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Japan Computer Access for Empowerment (JCAFE)
Japanese
  1. Internet for Nonprofit Activities
  2. The History of JCAFE
  3. Basic Idea and Guiding Principles of JCAFE
  4. Services and Projects
  5. Civil Society and the Internet; Twenty Years of Networking and Future Prospects

The History of JCAFE

Especially after the launch of the Gulf War in 1991, citizen groups in Japan felt the desire to have a network connected to the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), a computer communication network shared by NGOs in several countries. This desire for a united network culminated in the founding of Japan Computer Access (JCA) in 1993. JCA carried out activities to establish the right of citizens to information, and supported citizen groups hoping to use the Internet. This is how we started our activities.

On the basis of these activities, in April 1997 we set up JCA-NET, an ISP for NGOs, jointly with many NGOs and citizen groups.

To make an English name that better reflected our activities, in 1999 we changed our English name to Japan Computer Access For Empowerment, which from now on I will call JCAFE.

We acquired a specific not-for-profit activity corporation status in January 2001, and thus took our first step into the 21st century.