Overview

In 1917, founder Tokujiro Shibata and other young volunteers gathered together to found Kokushikan, a private academy and predecessor to the university in Azabu Ward, Tokyo (present day Minami-aoyama, Minato City). Wishing to promote education that respects human growth, the school moved to its current location in Setagaya in 1919. In 1953, a junior college was established and in 1958, the university was established along with the Faculty of Physical Education.  Subsequently, six more faculties were established by 2011 for a total of seven (the junior college was abolished in 2003). Starting in 1965, the first graduate school was established and today, there are a total of ten graduate schools.

Kokushikan University celebrated its 100-year anniversary in 2017. It is a comprehensive school that also includes Kokushikan Senior High School and Kokushikan Junior High School. Kokushikan has produced many public servants who contribute to the local society with a great sense of mission, choosing to become police officers, firefighters, teachers, paramedics, and more as a post-graduate path. Kokushikan ranks at the top nationally for the number of students who have passed these national examinations.

Following the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, Kokushikan University positioned itself as a disaster prevention university base, making basic education on disaster prevention mandatory for all new students, entering into cooperative agreements with local governments and related organizations, and working to train human resources that can contribute in times of disaster.

Kokushikan also contributes to society by giving educational research resources back to the community through open lectures, public use of its libraries, and cooperative initiatives to solve community issues.

Kokushikan University is making history without stopping as a glocal university open to the world and rooted in the community.

Remarks from the President

Keiich Satoh（Ph.D）
President, Kokushikan University

Since its founding as a private school—Kokushikan—in 1917, and the founding of Kokushikan University itself in 1958, thanks to your generous support, We’ve grown and developed into a general university, now with seven undergraduate faculties and ten graduate schools. For over a century,our founding spirit remains steadfast “to nurture kokushi—patriots—as human resources who are considerate of their country and can serve the world and others,”and is still followed as a guideline for the university’s educational activities to this day, over 100 years after its founding. We believe that it is our inherited mission to build upon the four virtues of our university’s educational philosophy—sincerity, Industriousness, Insight and spiritual strength—and our founding principles as the key to the development of human resources, and refine them into educational activities that meet the needs of the times.


The world is currently facing a difficult and unpredictable era that risks our own lives and livelihoods, with threats such as climate change, poverty and inequality, and military invasions in violation of international law. We live in a time when no one has the answers, and we cannot respond with the existing solutions. To survive in these turbulent times, We will work to establish common education courses for all students, to nurture autonomous individuals who can withstand various difficulties (i.e., problem-solving human resources). Leveraging our strengths as a general university, we have completely revised the general education courses that were previously offered during the first and second years of study. By taking these classes over the course of four years, we encourage the development and enhancement of thinking and decision-making ability by combining specialized fields with arts and sciences, deep insight into human existence, reasoning to appropriately understand reality and live as decent human beings, and tolerance to listen to different opinions.


We will also continue to expand education on the history of the university itself, its founding spirit and educational philosophy, and work to further nurture kokushi, in honor of the university’s name. In addition, to help students acquire the knowledge and skills necessary for data analysis and utilization and nurture them into human resources who can apply them to solve social issues in a society where digital transformation (DX) is advancing at a rapid pace, we have made “AI and Science” a required course for all faculties as of this spring, regardless of whether students are majoring in the humanities or sciences.


Traditions are important, but they must respond to the times, or they will lose their luster. Going forward, Kokushikan University will continue to implement various reforms in order to pass on the precious history and traditions—built up so painstakingly by our predecessors—to the future generations, and continue to be a university of choice.

Keiich Satoh（Ph.D） President, Kokushikan University

President, Kokushikan University
Born in Aomori Prefecture in 1955. Graduated from the doctoral course in political science at the Graduate School of Political Science, Kokushikan University in 1984, and became a Doctor of Political Science (Kokushikan University) in 2006. Employed as an assistant at the Institute for the Study of Religions in 1984. Became a Lecturer at the Institute for the Study of Religion and Culture in 1987, and served as professor at the Faculty of Political Science and Economics II in 2002. In 2003 he served as professor at the Faculty of Political Science and Economics, and was head of the Graduate School of Political Science in 2012. He worked as Director of the Department of Political Science from 2002 to 2003 and 2006 to 2008, and as Associate Dean of Academic Affairs at the Faculty of Political Science and Economics from 2003 to 2005 and 2007 to 2010. In December 2015 he was appointed President of Kokushikan University. Served as Director of the Japan Association of Comparative Constitutional Law from 2014. 2002 Academic Award: Received the Joji Tagami Award (The Japan Association of Comparative Constitutional Law). His specialty is the political history of the United States.