Makoto Watanabe

Makoto perceives Japan's journalism crisis as a pivotal opportunity to establish a robust infrastructure that fosters active civic engagement. By enhancing participatory mechanisms, this transformation aims to lay the groundwork for a more inclusive and dynamic democracy, where every citizen contributes meaningfully to the democratic process.

Tansa Newsroom exposes flaws in social structures and highlights marginalized groups through investigative reporting and media initiatives. By doing so, it compels citizens to recognize social injustices and take action. Beyond simply delivering information, Tansa engages diverse individuals—politicians, doctors, public servants, teachers, students, and anyone driven to improve society—demonstrating how investigative reporting can spark meaningful changes. Unlike traditional media, which often maintains a detached perspective, Tansa empowers people to become active agents of change, which is particularly a challenge in Japan where individuals are educated and trained to be obedient and conform to group norms by suppressing personal opinions and desires from early childhood.

Recognizing this challenge, Tansa takes an active role in bridging the gap by providing concrete guidance on how citizens can conduct their own investigations. Through guidance, individuals gain the skills to explore, confront, address, and resolve societal problems independently. Rather than positioning citizens as passive recipients of information, Tansa’s approach transforms them into proactive agents of change. By giving individuals access to reliable tools to find out the truth, they can hold power to account, demand transparency, and drive systemic change on their own terms. This represents a shift in journalists’ role—from merely “informing the public” to “building a participatory model where citizens play a central role in uncovering and addressing issues.”

Tansa functions as a web of support for key actors in the ecosystem and provides the most effective communication channels for their messages. It does not directly take the frontline in activism but provides the most effective communication channels for their messages and serves as a changemaker hub, connecting them with key individuals, resources, and organizations depending on the need. Through this approach, Tansa empowers citizens to take independent action while ensuring they have the necessary support whenever required, ultimately fostering a sustainable, citizen-driven investigative journalism ecosystem.

For decades, Japan’s mainstream media (television and newspapers) monopolized public discourse. Asahi Shimbun, one of Japan’s oldest and most influential newspapers founded in 1879 that has long been known for defending liberal values, had 10 million copies in circulation at its peak in 1994, declined to 3.5 million in 2024, reflecting a major exodus of readers. This decline is not solely due to digital transformation failures, but also to a decline in journalistic quality and a loss of public trust. Heavy reliance on the government-controlled Kisha-club (Press-club) based reporting, which often lacks fairness and originality, combined with a growing entanglement with political and corporate power, has eroded the credibility of mainstream media. Japan ranked 70th in the 2024 Press Freedom Index. As a result, the public no longer perceives major outlets as fulfilling their role as watchdogs, and many now believe that the mainstream media has become an extension of power rather than an independent check on it. Consequently, audiences have turned away from traditional media, significantly diminishing its influence over public discourse.

The decline of journalistic independence in Japan accelerated as major media outlets faced political pressure and internal struggles. Asahi Newspaper clashed with the PM Abe administration (2012-2020) over its reporting on the comfort women issue during the WWII and the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster in 2011, leading to backlash from both the government and right-wing groups. Under the pressure, Asahi withdrew the key stories, causing internal divisions within the organization. Other major media outlets distanced themselves from Asahi then, rather than defending press freedom, shifting towards government-aligned reporting. This shift resulted in a weakened culture of journalism, making mainstream media increasingly hesitant to challenge power, thereby further undermining its role as a watchdog. Instead of pursuing the truth, major media reporters started to write responding to how they are seen by their sponsors and readers to survive in the industry.

As Japan’s mainstream media lost its independence and credibility, it also failed to adapt to the digital era and invest in robust journalistic training. Unlike democratic countries in the West, Japan lacks a well-established system for journalist education, relying instead on in-house training within media organizations. This has resulted in a workforce that often lacks the investigative skills and critical mindset necessary for independent reporting. Furthermore, the pervasive influence of the Kisha-club (Press-club) system discourages original reporting, reinforcing a culture where journalists prioritize maintaining access to officials over pursuing hard-hitting stories. As a result, many choose not to report on critical issues, further eroding public trust. In this landscape, Tansa has emerged as a crucial resource, not only for citizen groups and social change organizations but also for journalists themselves, providing an alternative space where investigative journalism can thrive outside the constraints of traditional media.

Makoto aims to drive social transformation through the power of investigative reporting. He produces high-quality, in-depth reports that expose systemic malfunctions that lack transparency and accountability to exemplify what investigative reporting should look like. He created a platform not only for journalists who lacked investigative reporting training but also for ordinary citizens, professionals, and organizations to become investigative reporters themselves.

Unlike traditional major media outlets, which rely on an "observe and learn" OJT approach to train reporters—and in a country where structured university education for journalism is virtually nonexistent—Tansa has developed a systematic training method. Through clearly documented guidelines and structured curricula, Tansa efficiently cultivates journalists who uphold ethical principles and maintain a broad perspective in their investigative work. As a result, not only Tansa’s own staff but also reporters from major media organizations have begun attending Tansa’s training programs. The training program offers carefully designed sessions covering investigative techniques such as freedom of information (FOI) requests, data analysis, and systematic fact-finding methods, ensuring that anyone can use these skills to uncover critical information.

Furthermore, through collaborations with independent professional organizations, he developed publicly available databases that empower citizens as watchdogs. These tools are made sure to be user-friendly that, as he puts it, “even junior high school students can easily use.” Rather than restricting investigative techniques to journalists, he has democratized these methods, making them accessible to a broader audience.

One example is the Yen For Docs Database, collaboratively developed with the Medical Governance Research Institute (Iryo Governance), which allows anyone to look up the money paid by pharmaceutical companies to individual doctors and research facilities, enabling everyone to gain an understanding of the money that moves between these two industries. They saw 2.3 million hits during the first 2 months after it was launched. The research is ongoing, and real-time information is readily available. The database made a major impact in November 2019 when Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) used it for an official investigation on cash pay from pharma companies to medical doctors. During a House of Representatives committee meeting, MEXT confirmed that data from Tansa revealed seven university professors had received over ¥20 million in 2016, prompting the ministry to push for stricter ethical and employment regulations.

Another example is the Judgit Database, which enables anyone to look up information, including budget and outcomes on nearly all of the approximately 5,000 projects carried out by various government ministries, which was collaboratively developed with Koso Nippon, a respected independent think-tank. Judgit was replicated by the national government, showing Tansa’s credibility.

The other example involves a prefectural-level congressperson who underwent training with Tansa. She investigated the suspicious death of a young child following surgery at the largest children's hospital in Tokyo’s neighboring Kanagawa Prefecture with a population of 9 million, just second to Tokyo. Her investigative reporting, published through major online news sources, prompted a public apology from the hospital, acknowledging their responsibility for the child's death. This led to a significant personnel reshuffle, the first of its kind since the hospital transitioned to an independent administrative institution.

Tansa Newsroom operates as a vital back-office support hub, providing citizens, professionals, and advocacy groups with the tools, data, and investigative insights they need to act independently. By offering publicly accessible databases, investigative guides, and networks of legal and journalistic expertise, it ensures these groups have the foundation to sustain long-term reform efforts. While remaining behind the scenes, Tansa Newsroom empowers key groups—including medical doctors, former civil servants, municipal-level politicians, and grassroots organizations—to advocate for transparency and accountability. Through strategic partnerships, it validates, supports, and amplifies movements, allowing them to grow organically while maintaining credibility and strategic impact.

Looking ahead, Makoto plans to build a team of up to 50 people over the next 10 years, including operations and administrative staff, in addition to reporters. The team will not exceed 50 members, as he believes excessive growth could lead to bureaucracy and other negative consequences. More than its size, however, Makoto prioritizes expanding the network of citizens it partners with—individuals and organizations dedicated to strengthening democratic foundations across industries and social sectors. This network also includes entities connected to power, with which Makoto strategically cultivates and maintains perfectly balanced relationships, ensuring it remains independent and uncompromised.

Makoto first experienced the power of journalism at age 13 when he witnessed a classmate with disabilities being bullied. Though physically strong, he chose not to intervene with force but instead wrote an essay in the class diary condemning the bullying. His words had a profound impact, and the bullying stopped.

During high school, Makoto’s family faced financial difficulties and couldn’t afford cram school for college preparation. To support his education, he joined a paperboy program that provided room, board, and tuition assistance in exchange for newspaper delivery. Living in the dormitory exposed him to Japan’s harsh realities, including co-workers struggling with debt and former yakuza members trying to rebuild their lives.

After graduating from Waseda University, Makoto worked at a major TV company before joining Asahi Newspaper, where he eventually played a key role in leading its investigative unit. In 2014, Asahi faced intense criticism for its reporting on the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the WWII "comfort women" issue, prompting the newspaper’s leadership to issue public apologies. This controversy was one of the factors that ultimately led to the shutdown of the investigative unit a few years later.

In 2015, Makoto's team investigated the financial ties between pharmaceutical companies, doctors, and government committees. However, threats of lawsuits and advertising cancellations pressured Asahi to shut down the investigation on this issue. Then Makoto came to a stark realization that traditional media could no longer guarantee transparency. This awakening compelled him to leave Asahi and fight for change from the outside.

In 2017, he co-founded Waseda Chronicle, later renamed Tansa Newsroom. One of its first major achievements was publishing a database detailing payments from pharmaceutical companies to doctors, which was released in 2018, which was accessed 2.3 million times in two months. This work contributed to reforms discouraging large payments to doctors and increasing oversight in the medical field. The data has been renewed every year in collaboration with Medical Governance to this day.

In the summer of 2019, he was invited to a seminar at Central European University (CEU), an institution founded by George Soros, where investigative journalists from around the world had gathered. During this event, he connected with staff from the Open Society Foundation, which led to him becoming a grant recipient. To this day, he remains the only Japanese journalist to receive this ongoing support.