This week, we concluded our last class for National Development & Transport Infrastructure with Professor Shigeru Morichi.
I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude towards Professor Morichi for his insightful lectures as they have inspired me to think in new and creative ways while keeping in mind how policy implementation might be impeded by external factors like politics. We learnt about the various transport modes in Japan, from the JR, Shinkansen to ANA, JAL and road networks/highways. He has taught us how to think more deeply about policy issues related to logistics and urban transportation systems by identifying problems in a bigger context of the reinforcing cycles. In his last lecture, he encouraged us not to spend efforts solving small and easy problems first. Instead, he urged us to spend more time to think about the larger problems surrounding a certain phenomena and think of a way to create a positive feedback loop from there. Even the most difficult problems can have surprisingly simple answers, like a tweak in the toll collection system can significantly affect peoples' incentives and hence their behavior.
Despite his achievements, I believe that Professor Morichi's humility and patience in explaining concepts to students have inspired many students in this class. Through sharing about his work experience in implementing the Shinkansen, privatization of JR etc., we have benefitted tremendously from a vivid description of the problems faced as well as his way of overcoming these obstacles.
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Dr Shigeru Morichi is currently the President of the Institute for Policy Studies. He has also been awarded Professor Emeritus status at the University of Tokyo and the Tokyo Institute of Technology. You can view one of his presentations (in Japanese) at this website:
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