About FUN
Open to the World – Opening New Worlds
Future University-Hakodate - affectionately referred to as FUN - was established in April 2000, and started its graduate school in April, 2003. With "human values" as one of the university’s foundations, the University provides programs to not only meet the demands of a rapidly changing world but also to anticipate, and indeed, preempt future advances. The University focuses on applying new worldviews based on deep understanding of information and communication technologies - and the concept of complexity. The University’s guiding principle is that of "openness", a philosophy reflected in its facilities, teaching styles and content, and research portfolio.
In a Rapidly Transforming Global Environment
Throughout history, people have developed science, technologies and new societal systems that have led to unprecedented transformations in the ways people experience and live their lives. As a result, Japanese society and indeed all societies around the world, have continued to undergo drastic changes in recent years brought about by a complexity of factors including rapid advances in information processing and communication technologies.
Mankind is now at a point where it is important to review these transformations and think seriously about how they will affect our futures.
FUN in Context
FUN in ContextNestled in a picturesque mountain landscape overlooking the spectacular city of Hakodate, population approximately 300,000, lies Future University Hakodate - playfully referred to as 'FUN'.Representing a new style of tertiary educational institution this university of and for the future is steadily making its mark on Japan's conventional learning paradigms - considered by many to be outmoded.In a dynamic and competitive global environment of the 21st century which questions the very foundations of what universities should be doing, and in which Japan's student numbers display gradual decline, a university who boldly refers to itself as the 'Future' University is destined to venture where others dare not by exploiting the distinctiveness of its curricula, internationally-oriented academic staff, vigourous research portfolio, and focusedness of vision. Designing a Global Niche from HakodateStrategic educational institutions and practices emerge from the specific needs of time and place. In the case of FUN, an increasingly complexified global information environment has given rise to this unique university oriented to the studies of two main bodies of knowledge: Information and Communication/s Technologies or ICTs, and Complex Systems (CS).FUN's Complex Systems Department, with its emphasis on exploring the dynamics of complex human societies and natural environments, represents a department unique to Japan and to the world. Media Architecture, on the other hand, symbolizes a novel amalgam coupling ICTs with the metaphor of 'architecture', in recognition of the imperative of appropriately positioning ICTs within living dynamic societies. It is commonly recognized that of all the various pushes to the future, ICTs and new technologies in general, are amongst the most influential and paradigm-changing. It follows therefore that emerging ICTs be strategically and wisely designed and mediated to ensure their cumulative effects bring positive benefits to societies. |
Towards a Post-Information AgeHowever, FUN produces synergistic effects that go beyond ICTs and Complexity Thinking. The best ICT research requires solid foundations grounded in everyday realities such as values, philosophy, and history. FUN too, with its emphasis on the social embeddedness of ICTs also makes use of its internationally active academic staff specializing in frontier research as diverse as Creative Industries, design, psychology, economics, venture business creation and futures thinking, amongst others. Accordingly, one major goal for FUN is to see that ICT technologies do not lead to social control and the dystopian surveillance societies envisioned by George Orwell's all-seeing Big Brother scenario in his epic novel 1984 -- but to the betterment of human life and natural environments through the wise deployment of technologies: in other words, ICTs not in the service of a cliched Information Age, but rather, an Age of Wisdom. Aspirational FuturesThus contextualized, FUN aspires to become a different kind of university whose innovative niches include: 1. The creation of values-driven knowledge and management, and the public communication thereof for a Post-Information world, directly linked to the facilitation of better future societies; 2. The re-invention of Japan's tertiary education system appropriate to a dynamic and complexified global environment; and 3. The creation of new communication-rich learning environments and styles preparing Japan's scholars of tomorrow for full participation and collaboration in the international community; and 4. Novel understandings and interpretations of the dynamics of human behaviours and nature as complex systems, with a view to creating long term sustainable environments. At its essence: FUN waits for no future, but makes is the creator of new and alternative futures. |
