Abstract
Cooperation among client, designer, prime contractor, subcontractor, and workers is necessary in orde to improve the safety performance of the construction industry. Nevertheless, the Industria Safety and Health Law, throughout a series of amendments, has increasingly emphasized the responsibilities of ornly prime contractors. It is ordinary practice in Japan that the prime contractor is mainly obliged fbr all worker safbty and health related liabilities. As a result, safbty management in the Japanese construction industry is nearly all implemented by prime contractors.
It is essential for the future improvement of Japan's constnlction safety and health performance that the duties of all project participants need to be identified and adjusted. It is particularly important that the responsibilities and roles of designer should be clarified. In this paper the designer classiflcation and the irawareness for constmction safbty in Japan are introduced. After analyzing the roles of designer on designing for construction safbty, some recommendations at the design stage, that could contribute to reduction in occupational risks in public works, are presented.
