The potential abolition of so many universities is a ‘dramatic move’ that analysts warn will affect thousands of students and teachers
3-MIN READ3-MIN ListenJulian RyallPublished: 9:30am, 1 May 2026Japan’s shrinking youth population is forcing a reckoning in higher education, with the finance ministry pushing for the closure or merger of hundreds of private universities as campuses struggle to fill classrooms.University insiders broadly agree that Japan has too many small, private tertiary institutions battling enrolment shortfalls and financial pressures, but they also argue the education ministry’s own policies contributed to the problem.
“The number of universities they are talking about shutting or merging is quite a shock and it will be a concern for anyone in education,” said Makoto Watanabe, a professor of communications and media at Hokkaido Bunkyo University in Eniwa, Hokkaido.
“We all recognise that fewer children are being born in Japan now, but the education ministry approved the opening of several new universities in the last decade so it is partly their responsibility that there are too many now,” he told This Week in Asia.
“The issue of the nation’s birth rate is not new, so why did the bureaucrats who are now planning to close private universities approve the opening of others?”
The push comes from the finance ministry, which said in a report this month that 250 universities accounted for around 40 per cent of the 624 private higher education institutions across the country and were likely to be closed or merged.
