News Navigator: Japan universities diminishing talent with timed researcher firings

The Mainichi Shimbun answers some common questions readers may have about the termination of contracts for researchers in Japan, apparently done in bad faith to get around contract law.

Question: What is the issue surrounding the mass layoff of researchers in Japan?

Answer: The revised Labor Contracts Act, which came into effect in 2013, gave fixed-term contract employees the right to become permanent after five years on the same job. However, given that research activities require years on a subject, this was set at 10 years for researchers at universities and other research institutions. Last April marked 10 years since then, and it has come to light that a conspicuous amount of dismissals occurred, seemingly aimed at evading long-term employment of the researchers.

Q: Is this issue very serious?

A: In a questionnaire of around 2,500 researchers and others conducted by institutions such as the Japan Neuroscience Society, around one in eight were expecting to see their contracts ended. One respondent answered, “All researchers, technical staff and part-timers were terminated, and I’ve never heard of anyone changing to permanent employment.”

Q: That’s awful, what else is involved?

A: There also appears to be a deliberate application of “cooling-off” periods of six months or more between employment periods, which resets the total number of contract years. Around 30% in the questionnaire had seen or heard of the practice.

Q: Hasn’t this affected research in Japan?

A: Partly due to the national government’s measures, the number of researchers frequently changing workplaces while employed on short-term deals is rising. This is said to be a major factor in the declining quality of research in the country. Japan in 1996 ranked fourth for countries with the most papers cited by other papers, but from 2020 to 2022 it had dropped to 13th place, overtaken by countries such as Iran and China. We believe that Japanese universities and research institutions should provide more stable research environments by listening to the voices of those who are engaged in the fields.

(Japanese original by Yurika Tarumi, Lifestyle, Science & Environment News Department)