CALL FOR PROPOSALS

4th International Conference on Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education

第4回「教育分野に於ける池田・創価研究国際会議」

Value-Creating Approaches to Knowledge, Society, and Power

知識・社会・権力に関する価値創造的アプローチ

July 31 – August 1, 2025 (in-person)
DePaul University / Chicago, Illinois (USA)

Submission Deadline: Sunday, May 25, 2025
Notification of Acceptance/Rejection: Monday, June 9, 2025
Confirmation of Participation: Monday, June 30, 2025

The DePaul University Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education is thrilled to host the 4th International Conference on Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education. This conference engages with and takes its name from Japanese thought leader Ikeda Daisaku (1928–2023) and his many contributions to education as well as from the heritage of ideas and ideals from Makiguchi Tsunesaburō (1871–1944) and Toda Jōsei (1900–1958) that he embraced, developed, and spread globally under the broad banner of “sōka,” a Japanese neologism meaning the “creation of value.”

Conference Theme
This year’s theme—Value-Creating Approaches to Knowledge, Society, and Power—invites intrinsic and extrinsic scholarship on the principle of value creation common to Ikeda, Toda, and Makiguchi, even as they articulated and practiced it differently. By “intrinsic” we mean the historical and primary texts by Makiguchi, Toda, and Ikeda in Japanese and the contexts in which they were written; by “extrinsic” we mean these texts and their ideas in translation and application in various contexts and disciplines today.

Makiguchi introduced value-creating approaches in his four-volume work Sōka kyōikugaku taikei (The System of Value-Creating Pedagogy, 1930-1934/1981-1996, vols. 5-6). Drawing on decades of his own classroom practice, he distinguished truth from value, seeking to clarify the often-confused psychological processes of cognition (understanding something as it objectively is) and evaluation (determining its relevance to life). Facticity alone does not make truth meaningful to our lives, Makiguchi argued. Rather, the significance of truth or facticity in our lives comes from the subjective meaning, or “value,” we create from it. Makiguchi thus advocated a two-step pedagogical practice that fosters learners’ abilities to cognize truth and create value from it in terms of beauty, gain, and good—that is, aesthetically or sensorially pleasing and utilitarian value that serves oneself and others. He asserted that such value creation is what demonstrates agency and character value and engenders genuine, almost existential happiness.

Toda (1965–1966) applied a value-creating approach in his Jishū Gakkan tutorial school and used it as a framework for guiding learners’ deductive reasoning in mathematics and other subjects. In his foreword to Toda’s Suirishiki shidō sanjutsu (A Deductive Guide to Arithmetic), published under the name Toda Jōgai, Makiguchi 1981-1996) stated that although his value-creating pedagogy had to date remained a theory without empirical verification, “I am delighted to see its universality completely substantiated by this study guide, which was written based on many years of [instructional] experience by Toda Jōgai, who has long supported my pedagogy” (vol. 9, p. 204).

Ikeda (2021) memorialized the principle of value creation in the name and ethos of the kindergartens, schools, and universities he established across Asia and the Americas, defining it simply as the “capacity to find meaning, to enhance one’s own existence and contribute to the well-being of others, under any circumstance” (p. 6). He envisioned value-creating approaches in and outside schooling and across the age span as an onto-epistemological means of confronting the most pressing challenges facing humanity and the planet (Ikeda, 1988–2015).

Society today faces many such challenges: from the everyday struggles of learning and instruction to assaults on education and the professoriate; from the rise of nationalisms and geopolitical uncertainties to local and global economic destabilization; from disinformation and the undermining of science to anxieties surrounding artificial intelligence; from the erosion of human rights, agency, and bodily autonomy to existential threats of climate change and nuclear annihilation; and much more. In his 2010 annual commemorative proposal, Ikeda (2010) argues that “[n]o matter how great the divide between our ideals and reality may be, there is no need to give up hope or accept this with resignation. Instead, the ordinary citizens of the world need to come together to create a new reality” (p. 9). The challenge of creating a new reality is “the challenge of creating value—the process by which each of us, in our respective roles and capacities, strives to create that value which is ours alone to realize in order to benefit our fellow citizens, society as a whole and the future” (Ikeda, 2014, p. 11). This social resilience—that is, the means to “guide and restrain a runaway civilization” (Ikeda, 2010, p. 3)—lies in value creation of “people working together to resolve issues” and which “always takes hope as its starting point” and “calls forth the best in each of us” (Ikeda, 2014, p. 12).

This year’s theme, then, encourages us to reflect on the possibilities of value creation in our local and global communities and across the broad field of education.

Conference Scope
As research and praxis in the field of Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education grows worldwide, this international forum is an opportunity for established and emerging scholars to gather, substantively discuss the current state of, and actively and collaboratively unite, characterize, define, and advance scholarship in, the field. Particularly important here is a proper accounting of various elements of the primary texts, such as their diverse voices, modes, and styles (e.g., poetry, energetic and personal prose, essays, speeches, detailed proposals); purpose and audience (e.g., faith encouragement for the initiated, engagements with society at large, writings for specialists in specific disciplines); translation approaches used—domestication (bringing the writer to the reader) versus foreignization (bringing the reader to the writer)—and the terms, phrases, and meanings employed, assumed, and abandoned, as well as which of these are featured and endorsed in the most current, authoritative bilingual-bicultural scholarship and why. In navigating these the field must maintain fidelity to intrinsic dimensions while exploring extrinsic possibilities that are relevant to current and future demands in education and human becoming worldwide. It must recognize and articulate the nuanced and comparative particularities and uniqueness of the educational thought and practices of Ikeda, Toda, and Makiguchi, and reckon with conceptual and terminological assumptions, generalizations, gaps, and silences.

In sum, this conference provides a space for international scholars and professionals involved in Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education to present their work and engage in dialogue with others in the field. The conference will feature invited keynote presentations by leading scholars as well as submitted individual paper and panel presentations. We seek scholarly submissions on theory and theorizing; empirical, conceptual, and applied research in practice and policy; bilingual and critical discourse analysis; and text-based praxis of Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education in various contexts. These may include, but are not limited to, the conference theme and fields common to Ikeda, Toda, and/or Makiguchi, such as: human education, global citizenship, communities studies, human geography, human rights and peace education, nuclear disarmament, dialogue, creativity and the poetic heart/mind/spirit, literature and the arts, biospheric sustainability, interdependence and creative coexistence, people movements, youth activism and empowerment, deductive reasoning, language and literacies education, aptitude and assessment, knowledge and wisdom, student-teacher relationships, social self-actualization and contributive living and happiness.

Chicago is beautiful in the summer. We hope you will submit a proposal and join us for this conference!

Proposal Guidelines
We invite two types of proposals: Individual Papers and Panels (panels comprise 3-4 individual presentations thematically grouped). Each paper presentation, whether single or multi-authored, submitted individually or as part of a panel, will be limited to 18 minutes; dialogue and Q&A will be built into each session.

For Individual Papers, please include:

  • Title of the presentation (13-word limit)
  • Name and institutional affiliation of the presenter(s)
  • 400-600-word Summary of the presentation, including in-text and end references, addressing under separate headings:
    • key aspects of theoretical frames and/or arguments,
    • primary/secondary literature used,
    • research design and methods,
    • findings and implications
  • Full reference list [APA or Chicago Manual Style]

For Panels, please include:

  • Title (13-word limit) and 75-100-word Abstract of the Panel focus
  • Name and institutional affiliation of respective presenters
  • Title (13-word limit) and 300-500 word Summary of each presentation in the panel, including in-text and end references, addressing under separate headings:
    • key aspects of theoretical frames and/or arguments,
    • primary/secondary literature used,
    • research design and methods,
    • findings and implications
  • Full reference list [APA or Chicago Manual Style]

Submission Process and Timeline

Confirmation of Participation
Authors will be asked to confirm participation by June 30, 2025. If confirmation of participation is not received, the accepted proposal will not be included in the conference program.

Note: The Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education reserves the right to amend the grammaticality and syntax of titles and descriptions for accepted proposals. We ask submissions to follow translations included in The Light of Learning: Selected Writings on Education (Ikeda, 2021), the most recent and updated collection of works by Ikeda on education.

References
Ikeda, D. (1988–2015). Ikeda Daisaku zenshū [The complete works of Ikeda Daisaku] (Vols. 1–150). Seikyō Shinbunsha.
Ikeda, D. (2010). Toward a new era of value creation. Soka Gakkai.
Ikeda, D. (2014). Value creation for global change: Building resilient and sustainable societies. Soka Gakkai.
Ikeda, D. (2021b). The light of learning: Selected writings on education. Middleway Press.
Makiguchi, T. (1981–1996). Makiguchi Tsunesaburō zenshū [The complete works of Makiguchi Tsunesaburō] (Vols. 1–10). Daisan Bunmeisha.
Toda, J. (1965–1966). Toda Jōsei zenshū [The complete works of Toda Jōsei] (Vols. 1–5). Wakōsha.

Recommended Citation for this Call:
Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education. (2025). Call for proposals, Value-creating approaches to knowledge, society, and power. 4th International Conference on Ikeda/Soka Studies in Education. DePaul University Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education. Chicago, Illinois.

You can download the Call for Proposals here.