Greetings from the President
Happy New Year!
According to the Chinese zodiac, we are now in the Year of the Snake, a symbolic zodiac creature that molts and regenerates. I would like to think of this as a sign of the Japanese economy’s rebirth.
2023 was said to be the first year of AI, and 2025 is now expected to be the first year of AI agents. The world is transitioning from generative AI to behavioral AI, and in the coming future we will enter an era of artificial general intelligence (AGI), when systems built with this advanced technology will become close partners of humans. Against this backdrop, we as PR professionals will now be tested on how well we can leverage our new partner to increase productivity.
This year will also see the opening of the Osaka Expo in Japan on April 13. The event is expected to bring together knowledge and insights from around the world. Separately, but concurrently, Grand Green Osaka will fully open this year as a promising multi-purpose civic development centered around a beautiful urban green space that is sure to attract countless people, including expo visitors.
But despite these hopeful trends, ongoing problems persist in other areas, such as conflicts in various parts of the world that are fueling inflation, including in Japan. In addition, Japan’s GDP was overtaken by Germany last year and is expected to be surpassed by India this year. Even discounting the country’s continuing population decline, GDP per capita has not stopped declining. Furthermore, according to the World Happiness Report, happiness in Japan fell from 47th in 2023 to 51st out of 143 countries last year.
Japan’s economic downturn appears to be linked to lagging labor productivity, and the slump in happiness is said to be largely due to difficulties in various types of relationships in society. Japan is becoming an increasingly “divided society” with growing lines of division evident in various economic and social indicators. We are in danger of entering an era in which people are deceived by disinformation, leading to heightened anxiety and distrust.
AI cannot yet be used as a tool to directly create happiness. But if we learn to use it well, it could provide us with possible answers to fundamental questions, including how to increase productivity in Japan. However, it will be up to humans to continually evaluate the results and modify AI as needed with appropriate instructions. The key will be to determine the best questions to ask in order to close the gap between current conditions and future ideals, and to identify the most important issues to address.
An overemphasis on time and cost efficiency in the pursuit of a goal can result in algorithms and social media dividing people into groups that each see the world very differently. In turn, this could lead to less efficiency, lower productivity and growth in society, and in the worst case, society could fall into a state of widespread mistrust. Therefore, the volume and quality of two-way communication must be increased to encourage people to coexist and co-prosper as a whole, and to adopt a win-win mentality to coordinate the interests of diverse groups. From this perspective, public relations has an increasingly important role to fulfill.
Specifically, we need to increase the efficiency of processes for obtaining answers, which would allow us to save labor and redirect the freed-up capacity to constructive dialogue and communication focused on questions about human relationships (why) and societal issues (what). In addition to using AI to improve efficiency, PR professionals must also strive to assess consumer sentiment and use their creativity to develop methods that help maximize empathy among diverse stakeholders.
My hope is that 2025 will be the first year in which outdated models and practices are shed like the skin of a molting snake, and in turn, increased growth and happiness become the new normal.
Thank you in advance for your continued support this year.
Takamasa Yamaguchi
President
Public Relations Society of Japan (PRSJ)
