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The Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RIHN) was established in 2001 by the Government of Japan to promote ‘integrated cooperative research toward the solution of global environmental problems’ and to create the field of global environmental studies. RIHN’s objective is to define, conduct and debate integrative research capable of describing the true dynamism of earth phenomena and humanity’s place in it. To this end, RIHN solicits funds and hosts fixed-term research projects on key areas of interactions between humanity and nature.

This prospectus introduces RIHN's approach to environmental studies, one based in nuanced appreciation for past human success and failure, present social and biophysical processes, and their inevitable change and unknown future. We use the concept of futurability, a word coined in Japan as a translation of the ideographs for ‘future’ and ‘potentiality,’ to express the wide range of possibility in future development. Human societies must think boldly, and yet with humility, about their individual and collective futures in the midst of dynamic, changeable earth environments.

The year 2011 marks the opening of the RIHN's second decade. I would like to congratulate RIHN's many talented researchers on their impressive accomplishments to date. RIHN is also continually enriched through many individual and institutional academic collaborations and an emerging international network for transdisciplinary environmental studies. I should note the recent publication of “The RIHN Encyclopedia of Global Environmental Studies”, a formidable synthesis of current environmental thought in Japan and a fitting commemoration of RIHN’s first decade. The entire RIHN research community can take pride in such accomplishments, and yet much work remains. RIHN's intellectual goals and research structure continue to evolve as we consider how to enable the future potential in, and enhanced design of, interactions between humanity and nature.

This prospectus describes many of RIHN's endeavors and introduces the innovations to be adopted in its second decade. I hope the reader is impressed with the quality and breadth of RIHN research and will join us in our efforts to improve it. I invite your warm understanding and support, as well as your critical assessments, of this prospectus and all RIHN activities.