Akiyoshi Yonezawa is a Professor and Director of The Office of Institutional Research at Tohoku University, Japan. He is the co-editor of Springer’s book series Higher Education in Asia: Quality, Excellence and Governance, and a Member of Editorial Advisory Board of the journal Higher Education published by Springer.Yuto Kitamura is an Associate Professor of Graduate School of Education at The University of Tokyo, Japan. He graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles with a PhD in education. His research interests are comparative education and sociology of education.Beverley Yamamoto is a Professor of Critical Studies in Education for Transformation at the Graduate School of Human Sciences at Osaka University. She is the Director of Human Sciences International Undergraduate Degree Programme and Deputy Director of the university’s International College. She gained her PhD from the University of Sheffield and is on the Editorial Board of the journal Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power.Tomoko Tokunaga is a Lecturer at the Faculty of International Communication at Gunma Prefectural Women’s University. She was a Project Assistant Professor at the International Center at Keio University prior to her current position. She graduated from the University of Maryland, College Park with a PhD in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies.

• 1 Japanese Educationin a Global Age: An Introduction.- Part I How have Japan's Education Policies been Discussed by Social Scientists?.- 2 A Comparative Perspective of Attitudes toward Educational Inequality.- 3 Universal Participation in School Education as a Historical Process in Modern Japan.- 4 Borrowings, Modernity, and De-Axialization: Rethinking the Educational Research Agenda for a Global Age.- Part II What Contemporary Challenges is Japan's Education Facing?.- 5 Gender and Sexuality in Japanese Education: From Gender Disparity to Intersectional and Multiple Gender/Sexualities.- 6 School-to-Work Transitions for Japanese Youth in a Globalized Era.- 7 Are Children who do not go to School "Bad", "Sick", or "Happy"?: Shifting Interpretations of Long-Term School Non-Attendance in Postwar Japan.- 8 Sociological Studies on Universities in Japan: Focusing on the Academic Profession.- 9 Growing up in Multicultural Japan: Diversifying Educational Experiences of Immigrant Students.- 10 The Growing Influence of Political Leadership on Teacher Education: Radical POlicy Reforms in the Absence of Opposition Forces.- 11 Learning Opportunities since the Great Earthquake of 2011.- 12 (Column 1) New Pathways to Economic Participation? Youth, Labor Policy and Entrepreneurship in Japan.- Part III How does Japan's Sociology of Education go beyond the National Boundary?.- 13 Internationalization of Japanese Higher Education: Incremental Change in a Dynamic Global Environment.- 14 Beyond National Frameworks: Patterns and Trends in Articles in Japanese Researchers published in International Journals of Sociology of Education and related Fields since the 1990s.- 15 Achievements and Future Challenges in Japan's Sociology of Education: Sociologization, Pedagogization, and Resociologization.- 16 (Column 2) East Asian Networks in the Sociology of Education.- 17 Meritocracy and Modernity, and the Completion of Catch-up: Problems and Paradoxes.