SOCIOTECHNICA
Online ISSN : 1882-4609
Print ISSN : 1349-0184
ISSN-L : 1349-0184
Volume 2
Displaying 1-50 of 51 articles from this issue
  • Koki UCHIMARU, Yoshihisa SOUTOME, Yasushi OBAN
    2004 Volume 2 Pages viii-xiii
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    We have introduced prioritizing of issues in science and technology for a safe and secure society conducted by “Study Group on Science and Technology Policy for a Safe and Secure Society” of MEXT. Risks and threats have been collected and classified from various sources. Among the collected risks and threats, 17 areas including crime, terrorism, disaster, and infectious disease have been selected. Based on criteria for prioritizing issues, 35 priority issues (technologies for detection of hazardous materials, disaster mitigation, protection from infectious diseases, etc.) and eight common priority issues (simulation technologies for damage evaluation, sensor technologies, etc.) have been selected.
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  • Hideyuki HORII, Toyoaki NISHIDA, Masayuki NAKAO, Koichi Eugene OKAMOTO ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages xiv-xxxii
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The objective of this research is to construct a universal knowledge system by integrating the knowledge of individual safety-related research areas, as well as to design and manage the entire program. This includes structuralization and visualization of knowledge, deliberation on the concepts of safety and security, and complementary research into malpractice prevention and food safety. The group will also develop and propose detailed methodologies for designing of science and technology for society. The design of science and technology for society consists of the following processes: (1) Localization of problems, (2) Conception of solutions for problems, (3) Prediction of societal changes and effects following application of the solutions to society, (4) Evaluation of the results of the predictions based on various value criteria.
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  • Kei TAKEUCHI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 1-11
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Risk control is a methodology to sender unpredictable danger under human control through scientific methods. Still there is always a factor of uncertainty in risk cases. Uncertainly means unpredictability, which implies limit of controllability of human affairs. Thus, disasters with small probability could sometimes happen, and when it did happen, we could not do anything with it. We have to face “absurdity” and somehow to accommodate it. From social viewpoint, we have to find a reasonable methods of “distribution of misfortune” among the people concerned, which are acceptable to the society, and also to help extracting valuable lessons from the “misfortune”.
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  • Kazuhisa TAKEMURA, Toshiko KIKKAWA, Satoshi FUJII
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 12-20
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    We propose a decision theoretic framework for evaluating uncertainties of several societal risks in society. There are controversies on the theoretical discussions about uncertainties related to the societal risks among scientists, sociologists, and also, possibly, the populace. In the present paper, we propose taxonomy of the uncertainties from the standpoint of the environmental structure of decision makers, and examine the social risk problems as decision making problems uncertainties using it. We also discuss practical implications of our framework for risk evaluation as a process of social technology for social safety and security.
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  • Shigeru MIYAKE
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 21-29
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    This is one of the earliest works in Japan to introduce Ziman's arguments on science and discuss it. His major books on science studies, i.e., Public Knowledge, Reliable Knowledge, Prometheus Bound, and Real Science are reviewed relatively and his argument of knowledge production in academic science is presented as Ziman' model. The acceptance of Ziman's model in Europe and U.S. are surveyed. Finally, the application of Ziman's model to the arguments of science studies in Japan is discussed.
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  • Hideki IWABUCHI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 30-38
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    “Science shop”, which is a mediator between a research institute and civil society, is an effective institutional instrument to promote science and technology for society (STS). The current paper introduces the cases of recent Danish science shops, including the emergence of new science shops to seek the business-academia collaboration, and clarifies the role of science shop from the broadened viewpoint. Then, the significance of science shop is re-thought from the viewpoint of STS. We identifies two roles of science shop, the building of STS and the developing of human resource for STS. In addition, several policy proposals (e.g. a strategy to establish science shops in Japan) are derived to promote STS.
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  • Masaru YARIME
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 39-48
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    In developing a methodology of implementing sociotechnology, it would be a promising idea that the public sector promotes the introduction of new technologies by supporting the proper functioning of the market mechanism, rather than by replacing the market through direct regulation. In this paper, I examine the case of a recent attempt by Tokyo Metropolitan Government to make a shift in automobile uses in Tokyo from diesel vehicles to low-emission vehicles such as compressed natural gas vehicles. The new initiative encouraged car users, car makers, and fuel infrastructure providers to participate in open dialogues, with an intention to coordinate the behavior and expectation of the relevant actors crucial for the introduction of clean vehicles. The results of the public coordination and their implications are discussed.
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  • Masaharu YAGISHITA, Masanobu ISHIKAWA, Yukio HIROSE, Junkichi SUGIURA, ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 49-58
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The authors advance the research for the realization of an environmentally sound material-cycle society based on citizens' participation from 2002 to 2005.. “Forum for creating environmentally sound material-cycle society based on citizens' participation” has hybrid system which one is stakeholder conference, another is citizens' panel conference. In this paper, we evaluate the stakeholder conference. Stakeholders discussed several important points for which environmentally sound material-cycle society is explored, then, they evaluate Nagoya's efforts to reduce wastes. At last, they compile elements of it. As a result, we found that elements showed by stakeholders were considerably different from those of experts and the administrations, and provisions of Basic Law for Establishing a Recycling-Based Society.
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  • Yoko MIZUNO, Masaharu YAGISHITA, Yukihiro WAKUTA, Hiroe MAEDA, Satoko ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 59-67
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration in 1992 states that - Environmental issues are best handled with the participation of all concerned citizens, at the relevant level. However, the role of public participation has not entirely been recognised yet in Japan.
    In Denmark, the Danish Board of Technology established by the Danish Parliament has been implementing public participation in decision-making since 1986. We conducted interviews with the DBT and those who took part in the dialogues on environmental issues held by the DBT. This essay examines the role of public participation in environmental decision-making.
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  • Kenshi BABA, Osamu KIMURA, Tatsujiro SUZUKI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 68-77
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Wind power introduction especially large scaled wind farm development often causes conflicts among several values of environmental issues such as global warming, local ecosystem, and community development. Therefore participatory arena and procedure for actors to effective decision making are needed. The results from literature and interview surveys on some cases of wind power siting process in Japan and the US suggest the followings: the agenda setting is limited to landscape issue in the formal process according to institutional requirement of natural park in Japanese three cases, whereas the institution “NEPA” require full range of public interest and various agenda to be set in the early stage of the project, and another informal process conducted by the external expert playing as facilitator supports the formal process in the US offshore case.
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  • Akio YONEZAWA, Masahide HORITA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 78-88
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Development projects often cause conflicts. For supporting negotiation during conflict situations, this research has built a model that can provide a mediator with information about stakeholders' perception of the situation and other stakeholders. Also, the model's feasibility has been tested in a real conflict case.
    In the case study, the model has successfully been used to clarify the overall situation of the conflict by argument trees and a table of decision making. Subsequently, it has found a crucial misperception which made stakeholders adhere to their decision by analyzing their preferences and strategies. It has been demonstrated that the model can provide helpful information for a mediator to move negotiation forward.
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  • Takahiro UENO, Osamu KIMURA, Hideaki SHIROYAMA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 89-99
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The research question of this article is how to introduce alternative technologies that enhance social welfare. To answer this question, we analyzed the cases of introduction of alternative technologies in a transportation sector. They are six local activities that promote car sharing, biodiesel fuel and light rail. As a consequence, we identified three-stage niche strategy that consists of niche creation, niche management and niche extension as a common tendency among the six cases.
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  • -How do profitable SMEs in the clothing industry determine their markets, management styles of production resources, and locations of production?-
    Satoko YASUDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 100-111
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    This paper explores how Japanese competitive SMEs are recovering from their recent predicaments that have been caused by an avalanche of Chinese products into the Japanese market by looking at five Japanese clothing companies. The main findings are as follows: 1) even within the Japanese garment market, the sources of value added differ in each market segment, 2) it is the sources of value added which affect the decision of firms regarding the degree of the digitalization of intra-firm information flow and processing, 3) firms that have highly digitalized information are able to determine the production location under fewer constraints than those do not, 4) among firms that prefer highly digitalized information flow and processing, those which have sophisticated HRM are likely to locate their production overseas, while others prefer reconstructing their domestic factories.
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  • Yuji Koba, Satoshi Shirato, Kentarou Yamaguchi, Hideyuki Horii
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 112-122
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    It is important to analyze influences of a measure against social problems. It will enable the clarification of tasks at the implementation of the measure and its pre-evaluation. In this study, a method of influence analysis for measures against social problems is applied to an existing social problem. As an example of measures against social problems, effects of new institutions to improve earthquake-resistance of substandard houses are analyzed through influence-analysis method. Their effect and limitation are presented and the applicability of the method is discussed.
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  • Shintaro YAMAKI, Kentaro YAMAGUCHI, Satoshi SHIRATO, Hideyuki HORII
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 123-131
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In this study, we analyzed the influence on the society of the introduction of diagnosis navigation system as the solution for the social problem. We selected the eight areas related to medical treatments, and made the causal network of the each area, and the forecast of the influence which caused for the entire society and the evaluation of the fulfillment were executed by integrating them. The validity of the causal network was examined, and the fulfillment was admitted by the interview to the expert. Moreover, some problems of the existence of the bias in the answer when the fulfillment was evaluated were clarified for the influence analytical method.
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  • Kentaro YAMAGUCHI, Shintaro YAMAKI, Satoshi SHIRATO, Hideyuki HORII
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 132-139
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In the event that a solution to social problem is developed and introduced to the public, an evaluation based on plural values should ideally be conducted amongst people of diverse standpoints who are affected by the problems, on whether the anticipated social changes are desirable or not. Self-organizing Maps (SOM), developed by T. Kohonen, make it possible to conduct such kind of evaluation and identify the trends in attributes. In this article, we confirm the effectiveness of utilizing SOM to analyze conflict of diverse evaluations, through the case study of Real-time Diagnosis Navigation System. Additionally, based on the results of case study, we attempt to suggest desirable policies for developing and introducing Real-time Diagnosis Navigation System.
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  • Toyoaki NISHIDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 140-150
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Social technologies can be characterized as a process-centered knowledge creation environment in the complex and dynamical society. The conversational knowledge process support technologies attempt at realization of process-centered knowledge creation support system in a community, based on the central use of conversation which is the most natural communication means for people. In this paper, I characterize conversational knowledge process support technologies as a research on a conversation content distribution system based on the idea of conversation quantization. I point out that support for grasping a large collection of conversation contents, resolution of the bottleneck of content provision, realization of the reality of content, and the establishment of the evaluation method are all necessary for our approach to be effective. I propose a strategic research plan with particular emphasis on immersive conversation environment, externalized temporal-spatial memory system, advanced applications of conversational knowledge utilization, social intelligence evaluation package, and I review work towards on this direction.
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  • Hidekazu KUBOTA, Toyoaki NISHIDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 151-158
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    This paper describes fault-tolerance technology for sustainable risk communication. A discussion about social problems is unsuccessful unless allowing partial conflict of values and belief. We call it fault-tolerance of risk communication, and we focus three fault-tolerant technologies: Dialogue sustainability, Chance multiplex and Context control. This paper also describes knowledge channel that is a model of content management system mediated by agents. The method for applying knowledge channel to risk communication is proposed, and its experiment is discussed.
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  • Yukiko NAKANO, Toshihiro MURAYAMA, Toyoaki NISHIDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 159-166
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Establishing shared knowledge is indispensable to construct a safe and secure society. With the goal of providing information technologies helping knowledge sharing in a society, this paper proposes a conversational agent that can produce a presentation with natural nonverbal expressions, such as gestures and facial expressions. We also describe an information providing system into which the conversational agent is integrated. First, analyzing human presentation video-data, we establish a model of human gesture usage. Then, we implement the model into a conversational agent who works as a presenter. Finally, we will discuss the effectiveness of such systems in terms of information sharing in a society.
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  • Junichi Hoshino, Rai CHAN, Atsushi NAKANO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 167-172
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    We propose a system, which a virtual actor and a user move freely in the immersive environment by the panorama picture and performing by a physical interaction. In this immersive conversation environment, the knowledge at the time of the accident or a calamity can be acquired in experience. In this paper, a virtual actor performs walk and directional motion in panorama environment by annotating a walk domain or an object on a panorama picture simply. Moreover, entrainment to virtual environment is strengthened with a virtual actor not only answering using body motion, but a user's view moving appropriately to the influence from a user. This paper describes the construction technique and validity of the immersive conversation environment by using a panorama picture.
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  • Sadao KUROHASHI, Toshiaki OHIZUMI, Tomohide SHIBATA, Nobuhiro KAJI, Da ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 173-180
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In conversation, we can best exchange, modify and create knowledge. This paper proposes a media conversion method of linguistic information based on recent advances in Natural Language Processing, or NLP. We suppose that the unit of knowledge which is exchanged in conversation is a coherent content which can be expressed in 100--300 characters, and we call it a knowledge card. We first describe the criteria in which ordinal documents can be converted into a set of knowledge cards manually, Then, we describe a written-language to spoken-language conversion method and an automatic abstraction method which can create an abstract slide from a knowledge card.
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  • Ken'ichi MATSUMURA, Toyoaki NISHIDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 181-190
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    It is important to activate social communications among citizens. The importance of communication tools supporting for society increases. We need to construct the evaluation method which measures the impact on the society. SIQ (Social Intelligence Quantity) was presented as the evaluation method for communication tools supporting for community. SIQ have two components, SIQ-Personal and SIQ-Collective. SIQ-Personal is the scale for the impact on personal in society, and SIQ-Collective is the scale for communities, society, or groups. It is expected that the construct of the evaluation package for communication tools would make clear the impact of communication tools on society.
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  • Toshitaka KATADA, Noriyuki KUWASAWA, Masanobu KANAI, Makoto KODAMA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 191-198
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The safety to the natural hazard is restrictive. However, many citizens are feeling a surfeit of the reassurance by a lot of psychological factors, normalcy bias, and so on. In this paper, a questionnaire survey was undertaken for resident's evacuation against tsunami attack and factors of its decision-making on the earthquake of Miyagiken-Oki which occurred on May 26, 2003. As the result of the survey, we suggested reassurance to the natural hazard, and considered what education the tsunami disaster prevention should be. Lastly, we advanced the social technologies to incarnate safety and reassurance to the natural hazard.
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  • Toshitaka KATADA, Noriyuki KUWASAWA, Masanobu KANAI, Kyohei HOSOI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 199-208
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The primary mitigation measure for tsunamis is to develop effective warning system and evacuation strategies. As for a tool to optimize the warning system and evacuation, an integrated simulator was developed; the simulator combines hydrodynamic simulation of tsunami with warning and human-response simulations for evacuation. Furthermore, because of its visual GIS presentation, the simulator is used to educate the general public; in some sense, the simulator can be considered as a dynamic hazard map. In this research, we applied the simulator to the Owase City. And by showing the simulations and conducting the questionnaire survey, before and afterward, to the residents of Owase, we found significant change in tsunami awareness and proper perception for prompt evacuation.
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  • Masumi YAZAKI, Shintaro GOTO, Seiichi HAMADA, Nobuhiro SAWANO, Kunihis ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 209-217
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The hazard map concerning flood, landslide, volcanic and earthquake disaster have been developed recently in Japan. On the contrary, ESI (Environmental Sensitivity Index) map for oil spill is developing but its practical usage of the maps has not been fully examined. As for the foreign countries, U. S. NOAA OR&R (Office of Response and Restoration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) has already finished constructing ESI maps which estimate environmental sensitivity covering whole shoreline. In this study, based on an actual lesson from Nakhodka oil spill, we will arrange the conflictions among stakeholders in near shore area, and propose the way for resolving such conflictions by using ESI maps covering near shore area of Abashiri, Hokkaido Prefecture.
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  • Atsuomi OBAYASHI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 218-227
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    If a risk manager only knows troubles that are reported by his subordinates, his actions to reduce the number of reported troubles may suppress reporting troubles, which results in a higher risk of accident. In order to avoid hiding troubles, the risk manager may well put weak penalties on reported troubles, and give relatively small competitive incentives to his subordinates. For a type of accidents that are characterized by low frequency but large losses, the optimal penalties on reported troubles are even weaker. To prevent such accidents, the effectiveness of penalties will be limited, and the relative importance of intrinsic motivations will increase.
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  • Satoshi TSUCHIYA, Hirokazu TATANO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 228-237
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    This paper intends to show a process of analyzing regional economic impacts due to transport infrastructure damage, by a spatial computable general equilibrium (SCGE) model considering inter-regional trading, business trips and inter-industrial systems. The model is applied for calculating transport-related economic losses from the Tokai Earthquake Warning Declaration and from occurrence of the Tokai Earthquake, and for assessing the effects of mitigation policies on transportation network. Based on the model, we lastly mention catastrophic earthquake disaster risk management.
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  • Nobuhisa ABE, Hideyuki Horii
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 238-250
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In this thesis, a method to design science and technology policy based on reasonable ground is proposed. First, we categorize 21 kinds of risks selected from electronic dictionary and newspapers in two ways, from the viewpoint of characteristics and means. And then we can know the correspondence of characteristics and means of those risks by comparing two categorizes. This method would be useful to design new means for emerging risks because we can refer similar risks and their means with clear ground.
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  • -An Identification of Enforce Problems in the Law for Regulations of Nuclear Source Materials, Nuclear Fuel Materials and Reactors, and a Proposal for Law Revision-
    Tomoyuki TANABE, Yoshihiro NAKAGOME, Keiji KANDA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 251-274
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Institutional Inductility in the field of Japanese nuclear regulations resulted from compartmentalized entity-based regulation in the Law for Regulations of Nuclear Source Materials, Nuclear Fuel Materials and Reactors (the Nuclear Regulation Law), makes it difficult to cope with new issues, such as launching new nuclear business and implementing new international schemes securing safeguards and nuclear non-proliferation. This paper examines problems associated with entity-based regulation, and illustrates a proposal for introducing comprehensive licensing scheme for nuclear installations and material-based regulations to Japanese nuclear regulations.
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  • Tatsujiro SUZUKI, Setsuo TAKEI, Hideaki SHIROYAMA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 275-284
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Because of problems relating to the unsuitable handling of nuclear safety regulations these days, new regulatory system, such as the amendment of Electric Utility Law, the inauguration of the independent administrative institute called “JNES: Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization” was introduced. And attention is paid to standard setting and inspection system by the third party organization. In the U.S. and France, this kind of systems are already introduced in different forms concerning in in-service inspection of a nuclear reactor, and welding inspection, etc. In this article, roles of third party organizations concerning nuclear safety in Japan, U.S., and France are compared and basic issues for designing the institutional arrangement for the future in Japan will be analyzed.
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  • Yuji KOBA, Ryoko HATANAKA, Orie YOKOYAMA, Akio MURAYAMA, Hideaki SHIRO ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 285-292
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Much attention has been paid to the medical safety and quality around the world for the last several years. This article analyzes the U.S. legal and institutional system for medical safety and quality as reference for designing Japanese legal and institutional system for medical safety and quality. Overall structure of government organizations at federal and state level, hospital organizations, quality improvement organizations, consumer organizations for medical safety and quality is analyzed, and lessons are drawn for the designing Japanese system. Concretely, accident and incident reporting system and protection from discovery, administrative licensing and sanctions mechanism for medical doctors, clinical performance evaluation and information disclosure are the focus of the analysis.
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  • Ryoko HATANAKA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 293-302
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    Medical reporting system started, in April 2004, which obliged national hospitals and university hospitals should report medical accidental information for third body having professionals of analysis. However, it is not cleared how to ensure some functions of this organization. In this paper, author examined functional conditions in debating about third body which gathered accidental information. Some insist that reporting system need to have protection of reporting information for using in legal responsibilities By Learning from experimentation in U.S, there are found some conditions, like U.S tort reform, introduction of IT and use of nurses, not only information using limitation.
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  • —IMPLICATION FOR JAPAN—
    Takahisa FUNAKI, Akio MURAYAMA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 303-312
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Concerning the legal response to accidents in a large-scale system, how to balance the appropriate measures for the investigation for fact fiding and the legal sanctions is the point at issue. In this article, we discuss the legal system of aviation accident investigation in France, and investigate the duties and competence, institutions, the number of investigation, staffs, the process of investigation of BEA, GTA, and DGAC. BEA has the investigation system with expertise from various secotrs. GTA has the special police organization of aviation accidents, and cooperate in the investigation, for example, on the exchange of evidence with BTA. Through comparative analysis of Japan, the United States, and France, we analyze the options of legal systems for aviation accidents, and present the example of views to choose them.
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  • Shigenori MISAKI
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 313-320
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
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    Nowadays, the cases, such as hiding product recalls and hazard information, are found here and there. Consumers are involved in fatal accidents, because of some product manufacturers neglect or fail to promptly respond to the potential product risks, even where they already recognize the existence of risks after their product shipment. There are legal systems in various product areas in various countries, with regard to the product recalls. With the cross-sectional and cross-national comparison of recall system and its operation in each product area, we can see there is still room for development and improvement in our current systems. In order to prevent the recurrence of those recently happening product hazard caused by manufacturer's negligence of risk information management, and to ensure the safety of consumers, the legal recall systems need to be reexamined and improved, or the establishment of disclosure and reporting system from the manufacturers toward to the government agencies and consumers, should be considered.
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  • -Proposal to the Food Safety Commission-
    Takako NAKAJIMA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 321-330
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The Food Safety Commission launched on 1 July 2003 has opened new era of Japanese food safety policy. Among other things, the Commission is remarkable by promoting risk communication that never existed in the conventional administration. This paper firstly draws attention to the presence of dis-communication between consumer and government/expertise under the name of risk communication. Secondly, it suggests that the dis-communication is derived from risk communication activity in which government/expertise put priority to enlightening consumers rather than facing the consumer's historically accumulated distrust to them. In conclusion, it is proposed that history of Japanese food policy after 1945 should be compiled under the leadership of the Food Safety Commission.
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  • Tatsuhiro KAMISATO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 331-342
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In Japan, “food” became a big social issue in about 2002. It is considered to have been constructed at a stretch by digging up lots of past problems and being socially recognized from increase of the social concern about the food issues ignited by the outbreak of BSE in 2001, rather than de novo risk arose at this time. This paper shows first why BSE could have such impact on our society by illustrating its peculiarity as an illness, and what followed events attracted attention from the public. Then we describe the mechanism of setting off the panic in order to help solve the analogous cases in the future.
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  • Jinmin WANG, Sousuke MIYAMOTO, Hiroyuki KONNO, Kouichi E. OKAMOTO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 343-352
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Whistle-blowing is necessary for correcting and punishing organizational wrong-doings, and it may also be served as a deterrent to violations of laws and regulations in organizations. Because whistle-blowing behavior is based on one's attitude to the act and the prospected results, it is important to know employees' attitudes to whistle-blower protection laws and their expectations on such laws. In this study, relationship between attitudes to whistle-blower protection laws and individual characteristics was examined. Suggestions were also given on promoting and creating educational programs of whistle blowing.
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  • Chihiro KOBAYASHI, Koichi OKAMOTO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 353-361
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    People generally think they can monitor and control their own thoughts and behavior. However, owing to the recent development of research methods in the field of social cognitive psychology, it became clear that people's attitude and behavior consists of conscious aspect (explicit attitude) and unconscious aspect (implicit attitude). The development of the IAT (Implicit Association Test) by Greenwald and Banaji (Greenwald & Banaji, 1995; Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998) enabled a number of research on implicit attitudes to be conducted. Accumulated results of the research have indicated the relationships between implicit attitudes and behaviors on prejudice, stereotype, depression and social anxiety, aggressiveness. The present article reviews previously conducted research on implicit attitudes, focusing on the implicit attitude and people's actual behavior. Then, based on this review, the applicability of this implicit measure, especially on social technology, is discussed.
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  • - Development of Models on Group Decision Making in Organizations -
    Masayori ISHIKAWA, Nireka ADACHI, Koichi E. OKAMOTO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 362-369
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Recently, the matter which betrays national reliance such as a illegal act by the large company greatly breaks out frequently. These matters are common in the point that a contravention was being done through the agreement at a Meeting. Therefore, paying attention to the decision procedure in the group decision making, it is necessary to clarify the proper decision procedure to control systematic violation. This research aims at building an experiment tool to examine a proper group decision making procedure. As the experiment tool, a numerical simulation by the computer is used and various models about the decision rule will be developed. In this paper, we discus which parameters are essential to the simulation by preliminary analysis, and utility of the simulation is argued in the methodology.
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  • Yasunari OKABE, Hiroyuki KONNO, Koichi E. OKAMOTO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 370-378
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The measurement of individual differences in implicit “Ingratiation with Superiors” was developed to prevent violations. Study 1 (N=20) showed that the measurement exhibited good internal consistency. Study 2 (N=15) showed that the measurement had good internal consistency again and good stability (mean interval time of about7). Study 3 (N=36) examined the validity of implicit and explicit measures and show that implicit “Ingratiation with Superiors” was related to decision making of violation. The results suggest the implicit measure has high reliability and high validity. Finally, we discussed the utility of the implicit measure for risk management of organization.
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  • Mizuki YAMAZAKI, Toshiko KIKKAWA, Hedeyuki HORII
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 379-388
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    This study examined the structure of anxiety factors and proposed an anxiety model which focuses on the relationship between collecting information behavior and anxiety for Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, which is an emerging infectious disease. The factors of anxiety were grouped into five categories, “harmfulness”, “cost of food”, “collecting information”, “coping” and “other (situation-specific)”. This anxiety model is a looping model composed of four stages, “input of information”, “cognitive evaluation”, “arousal of anxiety” and “coping”. The central route and peripheral route are set in the model as coping processes. The former route includes the behavior of seeking reliable information and thinking by oneself, while the latter route includes the behavior of seeking a reliable person and inferring the meaning of the situation from his/her behavior.
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  • Takuya OGURE, Hisashi TAKAMATU, Kazuo FURUTA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 389-398
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Developing proper understanding of risks of nuclear technology over whole civil society is needed for addressing consensus-building on a nuclear-energy issue. To share technical knowledge and common awareness of the risks, web portal sites such as “directory search sites” on the Internet must be helpful if its directory, “ontology” is elaborated for the purpose. In this work we will profile the basis of an ontology of a civil-society organization by using a text-mining technique to compare their ontology with engineers' one derived from an educational curriculum for engineers. Based on the comparison we will then propose an ontology-designing strategy for sharing technical knowledge and common awareness within communities of civil society and engineers.
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  • Satoshi FUJII, Toshiko KIKKAWA, Kazuhisa TAKEMURA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 399-405
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In September 2002, it was found out that a Japanese electric power company had been concealing some defects of reactor-core-shroud for more than ten years. The authors examined the changes in trust in administration of nuclear power plants regarding the reactor-core-shroud negative event using data from a three-wave panel survey conducted in August 2002, November 2002, and September 2003. Participants of this panel survey were 142 people living in Tokyo Metropolitan area. The first survey was conducted c immediately before this incident and the second one was conducted a survey after this event, i. e., in November 2002, therefore the changes in attitudes before and after this event could be measured. Furthermore, the authors obtained data from the same sample of participants 1 year after the event, i. e., in September 2003. The questionnaire consisted of items of risk perception and trust in risk experts. The results indicated that trust in the company itself and nuclear power plant system have decreased, and have not recovered even 1 year after the event, the trust being slightly improved instead.
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  • Shizuka AZUMA, Issei FUJISHIRO, Hiroyuki HORII
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 406-413
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    The falsification problem at a nuclear power plant exposed in 2002 involves various factors being related intricately with each other. In order to analyze such a social problem, it is crucial to visually explore the structure of the problem. In particular, it is very effective in the problem analysis to show the layered structures obtained by classifying and arranging factors as well as the causality relationships between them.
    In this paper, we propose an information visualization technique which can be used to visualize these hierarchical causality relationships, and describe the outline of an up-to-date prototype system. Also, we illustrate the feasibility of the present technique with an application to the analysis of the falsification problem.
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  • Ikuo HORI, Toshinori KAWABATA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 414-424
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    On September 26, 2003, at Tokachi-Oki (southeast offshore of Hokkaido), a strong earthquake (Mj 8) occurred. The fire accident of a crude oil tank and a naphtha tank at the oil refinery located in Tomakomai City, occurred by this earthquake, generated sloshing in their tanks.
    In this report, focusing on earthquake-proof measures for oil tanks, regulation trends and emergency procedures were examined from the viewpoint of science and technology for safety. In addition, the discrepancy between expert knowledge in the special field and understanding in lay people was discussed with a suggestion of better information disclosure.
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  • Junji KIYONO, Aiko FURUKAWA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 425-434
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Collapse of timber frame houses during an earthquake was analyzed by the 2-dimensional (2D) and 3-dimensional (3D) Distinct Element Methods (DEM). A timber frame house with simple structural elements; beams, columns, floors, and a roof, was modeled. Contact parameters were decided based on Hertz theory, and joint parameters were calculated from a typical tenon modeling. Injury to human bodies also was considered. Human bodies modeled as circles (2D) or rectangular parallelepipeds (3D) were placed on its floors. The maximum impact acceleration on the human body during an earthquake was calculated. Injury to humans in houses was assessed by the Chest-G index and Head Injury Criteria (HIC) widely used in automobile engineering.
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  • Ping ZHU, Muneo HORI, Junji KIYONO, Yozo FUJINO
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 435-443
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    To make reasonable policies of earthquake disaster reduction, it is necessary for local authorities, civilians and engineering professionals to have consensus recognitions of earthquake hazard. A vivid simulation of seismic damage of structures within a city, in both views of all buildings in the city and individual houses, is helpful in making the consensus. As advance of computer technologies and structural analysis methods, it is possible to conduct digital simulation and visualization of seismic response for a whole city. But a big problem remaining is how to model all the structures, mainly buildings, of a city. On utilizing 3D GIS data, this study provides a method of constructing structural models of huge amount of buildings of a city, which enables seismic analysis of building structures. An illustration is also give by constructing building models of Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo using available GIS data.
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  • Muneo HORI, Tsuyoshi ICHIMURA, Kenjiro TERADA
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 444-454
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    It will be an important task for local government officers to improve their engineering ability of foreseeing possible earthquake damages. To this end, this paper studies the standardization of earthquake resistance design codes of various structures. Taking advantage of informatics methodology, we reconstruct flowcharts of various design codes such that the earthquake resistance design can be described in a common framework. The usage of object to express each design procedure is effective in standardization. The resulting standard codes which are expressed in terms of common description are expected to help government officers understand the concepts and methods of various earthquake resistance design codes to some proper extent that is needed for them.
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  • Kiyoshi TAKAHASHI, Hironori KATO, Shintaro TERABE, Mikiharu ARIMURA, Y ...
    2004 Volume 2 Pages 455-463
    Published: October 29, 2004
    Released on J-STAGE: December 21, 2007
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Japan made it decrease to a half by 2003 as compared with 1970 whose number of traffic deaths was a peak. But, the injured do not have reduction and the measure of a traffic accident is required for them. But, the measure against a traffic accident has so far been performed based on experience. From now on, it is necessary to perform accident analysis based on objective data, effect prediction, and measure implementation. And the system which can return evaluation to each stage is called for. But, while there are expense restrictions, there are few models which deal with an effect. Then, the model which consists of processes which analyze the measure effect from traffic accident data is built. And the prototype model which evaluates performance was proposed.
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