Shunsaku Komatsuzaki (Tokyo Metropolitan University)

Dr. Shunsaku Komatsuzaki is a professor of global public policy at the International Center, Tokyo Metropolitan University. He studied public policy for his master's and PhD in the United States while he graduated from the Department of Civil Engineering, the University of Tokyo. He has thus been working on multidisciplinary research for social problem solving, particularly in the fields of energy, healthcare, and regional/urban redevelopment. Also, he has been engaged in innovation and leadership education and provided many programs in Japan and other countries, such as Spain, Colombia, Peru, India, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Germany, UK, and the United States.

Course: Ideation Methods for Creative Policy Design: Toward Sustainable Societies

Contemporary societies face a wide range of complex and interrelated challenges related to sustainability, including climate change, energy transitions, disaster resilience, demographic change, social inequality, public health, urban and regional decline, technological transformation, and resource governance. These challenges cannot be adequately addressed by any single discipline or sector. Rather, they require the capacity to understand problems from multiple perspectives, collaborate across disciplinary and organizational boundaries, and generate creative policy ideas that respond to uncertain and rapidly changing social conditions.

This course introduces participants to ideation methods for creative policy design toward sustainable societies. You will learn basic theories, concepts, and practical methods drawn from design thinking, innovation studies, and related approaches to problem framing and solution development. Through lectures, discussions, and hands-on exercises, you will explore how to identify stakeholders’ needs, reframe complex social problems, generate alternative policy ideas, and develop preliminary policy concepts.

Concrete sustainability-related social issues will be presented as cases for policy design practice. Participants will work individually and/or in groups to apply ideation methods to the case, with the aim of developing innovative and feasible policy proposals. This course is designed as an introductory course for participants who wish to acquire fundamental competencies in creative thinking, multidisciplinary problem solving, and policy innovation for addressing wicked problems in contemporary society.