Creating Japan’s First “Captains of Industry” for a DX Era
September 2, 2021
Toshiaki Watanabe
Director, Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research
Professor, Institute of Economic Research
Naohiro Shichijo
Vice Director, Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research
Professor, Graduate School of Business Administration
Yasuhiro Otsuki
Board Member/Executive Vice President for General Affairs, Personnel, Research, Outreach, and Public Relations
Yuichi Washida
Director, Data Design Research Center
Professor, Graduate School of Business Administration
Establishing a new faculty and graduate school to promote data science from a social science perspective
In April 2023, Hitotsubashi University plans to establish Japan’s first Faculty and Graduate School of Social Data Science (tentative) to promote data science education and research from a social science perspective.
Since its founding in 1875 as the Commercial Training School, Hitotsubashi University has continued to foster future leaders in a wide range of fields to meet the needs of the time. Over the years, it has made its mark as an extraordinary academic community that pursues top-level research and education primarily in social science fields. In 2019, the university’s tradition and achievements in developing people by providing an all-round education to a select few, as well as its vision for the future, were recognized when it became the first institution specializing in the humanities and social sciences to be accredited as a Designated National University Corporation. The establishment of a Faculty and Graduate School of Social Data Science was part of the future vision that was developed and recognized at that time.
As the first new faculty and graduate school in over 70 years, there is clearly an extraordinary level of sentiment amongst those involved. We at HQ spoke to the Director and Vice Director of the Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research (the office handling the preparations), the Director of the Data Design Research Center, and a Hitotsubashi University Board Member and Executive Vice President, about the background to the initiative, the curriculum being developed, the types of people that the new institutions will produce, and the social contribution possibilities.
Answering society’s need for innovation drivers
The advance of information technologies in recent years has made it difficult to resolve the various challenges facing society using traditional social science approaches. On the other hand, that same advance has opened the way for utilizing massive amounts of data, so that now what society needs is people who can make use of statistics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and other technologies to analyze large-scale data and propose means of resolving new management and socioeconomic challenges.
In November 2020, Hitotsubashi University undertook an independent survey on the type of people sought after by a social sciences national university when setting up a new data science faculty. The top response—more than 50 percent—was “people who can drive innovation.” What we currently need, it would seem, are “captains of industry” for the DX (digital transformation) era.
“Recognizing that need, and also drawing on survey results, we plan to set up a new faculty and graduate school that integrates our traditional strength in social sciences with data science based on mathematics and statistics education so as to produce people who can contribute to the advancement of information technologies in society along with digital transformation.” (Professor Toshiaki Watanabe)
As of June 2021, the outline of the new faculty and graduate school is follows:
Faculty: Aim to produce leaders who can revolutionize business by using data accumulated daily in settings such as business and policy, and propose and execute solutions to new socioeconomic issues amidst an advancing digital transformation of society.
Graduate school: Aim to produce people who have acquired advanced specialist knowledge and skills in statistics, information and AI, and programming that enables them to take a data-driven approach to creating new business value from a specialist perspective, and to implement new socioeconomic solutions and contribute to the creation of new social science fields.
* A doctoral program is scheduled to be established in April 2025.
Significance of the word “social” in the name of the new faculty and graduate school
Some might suggest that while there is clearly an urgent need to produce more data scientists, that task might be better left to faculties of science and technology rather than a social sciences university like Hitotsubashi University.
Certainly, Hitotsubashi University’s focus over the years has been on education and research in the social sciences. Our entrance exams, however, allocate a high points ratio to mathematics and we have a track record of accepting students who chose a science path at high school. And in addition to our faculty members working in the social sciences, we also have many faculty members with science and technology backgrounds.
The new faculty and graduate school will leverage this characteristic to pursue the concept of co-creation of social sciences and science/technology which transcends binary distinctions between the two. The aim is for all social data science students, whether they entered university viewing themselves as belonging to the social sciences or to science and technology, to go out into society armed with both types of scientific knowledge acquired through friendly competition in classes and seminars.
Globally, data science is not viewed as part of the science and technology field. It is part of computer science, but computer science, like disciplines such as mathematics, psychology (cognitive science), and architecture, is taught in social sciences or cross-disciplinary faculties. The field of science and technology, it should be added, is grounded in the natural sciences.
“In Japan, however, people equate computers with machines, so computer science has been categorized rather unreflectively as part of the science and technology field. Despite the mathematics underlying computer science and providing a common language for both the social sciences and science and technology, a needless gap has emerged between the two. To close that gap, we want to once again think about social science with mathematics at its core, a concept that has always been held by the university.” (Professor Yuichi Washida)
“Social sciences that are based on data” – therein lies the significance of placing the word “social” at the beginning of the new faculty and graduate school’s name. Reforming social sciences towards a new direction to meet the needs of an increasingly DX-based society. It also carries the meaning of students honing their ability to propose and execute solutions to business and socioeconomic issues. These are the expectations underlying “social data science”.
Differences from the existing four faculties and data science faculties at other universities
So, what is the current (June 2021) curriculum vision?
Hitotsubashi University’s existing Faculty of Commerce and Management, Faculty of Economics, Faculty of Law, and Faculty of Social Sciences also offer many subjects that enable students to learn data analysis skills appropriate for their discipline. The new faculty, however, will give students the opportunity to systematically acquire more universal data science skills as well as an understanding of the ethical and legal issues presented by the utilization of these skills. The new faculty will also differ from the existing faculties in taking a data-driven approach to resolving business and socioeconomic issues.
Compared with existing data science faculties at other universities, the key difference lies in the “social” aspect. The curriculum emphasizes the application of data analysis skills to various areas of social science and to the solution of business and socioeconomic issues. In terms of training, compared to existing information and engineering faculties that develop new data science technologies, the emphasis will be on producing people who can use those technologies to propose and implement solutions to business and socioeconomic issues. These characteristics make it “social data science.”
Project Based Learning: Considering solutions based on data from companies and government institutions
The subject that most clearly reveals the characteristics of the new faculty and graduate school is Project Based Learning (PBL). This is a practical subject in which actual business issues and socioeconomic issues that arise from carrying out policies, as well as data for resolving these, are provided by companies and government institutions. Students then work hands-on in small groups to find solutions. At present, the data comes only from companies and government institutions in Japan, but there are possibilities to source data from beyond Japan in the near future.
“Hitotsubashi University international student graduates have a great reputation throughout Asia, including China, Korea, and the ASEAN countries. The new faculty and graduate school will share the university’s mission of producing people who will be active worldwide. Widening our data sources internationally would certainly make sense also in terms of offering a new discipline to more international students in the new faculty and graduate school.” (Professor Otsuki Yasuhiro)
The above curriculum is still in the planning stage, so course names and content may well change or be deepened going ahead.
The appeal of a research institution that gathers data science experts under one roof
As noted earlier, the aim in establishing the Faculty and Graduate School of Social Data Science is to establish a new field of education and research that promotes data science from a social science perspective. Let’s focus on the appeal of these research institutions.
In short, by bringing data science experts together under one roof, undergraduates and graduate students can absorb data science-specific knowledge all at once and without having to take any detours.
What do we mean by detours? Speaking from his own experience as a researcher, Vice Director of the Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research, Naohiro Shichijo says “what took me 25 to 30 years to learn, here (at the new faculty and graduate school), students will be able to acquire in just six years in the undergraduate and master’s program.” In other words, data science experts to date have taken “detours” for almost 20 years compared to future data science students.
For example, Professor Shichijo began by studying mathematics as a common language for understanding various social phenomena. He went on to get a doctorate in engineering so that he could use mathematical thought in society, then moved on to mathematics-based material development. Recognizing that innovation arises from a social context, he taught himself R&D management (technology management). Mathematics-based R&D management falls within the scope of social data science. However, because Professor Shichijo did not have access to foundational theory or education programs, he had to pursue his own studies based on information acquired at academic conferences and basic instruction from research collaborators, which is why it took 25-30 years.
Another feature of the new faculty and graduate school is therefore an environment in which that lengthy process is condensed into six years, because students can learn from data science experts gathered in one place. The call from academia to systematize social data science as a discipline is a further important point.
“The challenge will be to develop social data science into an academic system. We still don’t know what fields of social science—ethnography, marketing research, future insights, etc.—will relate to data science in terms of resolving social issues. However, data science clearly has unexplored potential as a tool that could relate to various fields. In the new faculty and graduate school, students will have the chance to engage in discussion and research with data science experts. That’s a huge merit.” (Professor Naohiro Shichijo)
Hitotsubashi University has arranged a promising domestic advisory board in conjunction with the establishment of the new faculty and graduate school. The Tokyo Institute of Technology, the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, and the Institute of Statistical Mathematics have all joined to provide various suggestions to Hitotsubashi University. With faculty exchange also planned in the future, it is not difficult to imagine that the appeal of the new faculty and graduate school will increase still further.
Spotlighting archives and influencing government institutions
Bursting with great appeal as education and research institutions, the new faculty and graduate school may also shine new light on Hitotsubashi University’s valuable database archives and contribute to international research.
For example, the long-term statistics on the Japanese economy held by the Hitotsubashi University Institute of Economic Research represent unbroken time series data from the late Edo period (the mid-1800s) to the present day. Researchers even now visit Hitotsubashi University from all over the world to access this goldmine, digitalizing objective data as they see fit and publishing it internationally in academic papers.
“We have a real treasure-trove of information on not only the Japanese economy but also other Asian economics. Although our collection is stored on paper, intact and unbroken series of data on this scale are extremely rare; even in the United States, only Carnegie Mellon University matches it. Furthermore, our economic data for China during World War II is highly coveted by Chinese researchers. I’m hoping that the new faculty and graduate school will take on the task of extracting meta data from paper and getting it out into the world.” (Board Member/Executive Vice President, Yasuhiro Otsuki)
As will be discussed below (following section), one future possibility for graduates might be to work in government institutions, creating data and using it to tackle socioeconomic issues. For example, if the mission is to create GDP figures, it would be a major advantage to have learned about Hitotsubashi University’s high-quality productivity database and government statistics, as well as information on Japanese and international share prices and exchange rates.
Professor Toshiaki Watanabe, Director of the Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research is a researcher at the Hitotsubashi Institute for Advanced Study’s Research Center for Evidence-Based Policy Making, himself engages in quantitative analysis of finance and macroeconomic models at the Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan. He states “there is no doubt that EBPM (evidence-based policy making: decision-making based on evidence such as data) is used even by government institutions, and it will become increasingly important in the years ahead.”
Areas of activity for future graduates, as envisioned by the new faculty and graduate school
Finally, we will introduce fields in which we expect graduates from the new faculty and graduate school to play an active role.
In Japan, many IT engineers work at companies that build systems, but few are found in companies using those technologies. The same holds for data science positions, with Japan suffering a nationwide lack of data scientists who can make effective use of data analysis technologies in various areas of corporate management.
Graduates from the new faculty and graduate school are expected to play an active role in positions where they can use their management capability to oversee data analysis projects—project managers or business designers, for example—in a range of companies that use information technologies, including wholesale, retail, communications, transport, and manufacturing.
They might also supervise groups engaged in policy impact analysis and risk analysis at government and financial institutions or become analysts involved in groups that conduct various types of big data analysis at consulting firms and thinktanks.
There are also expectations that some graduates will become transdisciplinary academic researchers in fields such as social sciences, artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and statistics at universities and research institutions or become entrepreneurs.
Through the Faculty and Graduate School of Social Data Science, Hitotsubashi University aims to establish education and research that will produce “captains of industry” for the DX era. This initiative is unprecedented in Japan and we are less than two years away from its inauguration. The temperature of discussions around the Center for the Promotion of Social Data Science Education and Research will only rise in the time ahead.
