Mirai no Sumai (Housing of the Future –Where is the Frontier of Housing Studies)

The Housing Research Foundation, the editor of this book, is famous as an organization that exclusively supports housing research and is familiar to researchers involved in housing research in Japan. The organization was founded in 1948, shortly after world war 2, and has consistently supported academic research related to housing ever since. This book is based on the record of the symposium (2018), "Where is the Frontier of Housing Research?," which was planned as a project to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the foundation.
 
In this book, Chapters I to VII are the reports of the researchers who presented at the symposium. Chapter VIII is a compilation of the contributions of SUKENARI Yasushi, who moderated the debate at the symposium. The final chapter IX records the state of the debate.
 
It is a complete coincidence that four of the eight authors of this book are faculty members at the University of Tokyo. YASHIRO Tomonari teaches at the Institute of Industrial Science, OTSUKI Toshio at the Graduate School of Engineering, OKABE Akiko Okabe at the Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, and SUKENARI Yasushi at the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences. It can be said that this speaks eloquently of the breadth of the field of housing research.
 
The primary purpose of this symposium was to discuss "what should housing research aim for in the future 10 years from now" from various angles. Currently, the situation surrounding Japanese housing is symbolized by the group of keywords embedded as a design on the cover page of this book: the World Financial Crisis, the Great East Japan Earthquake, Brexit, Declining Birthrate and Aging Population, Millennials, Immigration Problems, AI, World Trade War, Extreme Weather, SNS spread, SDGs, Vacant House Problems, Shared-houses, House Renovation , ZEH (Net Zero Energy House), Smarter World. Now that several years have passed since the symposium, it is tempting to include keywords such as coronavirus and multi-site residence, but social issues that have a major impact on housing development will develop in units of 10 years. It seems that this is also shown at the same time.

The issues facing housing will change in response to social issues that fluctuate on a global scale. Accordingly, the ways of building and living will also change. I think this is a very useful book for housing researchers who have to keep up with immediate changes to understand what kind of ball they are trying to hit back and how.
 
The Housing Research Foundation also brought out a publication to commemorate the 60th anniversary of its founding. The book Transition and Prospects of Contemporary Housing Research (Maruzen, 2009) thoroughly discusses the academic transformation process of postwar housing research based on academic papers. If you are interested in the contents of Housing of the Future, I recommend that you read Transition and Prospects of Contemporary Housing Research next. (Honorific title omitted in the text)
 

(Written by OTSUKI Toshio, Professor, School of Engineering / 2021)