This study provides an overview of 50 years of Kominkan research and looks back at the 20 years since the founding of The Japan Society for the Study of KOMINKAN and examines the achievements and challenges of Kominkan research.

In 2014, to mark its 10th anniversary, the Society compiled a booklet entitled “Challenges and Possibilities for Kominkan.” This year, a report will be issued that looks back over the past 50 years, with particular attention given to the progress of research since the Society’s 10th anniversary.

The points that emerged are as follows:

(1) Research on Kominkan has accumulated through the collective efforts and collaboration of researchers and practitioners.

(2) Research on Kominkan has been conducted with the aim of systematizing the study thereof.

(3) The reality is that there has been a decrease in both the number of Kominkan facilities and the number of staff.

(4) The introduction and taking root of Kominkan in local communities since World War II has been uneven.

Therefore, the challenge for the future is to develop an “expanded image of the Kominkan” based on an “expanded of sense of the public,” and by doing so create a diversity of Kominkan models. To this end, we have presented a number of points that should be addressed by the Society in its role as an academic organization.

On the one hand, it has been pointed out that the concept that underlyies the Kominkan system was an expression of the nationalism that persisted in Japan after the Second World War, while on the other hand, Sakuo Teranaka, who originally conceived the Kominkan system, clearly stated that social education is “the self- and mutual education of the people.”

Teranaka has been viewed from these two contrasting perspectives. This paper will examine Teranakas ideas, including the fundamental theme that the process of adopting the Kominkan system into the postwar Japanese social education framework was linked to the original concept. It will then reexamine the continuity and discontinuity between prewar social education reform and the Kominkan concept. Furthermore, this re-examination of the historical issues of postwar social education reform and the institutional design of the Kominkan system, has clarified the various issues related to the establishment and development of the Kominkan system.

This paper discusses the “freedom to learn” in Kominkan. It takes up the case of the rejection by the Saitama City Kominkan of the “Haiku on Article 9 of the Constitution.”

A haiku circle at the Center presented a haiku composed by one member of the circle in June 2014 that was entitled “Let’s protect Article 9 of the Constitution, voices of a women’s demonstration under a rainy-season sky.” Center staff rejected this work because it deviated from the Kominkan’s principle of political neutrality. The woman who composed this haiku took legal action in June 2015.

The Saitama District Court handed down its judgement in October 2017, followed by a Tokyo High Court decision in May 2018, both of which decided in favor of the plaintiff. The High Court decision was upheld in December 2018 when the Supreme Court dismissed the case. The High Court ruling it made clear that the “freedom to learn and the right to learn are guaranteed” and went on to assert that “it is the responsibility of staff at Kominkan to guarantee the rights of residents to learn.”

The “Haiku on Article 9 of the Constitution” lawsuit called into question the relevance of social education, which is supposed to encourage the autonomous learning and expressive activities of citizens as set out in the Social Education Law.

I have been working at the Shiojiri Kominkan for 11 years. Reflecting upon my experiences, I would like to reassess the Kominkan, confirm its purpose, and examine the role of the Kominkan director.

The city of Shiojiri continues to promote lifelong learning. The Kominkan is therefore working towards the goals of “people building,” “connection building,” and “community building.” The role of the Kominkan director and its staff is to protect the residents of the community, who are the main actors in the community, and to look into the issues facing the community. This requires facilitation, presentation, and coordination skills. Kominkan staff, while retaining their professional expertise, work closely with residents while retaining their professional expertise. This is because the main actors in community development are the residents themselves, helping to make the Kominkan a place where hope abounds for everyone.

Finally, everyone involved in the Kominkan, including those who participate in Kominkan meetings, must remember to have fun. Fun is contagious. Furthermore, the growth of the Kominkan director will lead to the growth of the Kominkan, and this growth will extend to the community. It is the Kominkan director who moves forward steadily, one step at a time, always with a sense of purpose towards a better future for the Kominkan.

This paper summarizes the reports and discussions that came out of the commemorative symposium held to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the establishment of The Japan Society of the Study of KOMINKAN.

At the symposium, an executive committee was formed and was given the task of looking back on these 20 years as an academic society, and to clarify the past achievements of Kominkan research and to look ahead to future challenges. Along with the keynote report by Keizo Ueno, who is also a former president of the Society, the issues raised and discussed by three presenters were also summarized. These steps have helped clarify issues related to advances in theory that will help further systematize future Kominkan studies.

This paper analyzes the results of the “Questionnaire on Kominkan Work,” a survey conducted in 2023 by the “Kominkan Services for the Support of Daily Lives” project of the Japan Society for the Study of Kominkan. 372 valid responses to the survey were received from staff working at Kominkan and Kominkan-related facilities in 13 prefectures.

An analysis of the results revealed the following three points. First, it was found that staff held structural or institutional views of Kominkan services. Second, the findings suggested that having acquired the necessary qualifications to become a social education director or the number of years of on-the-job experience of Kominkan staff influenced the perspectives of the respondents. Third, it became clear that there were differences in how staff at those Kominkan that were managed directly and those that had adopted a designated-manager system perceived Kominkan operations.

Some issues were left unanswered by the survey. For example, it was not possible to analyze how the perceptions of individual staff members changed over time. Nor did it allow for a sufficient comparative framework to analyze different regions or municipalities. In the future, efforts will be needed to provide feedback to the Kominkan themselves in order to reach a common understanding of how Kominkan projects work.

This paper examines an approach to the evaluation of Kominkan services from the perspective of “evaluation as learning.” When undertaking an evaluation of Kominkan services, the process by which the value of these services is seen by staff and by local residents is important, although there are some issues regarding how the impact of these services on the local community as well as how activities in which local residents take the initiative are evaluated.

We first discuss the efforts of Okayama City to evaluate the impact of Kominkan services on local communities. For this evaluation, the city first developed an idea of what an ideal Kominkan would be, based on basic Kominkan policy. It then created a logic model for Kominkan services and then sought to identify the value of these services within an administrative evaluation framework.

Next, a methodology for evaluating community empowerment is discussed. This approach is based on the concept of empowerment and elaborates a framework of reflection that is essential for the evaluation of services and is characterized by its ability to enhance how residents imagine local organizations and the local community.

These two evaluation approaches have the advantage of making it possible to visualize the process of change within the community, stimulated by Kominkan services, as well as the deepening awareness of residents towards the local community, all of which can help convey the value of kominkan services to the outside world.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify what “Kominkan Jigyō (activities and projects) that support daily life” are and what are the roles and basic perspectives of the staff who make these Jigyō possible. The following five points emerged as the basic perspectives that help make the these Kominkan Jigyō a reality.

(1) The view that Kominkan Jigyō should be positioned not only to guarantee the right to learn, but also as help guarantee the right to life. (2) “Intake work”: Kominkan serve as “general health clinics” for the local community, and Kominkan staff are the “intake workers” who clarify and share the “daily life needs” of local residents. They also help by taking the steps necessary to answer these needs through Kominkan Jigyō. (3) Fostering human relations, social capital, and collaboration among local residents through Kominkan Jigyō. (4) Comprehensiveness of Kominkan Jigyō (broad perspective, coordination and collaboration): In order to demonstrate this comprehensiveness, as the early Kominkan did immediately after World War II, coordination and collaboration with organizations other than those in the social education sphere are necessary. (5) Viewing Jigyō as linked to the overall function of Kominkan (the totality of staff “work”).

Hamamatsu City has been undergoing administrative and fiscal reforms as well as a ward reorganization since its absorption of neighboring districts in 2005 and its subsequent designation as an “ordinance-designated city” in 2007. Since that time, many of its social education facilities have been subsidized and supported by local government departments. Kominkan, too, have operated at the discretion of the city, and have worked to achieve flexible and efficient organizational management strategies and to find solutions to local issues. To this end, fulltime community affairs staff have been assigned to these facilities, which are now working to combine their community development functions with lifelong learning functions. Community affairs staff are therefore expected to develop expertise in (1) understanding the characteristics of the area and building face-to-face relationships through dialogue, (2) learning about the needs of residents and of local issues and turning them into learning events, (3) acting as a bridge between courses offered by the Kominkan and Kominkan circle activities, (4) coordinating resident-led community development, and (5) responding to and utilizing the media. Taking up the Tomitsuka Cooperative Center in Hamamatsu City as a case study, we examined how a grasp of local issues is essential for community development. The study also clarified the potential of social education to bring about solutions to local issues through the power of self-governance.

This paper has two objectives. First, it aims to show the trends involving the people who use the Kominkan and the city assembly regarding discussions over the Kominkan reorganization plan that was first proposed and then withdrawn by the city of Nara in 2023. Second, it will zero in on the problems and unsolved issues that emerged from the proposed Kominkan reorganization from the perspective of Kominkan staff.

The outline of the proposed reorganization of the Kominkan by the city of Nara involved the addition of Kominkan functions to the Community Interaction Halls (Chiiki-Fureai-Kaikan), making them centers for local self-government as well as for social education and lifelong learning. Specifically, of the 24 Kominkan, six would have been retained, while the others would have either been transferred to Community Interaction Halls or closed within five years.

The reactions of residents who frequented local Kominkan as well as those of members of the city assembly after the public announcement of the Kominkan reorganization plan showed the level of public trust in the Kominkan. This is why the reorganization plan was withdrawn. Currently, a series of discussions have arisen over a new Kominkan reorganization plan, again highlighting the issues surrounding the Kominkan. In particular, the difficulties of the position of the Nara City Lifelong Learning Foundation as an external organization of the city and of the employees who work there have become apparent. With these points in mind, I will conclude with a discussion about the existence of Kominkan from the perspective of those who utilize them and then raise issues for the future.

This paper discusses what a “Kominkan” is and how to design links between local community development and social education through a review of the process by which Kominkan and administrative system for community development were reorganized in Amagasaki City, Hyogo Prefecture. In moving to formally repeal its Kominkan, Amagasaki City learned from the efforts of Iida City, Nagano Prefecture, which has served as a leading example of Kominkan staff training, and has helped revitalize the Kominkan as a symbol, with the aim of restructuring and revitalizing social education.

Amagasaki City, a core city with a population of approximately 450,000, enacted an Autonomous Community Development Ordinance in 2016 and subsequently proceeded with the restructuring of its administrative system for community development in adherence to the principles of this ordinance. The six Kominkan and six District Centers, located in six different districts of the city, were integrated and reorganized into twelve Lifelong Learning Plazas following the repeal of the Kominkan Ordinance. Based on interviews with the mayor and a city official who was in charge of the reorganization in Amagasaki at the time, this paper describes the details of the reorganization process and raises questions about the nature of Kominkan.

Kominkan staffing systems have been created as a result of the relationship between the guarantee of residents’ right to learn and the various rights of social education staff. In order to shed light on this relationship, this paper summarizes the historical changes that have taken place in the staffing system, using Kaizuka City as a case study, and clarifies the social education practices and research issues that relate to this system.

As for the relationship between practice and the system, it was possible to grasp the fact that this system of a professionalized staff was created in the midst of criticism of the way social education and Kominkan were managed, the quality of their operations, as well as a questioning of the nature of the staff. Local government labor unions also emerged to promote institutionalization amidst moves to bring about administrative and fiscal rationalization.

However, the system in Kaizuka City has been limited by the internal regulations of the Board of Education and the need to submit to local government ordinances, which has inhibited the stable allocation of social and community education personnel. This system, therefore, is still in flux, and is developing through the pursuit of a guarantee of the right to learn for local residents, and the calling into question the existence of a staffing nucleus.

This paper systematically reviews the process of constructing China’s community education network, its current characteristics, and strategies for expansion. As an essential part of the lifelong education system, the development of the community education network has evolved from initial exploration and pilot experiments to large-scale promotion. During this process, a multi-level organizational system has been formed, featuring vertical coordination and horizontal integration. This structure spans five administrative levels: province, city, district (county), township (street), and village (community). This study thoroughly analyzes the key strategies that have driven the expansion of the community education network, including government-led policies, effective resource integration, curriculum optimization, teacher training, and the application of information technology. Additionally, the research highlights some of the challenges faced by the community education network, such as regional development imbalances, disparities in digitalization levels, and insufficient resource integration.

This paper examines the current status, the latest trends, and the role of community educational facilities in Taiwan, facilities which have increased in number since the late 1990s.

The study showed that community colleges are emphasizing more than ever their institutional responsibility for dealing with local issues, brought on by Taiwan’s declining birthrate, its aging population, and the need to respond to multiculturalism. Placing “learning” at their core, community colleges are also taking on the role of social welfare providers for area residents as well as offering community learning services and teacher training.

However, for community colleges, which are institutions of learning, to take on administrative issues, such as seeking solutions to local problems, could lead as well to a mobilization of learners.

This suggests how important it is for community education facilities to be places where people can learn in an enjoyable and casual environment, as well as the need to create more places where learning is fun and where solutions to local issues can emerge.