Urban Resilience Research Center

In conjunction with the founding of Osaka Metropolitan University, "Urban Research Plaza (URP)" and "Center of Education and Research for Disaster Management (CERD)," both of which were formerly organized in Osaka City University, were merged to form "Urban Resilience Research Center (UReC)."

UReC is integrating the research and related activities that URP and CERD have been engaged in, and actively grapple with wide-ranging urban issues.

The missions and activities

The Urban Resilience Research Center (acronymic UReC) of Osaka Metropolitan University (OMU) is an interdisciplinary research organization undertaking comprehensively three functions of education, research, and social contribution in line with the founding purpose of OMU that aims for solving problems and promoting development of the Metropolitan Osaka.  UReC plays a part of an urban think tank in collaboration with departments and institutions both inside and outside the university.

UReC gathers the knowledge and resources of OMU’s internal and external experts to address the complex and multidimensional risks and crises that cities face nowadays and in the future. It carries out education, research, and social contributions as a hub for the network of industry, government, academia and civil societies to jointly engage in urban risk management and governance.

UReC also aims to realize inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable cities and human settlements by serving as an international base for urban science and disaster prevention research.

UReC strives to deepen scientific knowledge that contributes to solving the various challenges that need to be overcome for realizing inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable cities and human settlements and widely disseminates and shares its research results with both the local community and the whole world.

UReC trains researchers and practitioners who will take the lead in urban science and disaster prevention research for responding to the complex and diverse risks and crises that cities face now or will face in near future.

UReC does not keep to an “ivory tower” but goes to scenes where various urban problems actually occur and contributes to the realization of sustainable cities by collaborating with city governments, civil society organizations and residents who work on solving those urban problems.

UReC is certified as one of the “Joint Usage/Research Centers” by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) under the name of “Platform for Leading-edge Urban Studies”.

The “Joint Usage/Research Center” is a system for researchers from all over Japan to jointly use large-scale research facilities and other invaluable academic resources to conduct joint research beyond the framework of individual research institutions. 

UReC not only provides its abundant academic resources related with urban issues to researchers nationwide.  It also fulfills its mission as a "Joint Usage/Research Center" by connecting researchers from various research institutions in Japan with the international networks of urban research which have been built so far with research institutions in various cities in East Asia, and by organizing interdisciplinary joint research projects of multiple researchers from different research institutions.

UReC also actively engages in nurturing young researchers who will take on urban research in the coming era in connection with the above-mentioned activities.

*Following links are for the archived websites of Urban Research Plaza and the Center of Education and Research for Disaster Management, Osaka City University.