The purpose of this study is to examine whether the parliamentary activities of Japanese Diet members are positively related to their electoral performance. Previous studies have mainly focused on individual and environmental factors that influence the electoral performance of Japanese Diet members. However, these studies fail to consider the impact of Diet members' parliamentary activities on their electoral performance. In contrast, this study specifically focuses on committee work among parliamentary activities and uses the number of words of committee remarks proposed by Matsumoto & Matsuo (2011) as a measure of a Diet members' committee work, and tests the hypothesis that Diet members who are more active in committee work increase their vote share in the next election. It also tests the hypothesis that this effect is stronger for Diet members who have served fewer terms, as a consequence of the hypothesized theoretical causal mechanism.

　This paper examines how municipal election administration commissions responded to COVID-19 for the 2021 general election for the House of Representatives. In order to control the spread of the infection of COVID-19, the administration was urged to change its traditional practices, in particular, to avoid face-to-face contact. However, this was not easy to do when voting, and measures were mainly taken in the polling places. Although it is natural to assume that the measures taken against COVID-19 at polling places are uniform throughout the country, the actual measures taken varied considerably among election administration commissions. By examining the characteristics of Japan's electoral management bodies, this paper considers four reasons for the variation: constraints on available resources, political demands through the election administration commissions, cross-referencing at the prefectural level, and the governor's strategies. Based on the third National Municipal Election Commission Secretariat Survey conducted in January-February 2022, our analysis found that resource constraints were significantly effective in explaining the variation, and the governor's strategy was effective to some extent. Concerning cross-referencing, we can observe the convergence at the prefectural level in some measures, but the reasons for this have not yet been elucidated.

　The new Corona disaster provided a good opportunity to promote digitization in local governments. In Japan, many cities, towns, and villages took the opportunity of the corona disaster to promote digitization. This paper introduces the case of Aizu Wakamatsu City, which had been promoting digitalization even before the Great East Japan Earthquake. Since the Great East Japan Earthquake, Aizu Wakamatsu City has been actively promoting the digitization of its administration and had the foundation to utilize ICT. In the Corona Disaster, Aizu Wakamatsu City used a grant provided by the Japanese government to accelerate digitalization. As a result, the city successfully attracted ICT companies and enhanced citizen services. Although there are issues to be addressed, such as the participation of many citizens, Aizu Wakamatsu's challenge can be evaluated as a good example

　The changes and impacts brought about by the expansion of the new corona that began in the spring of 2020 have useful implications for a post-disaster and post-corona society. In this paper, we introduce new attempts in the Fukushima region using artificial intelligence and robotics technology with an awareness of the post-earthquake and post-corona. In our paper, we present the background and purpose of our decision to use robots to teach English in Fukushima, and discuss the content and effectiveness of the lessons. The intention of our project is to help children recognize that they are the subjects who move the robot, and to learn together with the robot as a "peer learner". Due to the nuclear disaster, it is not easy to employ ALTs in Fukushima. This is also the motivation for our decision to make use of robots. There are three major findings from the AI robot lessons. First, we found that children are curious about robots. Second, the robot's behavior may contribute to the growth of children's social and cooperative skills. Third, education using AI robots can have a positive effect on children's logical thinking and problem-solving abilities. Our paper also points out that AI and robotics technology can be a means to solve local problems.