Dr. Hiroko Hara is Professor at the Graduate School of Humanities, Josai International University. She serves as the Vice Chair, Japan Women’s Network for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Advisor/Former Chair, Asia Pacific Women’s Watch (APWW), and Director and Professor at the Institute for Gender Studies, Ochanomizu University. She has served as a member of the Advisory Committee for the Prime Minister's Office on Gender Equality and as an NGO advisor for the ICPD Preparatory Committeein 1994 in New York. Major works in English include “Environment, Resources, Population and Human Rights: Views as a Japanese Woman,” and “Women’s Participation in Various Areas of Higher Education,” in National Women’s Education Center, ed., Women in a Changing Society: The Japanese Scene (1990). Dr. Hara received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from Bryn Mawr. With more than 250 publications in Japanese, she was the first woman to be elected President of the Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology Institute. Hara taught a graduate seminar on “"Disaster and Gender in Japan.” The course examined the creation of innovative, gender-friendly policies in disaster risk reduction.