The Japan Institute of Architects (JIA) is Japan’s only professional organization of architects. Its principal role is to define and promote the social and legal status of professional architects in Japan. Following seventy years of efforts on the part of our predecessors to establish the profession of architecture in Japan, the JIA was founded in May 1987. It started by unifying two formerly individual associations that shared the same ideology: The Japan Architects Association (JAA) and The Japan Federation of Professional Architects Association (JFPAA). As an association of free and independent architects, the JIA is striving to create a greater understanding of the field of architecture within Japanese society, and to establish a firm social foundation and recognition for its members and their foreign counterparts worldwide.