On the Persistence of the Japanese History Problem

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1351611925
Total Pages : 283 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (516 download)

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Book Synopsis On the Persistence of the Japanese History Problem by : Hitomi Koyama

Download or read book On the Persistence of the Japanese History Problem written by Hitomi Koyama and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-06-13 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Japan, people often refer to August 15, 1945 as the end of "that war." But the duration of "that war" remains vague. At times, it refers to the fifteen years of war in the Asia-Pacific. At others, it refers to an imagination of the century long struggle between the East and the West that characterized much of the 19th century. This latter dramatization in particular reinforces longstanding Eurocentric and Orientalist discourses about historical development that presume the non-West lacks historical agency. Nearly 75 years since the nominal end of the war, Japan’s "history problem" – a term invoking the nation’s inability to come to terms with its imperial past – persists throughout Asia today. Going beyond well-worn clichés about the state’s use and abuse of discourses of historical modernity, Koyama shows how the inability to confront the debris of empire is tethered to the deferral of agency to a hegemonic order centered on the United States. The present is thus a moment one stitched between the disavowal of responsibility on the one hand, and the necessity of becoming a proper subject of history on the other. Behind this seeming impasse lay questions about how to imagine the state as the subject of history in a postcolonial moment – after grand narratives, after patriotism, and after triumphalism.

The History Problem

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Author :
Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824874390
Total Pages : 293 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis The History Problem by : Hiro Saito

Download or read book The History Problem written by Hiro Saito and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2017-04-01 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seventy years have passed since the end of the Asia-Pacific War, yet Japan remains embroiled in controversy with its neighbors over the war’s commemoration. Among the many points of contention between Japan, China, and South Korea are interpretations of the Tokyo War Crimes Trial, apologies and compensation for foreign victims of Japanese aggression, prime ministerial visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, and the war’s portrayal in textbooks. Collectively, these controversies have come to be called the “history problem.” But why has the problem become so intractable? Can it ever be resolved, and if so, how? To answer these questions author Hiro Saito mobilizes the sociology of collective memory and social movements, political theories of apology and reconciliation, psychological research on intergroup conflict, and philosophical reflections on memory and history. The history problem, he argues, is essentially a relational phenomenon caused when nations publicly showcase self-serving versions of the past at key ceremonies and events: Japan, South Korea, and China all focus on what happened to their own citizens with little regard for foreign others. Saito goes on to explore the emergence of a cosmopolitan form of commemoration taking humanity, rather than nationality, as its primary frame of reference, an approach increasingly used by a transnational network of advocacy NGOs, victims of Japan’s past wrongdoings, historians, and educators. When cosmopolitan commemoration is practiced as a collective endeavor by both perpetrators and victims, Saito argues, a resolution of the history problem—and eventual reconciliation—will finally become possible. The History Problem examines a vast corpus of historical material in both English and Japanese, offering provocative findings that challenge orthodox explanations. Written in clear and accessible prose, this uniquely interdisciplinary book will appeal to sociologists, political scientists, and historians researching collective memory, nationalism and cosmopolitanism, and international relations—and to anyone interested in the commemoration of historical wrongs. An electronic version of this book is freely available thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched, a collaborative initiative designed to make high-quality books open access for the public good. The open-access version of this book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which means that the work may be freely downloaded and shared for non-commercial purposes, provided credit is given to the author. Derivative works and commercial uses require permission from the publisher.

The Art of Persistence

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Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 082488230X
Total Pages : 342 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis The Art of Persistence by : Charlotte Eubanks

Download or read book The Art of Persistence written by Charlotte Eubanks and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2019-12-31 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Art of Persistence examines the relations between art and politics in transwar Japan, exploring these via a microhistory of the artist, memoirist, and activist Akamatsu Toshiko (also known as Maruki Toshi, 1912–2000). Scaling up from the details of Akamatsu’s lived experience, the book addresses major events in modern Japanese history, including colonization and empire, war, the nuclear bombings, and the transwar proletarian movement. More broadly, it outlines an ethical position known as persistence, which occupies the grey area between complicity and resistance: Like resilience, persistence signals a commitment to not disappearing—a fierce act of taking up space but often from a position of privilege, among the classes and people in power. Akamatsu grew up in a settler-colonial family in rural Hokkaido before attending arts college in Tokyo and becoming one of the first women to receive formal training as an oil painter in Japan. She later worked as a governess in the home of a Moscow diplomat and traveled to the Japanese Mandate in Micronesia before returning home to write and illustrate children’s books set in the Pacific. She married the surrealist poet and painter Maruki Iri (1901–1995), and together in 1948—and in defiance of Occupation censorship—they began creating and exhibiting the Nuclear Series, some of the most influential and powerful artwork depicting the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing. For the next forty or more years, the couple toured the world to protest war and nuclear proliferation and were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995. With abundant excerpts and drawings from Akamatsu’s journals and sketchbooks, The Art of Persistence offers a bridge between scholarship on imperial Japan and postwar memory cultures, arguing for the importance of each individual’s historical agency. While uncovering the longue durée of Japan’s visual cultures of war, it charts the development of the national(ist) “literature for little citizens” movement and Japan’s postwar reorientation toward global multiculturalism. Finally, the work proposes ways to enlist artwork generally, and the museum specifically, as a site of ethical engagement.

Colonial Legacies

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Publisher : Psychology Press
ISBN 13 : 9780415921527
Total Pages : 340 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (215 download)

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Book Synopsis Colonial Legacies by : Jeremy Adelman

Download or read book Colonial Legacies written by Jeremy Adelman and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The United States between China and Japan

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Publisher : Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1443865052
Total Pages : 502 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (438 download)

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Book Synopsis The United States between China and Japan by : Caroline Rose

Download or read book The United States between China and Japan written by Caroline Rose and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2014-07-24 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From its insistence that Japan should favour diplomatic normalization with the Republic of China over the People’s Republic of China in 1952, through its role, via the Security Treaty, of keeping the ‘cap in the bottle’ of Japanese militarism, to weighing in on the Diaoyu/Senkaku islands dispute between China and Japan, the United States has played a pivotal, and at times controversial, role in the development of China-Japan relations since the end of World War II. By extension, US influence on China-Taiwan and Taiwan-Japan relations, in addition to its impact on the efforts of various actors to construct a Northeast Asian regional community, continues to pose important questions about the nature of the US role in East Asia in the 21st century. This volume provides a multi-faceted overview of the nature of America’s interaction in East Asia since the end of the war, and highlights the obstacles to improved bilateral and regional integration. The contributors offer a range of perspectives from their respective US, European, and East Asian vantage points, and point to the ongoing and prominent involvement of the US in the region for the foreseeable future.

Japan’s Island Troubles with China and Korea

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1351619039
Total Pages : 258 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (516 download)

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Book Synopsis Japan’s Island Troubles with China and Korea by : Victor Teo

Download or read book Japan’s Island Troubles with China and Korea written by Victor Teo and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-11-01 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the Senkaku/Diaoyu dispute between Japan and China and the Dokdo/Takeshima dispute between Japan and Korea, in order to offer new perspectives on the possible approaches towards amelioration and resolution of these conflicts. Japan’s Island Troubles with China and Korea addresses the prospects of and challenges to achieving resolutions in the island disputes, rather than focusing solely on the origins and the political roles they play in the domestic politics of the three nations. Furthermore, in taking an interdisciplinary approach, this book transcends existing studies, which focus on the domestic contexts of the disputes, and therefore avoids the pitfalls of nationalistic narratives. Instead, this book fills a theoretical and methodological lacuna in the academic literature, exploring how the islands could become a point of co-operation, rather than contention. Providing a fresh examination of Japan’s relations with its two closest neighbours, this book will be invaluable to students and scholars of Asian politics and international relations, security studies, and Asia-Pacific studies more generally.

Handbook on the Politics of Memory

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Author :
Publisher : Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1800372531
Total Pages : 419 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (3 download)

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Book Synopsis Handbook on the Politics of Memory by : Maria Mälksoo

Download or read book Handbook on the Politics of Memory written by Maria Mälksoo and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2023-01-20 with total page 419 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Providing a novel multi-disciplinary theorization of memory politics, this insightful Handbook brings varied literatures into a focused dialogue on the ways in which the past is remembered and how these influence transnational, interstate, and global politics in the present.

Asia and Postwar Japan

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 1684176638
Total Pages : 444 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (841 download)

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Book Synopsis Asia and Postwar Japan by : Simon Avenell

Download or read book Asia and Postwar Japan written by Simon Avenell and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2023-12-04 with total page 444 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: War, defeat, and the collapse of empire in 1945 touched every aspect of postwar Japanese society, profoundly shaping how the Japanese would reconstruct national identity and reengage with the peoples of Asia. While “America” offered a vision of re-genesis after cataclysmic ruin, “Asia” exposed the traumata of perpetration and the torment of ethnic responsibility. Obscured in the shadows of a resurgent postwar Japan lurked a postimperial specter whose haunting presence both complicated and confounded the spiritual rehabilitation of the nation. Asia and Postwar Japan examines Japanese deimperialization from 1945 until the early twenty-first century. It focuses on the thought and activism of progressive activists and intellectuals as they struggled to overcome rigid preconceptions about “Asia,” as they grappled with the implications of postimperial responsibility, and as they forged new regional solidarities and Asian imaginaries. Simon Avenell reveals the critical importance of Asia in postwar Japanese thought, activism, and politics—Asia as a symbolic geography, Asia as a space for grassroots engagement, and ultimately, Asia as an aporia of identity and the source of a new politics of hope.

Hard Times in the Hometown

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Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824861124
Total Pages : 266 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis Hard Times in the Hometown by : Martin Dusinberre

Download or read book Hard Times in the Hometown written by Martin Dusinberre and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2012-02-29 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hard Times in the Hometown tells the story of Kaminoseki, a small town on Japan’s Inland Sea. Once one of the most prosperous ports in the country, Kaminoseki fell into profound economic decline following Japan’s reengagement with the West in the late nineteenth century. Using a recently discovered archive and oral histories collected during his years of research in Kaminoseki, Martin Dusinberre reconstructs the lives of households and townspeople as they tried to make sense of their changing place in the world. In challenging the familiar story of modern Japanese growth, Dusinberre provides important new insights into how ordinary people shaped the development of the modern state. Chapters describe the role of local revolutionaries in the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the ways townspeople grasped opportunities to work overseas in the late nineteenth century, and the impact this pan-Pacific diaspora community had on Kaminoseki during the prewar decades. These histories amplify Dusinberre’s analysis of postwar rural decline—a phenomenon found not only in Japan but throughout the industrialized Western world. His account comes to a climax when, in the 1980s, the town’s councillors request the construction of a nuclear power station, unleashing a storm of protests from within the community. This ongoing nuclear dispute has particular resonance in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima crisis. Hard Times in the Hometown gives voice to personal histories otherwise lost in abandoned archives. By bringing to life the everyday landscape of Kaminoseki, this work offers readers a compelling story through which to better understand not only nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japan but also modern transformations more generally.

Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1351110217
Total Pages : 315 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (511 download)

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Book Synopsis Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia by : Kosuke Shimizu

Download or read book Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia written by Kosuke Shimizu and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-01-30 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do we study when we study International Relations (IR)? This book interrogates the meanings of the established ontology and subjectivity embedded in the discourse of "Western" and "non-Western" IR. We are predisposed to see a nation-state as a unified entity, everlasting and moving towards a particular end. This leads us to say, for example, "Japan is threatened by the possible Chinese attack’ without questioning what "Japan" and "China" mean in this context. This book tries to locate and unearth the consistent structure and system of the world, with a particular focus on subjectivity and temporality in IR that captures the way in which we conceive and misconceive the world. The contributors reveal the extent to which contemporary IR discourses are a part of the culture of linear progress and pre-given autonomous sovereign individuals. Our targets of inquiry therefore inevitably include not only "Western" IR, but "non-Western" discourses as well. The contributors focus on the fluid identities of contemporary world affairs with special attention to temporality, and strive to develop a new approach to understanding the contemporary world and the meanings of world affairs.

Disciplining Democracies

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Publisher : Policy Press
ISBN 13 : 1529232864
Total Pages : 247 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (292 download)

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Book Synopsis Disciplining Democracies by : Lindsay Black

Download or read book Disciplining Democracies written by Lindsay Black and published by Policy Press. This book was released on 2023-07-27 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines Japan’s relationship with Myanmar from the passage of its constitution in May 2008 to the February 2021 coup d’état that finished its transition to a ‘disciplined democracy.’ It explores the nexus between security and political economy in the context of changing regional dynamics characterized by ‘Great Power’ competition and cooperation. Focusing on the impact of Japan’s relations with Myanmar on people in Myanmar and beyond, the author argues that the Japanese government and businesses side lined ‘universal values’ for profit at the expense of human security. This text develops a unique Area Studies approach that critiques how Japan’s foreign policy elites perceive Japan’s role in the liberal international order.

Japanese American Ethnicity

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Publisher : University of Washington Press
ISBN 13 : 0295801832
Total Pages : 222 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (958 download)

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Book Synopsis Japanese American Ethnicity by : Stephen S. Fugita

Download or read book Japanese American Ethnicity written by Stephen S. Fugita and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2011-10-01 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why do some groups retain their ethnicity as they become assimilated into mainstream American life while others do not? This study employs both historical sources and contemporary survey data to explain the seeming paradox of why Japanese Americans have maintained high levels of ethnic community involvement while becoming structurally assimilated. Most traditional approaches to the study of ethnicity in the United States are based on the European immigrant experience and conclude that a zero-sum relationship exists between assimilation and retention of ethnicity: community solidarity weakens as structural assimilation grows stronger. Japanese Americans, however, like American Jews, do not fit this pattern. The basic thesis of this book is that the maintenance of ethnic community solidarity, the process of assimilation, and the reactions of an ethnic group to outside forces must be understood in light of the internal social organization of the ethnic group, which can be traced to core cultural orientations that predate immigration. Though frequently excluded from mainstream economic opportunities, Japanese Americans were able to form quasi-kin relationships of trust, upon which enduring group economic relations could be based. The resultant ethnic economy and petit bourgeois family experience fostered the values of hard work, deferred gratification, and other perspectives conductive to success in mainstream society. This book will be of interest to sociologist and psychologist studying ethnicity, community organization, and intergenerational change; and to anyone interested in the Japanese American experience from an economic or political perspective, Asian American studies, or social history of the United States.

Acting Like a State

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1351977881
Total Pages : 233 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (519 download)

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Book Synopsis Acting Like a State by : Gëzim Visoka

Download or read book Acting Like a State written by Gëzim Visoka and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-06-13 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do emerging states obtain international recognition and secure membership of international organisations in contemporary world politics? This book provides the first in-depth study of Kosovo’s diplomatic approach to becoming a sovereign state by obtaining international recognition and securing membership of international organisations. Analysing the everyday diplomatic discourses, performances, and entanglements, this book contends that state-becoming is not wholly determined by systemic factors, normative institutions, or the preferences of great powers; the diplomatic agency of the fledgling state plays a far more important role than is generally acknowledged. Drawing on institutional ethnographic research and first-hand observations, this book argues that Kosovo’s diplomatic success in consolidating its sovereign statehood has been the situational assemblage of multiple discourses, practiced through a broad variety of performative actions, and shaped by a complex entanglement with global assemblages of norms, actors, relations, and events. Accordingly, this book contributes to expanding our understanding of the everyday diplomatic agency of emerging states and the changing norms, politics, and practices regarding the diplomatic recognition of states and their admission to international society.

Historical Memory and Foreign Policy

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Author :
Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 3031151941
Total Pages : 142 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (311 download)

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Book Synopsis Historical Memory and Foreign Policy by : Lina Klymenko

Download or read book Historical Memory and Foreign Policy written by Lina Klymenko and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-10-13 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the uses of the past in foreign policy-making. It outlines why and how political leaders refer to historical events in contemporary foreign policy discourses; the goals they hope to achieve; and the sometimes unintended foreign policy consequences of their (ab)use of historical memory. Furthermore, it looks at how political leaders shape domestic collective memories in pursuit of their international agendas, and highlight historical events leaders forget, reinterpret or obscure through selective narratives. The chapters explore a variety of theoretical concepts that shed light on how memory and foreign policy are linked in a complex and reciprocal way. The following mechanisms are discussed: the application of historical analogies; the construction of historical narratives; the creation of memory sites; the marginalisation and forgetting of the past; and the securitisation of historical memory. Through the use of a number of methodological approaches (such as discourse analysis, narrative analysis and content analysis of securitising moves) and a broad range of qualitative and quantitative data (newspaper articles, policy documents, commemorative speeches, interviews with policymakers and the observation of memory sites), the contributions highlight the interdependence of the international, national, regional and local dimensions of memory practices and history writing. Although they mostly focus on national case studies of foreign policy-making, they also reveal how representations of historical events evolve through interaction between political actors at the international level of analysis. The collection originated in the section entitled ‘Exploring the Link between Historical Memory and Foreign Policy’ at the annual Pan-European Conference of the European International Studies Association (EISA) 2018 held in Prague, the Czech Republic.

Ontological Entanglements, Agency and Ethics in International Relations

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1351854100
Total Pages : 247 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (518 download)

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Book Synopsis Ontological Entanglements, Agency and Ethics in International Relations by : Laura Zanotti

Download or read book Ontological Entanglements, Agency and Ethics in International Relations written by Laura Zanotti and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-07-06 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International Relations have been the subject of growing debate for several years, the implications for ethics and political agency of embracing an ontology of entanglement have remained unexplored. This work focuses on the importance of addressing the ontological and epistemological assumptions of the discipline of International Relations. There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory, Zanotti also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. She also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti. Highlighting the need for critically re-thinking the way we conceptualize political agency and validate ethics, this work will be of interest to scholars of International Relations theory, ethics and critical security studies.

Sino-Japanese Relations

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Author :
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1134432364
Total Pages : 189 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (344 download)

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Book Synopsis Sino-Japanese Relations by : Caroline Rose

Download or read book Sino-Japanese Relations written by Caroline Rose and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2004-08-02 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over recent years, there has been increasing interest in the relationship between China and Japan, particularly as a way of understanding contemporary political, economic and security developments within the whole East Asia region. Caroline Rose presents a thorough, balanced and objective examination of both sides of the relationship. This will be of great interest to academics and policy-makers in the UK and US, as well as to professionals working in Chinese and Japanese communities.

Japan's Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century

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Author :
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 1498587968
Total Pages : 401 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (985 download)

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Book Synopsis Japan's Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century by : Lam Peng Er

Download or read book Japan's Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century written by Lam Peng Er and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2020-03-09 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited collection analyzes the innovative changes in Japan’s foreign policy. Pursuing new relationships with South Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe, Japanese initiatives include regional peace-building and human security activities, Asian multilateralism, and the Indo-Pacific concept. This collection focuses on these evolving international relationships through Japan’s unique approach to political change and continuity.