be changed.
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(ii) Expected benefits include reduced early contract termination by junior female
faculty, as well as reduced uncertainty for human-resources and laboratory
colleagues. In turn, this may contribute to ending a vicious cycle of female
researchers being seen as less stable academic “investments” by supervising
laboratories, facilitating promotion.
(iii) In order to meet individual needs, the maximum childcare leave period should be
extended from the current level and allocated to suit non-tenured faculty members’
needs on a case-by-case basis. At present, childcare leave is only available for female
researchers, and extension to male researchers should also be considered to account
for changing family roles.
(iv) However, a change in policy is not enough, and should be accompanied by a shift
in attitudes (e.g. peer pressure and role models) in order for female faculty to avail of
more flexible childcare leave periods.
- Solution 3: To end all official meetings before 6pm.
(i) UTokyo has officially discouraged official meetings from taking place beyond
regular office hours since at least 2009 (UTokyo, 2009). However, in practise official
meetings are regularly held at and beyond 6pm. On one hand, this creates a time
burden for all faculty members, regardless of gender. On the other hand, late official
meetings may specifically exclude female researchers. Indeed, as mentioned in cause
3, female researchers are more likely to be responsible for the majority of household
tasks than their male colleagues, which may include collecting children from public
nurseries, most of which close at or around 6pm. Therefore, female researchers are
more likely to miss out on important developments in their faculty or department,
which may negatively impact research opportunities and promotion.
(ii) Expected benefits are a reduced time burden on all faculty members, and greater
flexibility for all members of the UTokyo community to effectively combine research
and household life, contributing to a change in role models.
(iii) One method is to transition from simply discouraging late meetings, to
enforcement. For example, two options are: creating “nudges” such as posters asking
researchers to reconsider if a late official meeting is essential, and (online) log-books
requiring researchers to keep a record of their meeting times.
(iv) Convincing full professors to adopt the new policy is expected to be the biggest
challenge. With their positive leadership, junior faculty are likely to follow.
- Solution 4: To provide a compulsory gender awareness course to all students and
faculty.
(i) As suggested in the introduction, the long-term aim of this project is to increase the
proportion of female members of the UTokyo community, and to create a self-
sustaining environment which encourages diversity. However, in the absence of a
critical mass of female researchers, educational policy provides a short-term means to
change campus culture towards respect for diversity. Although courses on harassment
are provided to all new students entering the university, and to faculty when changing
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academic positions, at present there are no compulsory courses on GE. While courses
on harassment are self-evidently important, they do not address potentially underlying
issues such as discrimination and bias. This is important, as ironically the low
proportion of female researchers means that male researchers may not be aware of
gender-related issues mentioned in Section 3.2, and may therefore not appreciate the
extent of the problem nor be able to recognise (let alone acknowledge, call out, and
change) harmful attitudes.
(ii) Expected benefits are reduction of unconscious bias, among both male and female
researchers. Moreover, if UTokyo is seen as actively promoting GE, other effects
could include attracting more female researchers (including foreign female full
professors) to the university, as well as encouraging other leading Japanese
universities to boost their GE efforts.
(iii) At present, a pilot course is being developed by a female Japanese professor in
conjunction with the Office for Gender Equality. One priority is to allocate more
financial and human resources to this promising project.
(iv) For now, the pilot course will not be provided to faculty members. One challenge
is how to meaningfully incorporate gender awareness-raising into their already busy
schedules.
- Solution 5: To consider using the “Toward Daiversity” logo to represent and unify
action on GE at UTokyo.
(i) In order to increase progress towards GE at UTokyo, greater linkage between
existing initiatives (see Figure 1) is required (see cause 5). Our proposal is to
introduce a logo to act as a visual and unifying umbrella device for GE at UTokyo.
(ii) Expected benefits include greater visibility of and interlinkage between GE efforts
at UTokyo.
(iii) Our SIP team has designed and manufactured a candidate logo, which will be
made available to the UTokyo Office for Gender Equality. We hope the Office will
use the logo in two ways: as an eye-catching symbol for official endorsement of
existing initiatives on GE at UTokyo, by granting usage permission to relevant
parties; and as an awareness-raising device distributed during GE events on campus.
The logo can be found on our SIP webpage (Towards Gender Equality at UTokyo,
2020).
(iv) One challenge is to strike a balance between coordination of individual GE
activities in view of raising their collective impact, and respect for the distinct nature
of each initiative.
After completion of the causal analysis (Section 3.2) and development of solution
proposals (Section 3.3), our team sent a 10-page letter to UTokyo President Makoto
Gonokami1 in March 2020 summarising our findings and urging him to consider our
recommendations. It is noteworthy that several of our recommendations overlap with
1 In this paper, Japanese names are written with the given name ahead of the surname.
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the output of prior work by Toyoizumi (2017) on methods to reduce the gender gap in
the Japanese research community. Unfortunately, the timing coincided with the
COVID-19 crisis, which understandably changed university priorities. Although we
are still waiting for a response, we are currently exploring other pathways for concrete
implementation of our recommendations. In addition, our outreach activities have
enabled us to share our findings with a wider variety of stakeholders within and
beyond UTokyo, creating new partnerships.
4. Outreach
The R&D stream of the SIP focused on a relatively narrow group of researchers and
university stakeholders. On the other hand, one recurring finding in Section 3 is a lack
of awareness of GE issues within the UTokyo community. In response, a three-part
series of outreach activities was conducted in order to share our findings, promote
discussion on gender-related issues among both male and female students and faculty
members, and contribute to gender mainstreaming.
The three-part workshop consisted of a sequence of discussion sessions, around two
hours each, following the progression shown in Figure 7. More detail can be found on
the SIP website (Towards GE at UTokyo, 2020).
Figure 7. Sequence of three workshops in the “Gender Series” of discussion sessions.
The first event, “International discussion on shaping gender in Japan”, aimed to raise
awareness of GE issues specific to the Japanese context, via a documentary screening
and a panel discussion with members of the UTokyo Office for Gender Equality.
Participants (students and faculty members) were divided into three brainstorming
groups, and the two outputs were: brief definitions of GE in Japan today; and
identification of the main factors influencing GE. The second event, “Gender-
balanced decision making: policy vs reality”, encouraged participants to move beyond
understanding into analysis and reaction via development of policy proposals. Finally,
in the third event we held a discussion between several of our interviewees, faculty
members in the School of Public Policy and Institute for Future Initiatives, and
GSDM stakeholders in order to share our SIP findings and develop a roadmap for the
next stage of our project.
Over 60 students, faculty members, and employees of NGOs and public interest
organisations joined the “Gender Series”, contributing to fruitful discussions. Several
participating organisations have offered to partner with us as we extend the SIP this
fiscal year, with potential for a lasting legacy. Multiple students, both male and
female, reported feeling empowered after joining the workshops, which was an
extremely rewarding outcome, and one participant has joined the SIP team. These
results demonstrate that beyond inspiring, outreach can also translate into concrete
action.
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5. Conclusions
In this work, a student action project was initiated to identify causes and develop
solution proposals for the leaky pipeline of female researchers at the University of
Tokyo. The main findings can be summarised as follows:
- Five main causes were identified through an interview-based method. The
overarching cause is a lack of critical mass of female researchers. Most causes
involve intersection between systemic issues which affect all UTokyo researchers,
such as severe competition for tenured positions and overwork, and gender-specific
issues such as major life events related to childbirth.
- Five promising solutions were developed by consultation with key executive
university stakeholders, and recommendation proposals were sent to the President of
UTokyo. The main recurring theme is the need to develop linkage between top
university priorities, such as UTokyo’s international research ranking, and GE. Based
on this work, one potential high-impact method is gender-blind recruitment of foreign
female full professors, alongside continued affirmative action for domestic
researchers.
- Given that one key problem identified was a lack of awareness, a series of
three interactive workshops were held to promote discussion on GE between members
of the UTokyo community. The workshops’ lasting impact, which includes
establishing new partnerships on promoting GE at UTokyo, shows that student-led
initiatives offer an effective means to support institutional progress on GE.
The most significant limitations of the present work are: the absence of quantitative
analysis of causes of the leaky pipeline at UTokyo, as well as for separation of cohort
and leakage effects; and the small sample size of interviewees. In addition, more
investigation is required into the relationship between the current gender ratio among
senior faculty at UTokyo, and the equilibrium gender ratio with equal access and
opportunities for males and females. It is conceivable that when all female researchers
are given equitable opportunities to pursue a career in academia at UTokyo, the
gender ratio at senior (and junior) level could remain below 50%, and yet be
considered a gender-equal outcome. Such considerations are important when setting
long-term targets for GE. Finally, in future work, this student action project will shift
from development of recommendations to concrete implementation.
The main implications of this study are that:
- An equitable academic environment benefits both university executives,
students and faculty members, regardless of gender.
- Looking beyond higher education, Japanese societal needs are set to raise
demands for effective work-life balance by the female workforce, to combine
contributions to the declining national birth rate and to the shrinking economy. A
larger number of projects similar to the present initiative are required to effectively
prepare for this societal shift.
Acknowledgements
The authors extend their sincere gratitude to their interviewees, who provided the
personal experiences on which this study was built. Thanks are also due to Executive
Vice Presidents Sawako Shirahase and Norio Matsuki of the University of Tokyo,
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Professor Kan Suzuki, as well as staff at the Office for Gender Equality, who
provided invaluable, timely and constructive advice on our project. We are grateful
for support received from WomEnpowered International during the early phase of this
work, and from Arika Matsui during the final phase. Thank you also to Fahma
Azizah, Moeko Hirano, Nikhil Bugalia, Paul Nadeau and Yang Li for their supporting
role as SIP members. Finally, we warmly recognise the strong support received from
the GSDM office throughout this project.
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Contact email: ge.at.utokyo@gmail.com
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