The event is sponsored by the Japan Society for Promotion of Science and
the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership.
 

When the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan regained the power led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in December 2012, Japan’s government embarked on a set of economic policies dubbed “Abenomics.” Abenomics aimed at bringing Japan back from stagnation and restoring its growth potential.  The Abe administration entered its 7th year and Prime Minister Abe looks most likely to become the prime minister with the longest reign in the post war era.  Abenomics looks seemingly successful as well.  Japan’s economy has been in the longest expansion phase in the post war era.  The unemployment rate is so low that many employers claim they cannot find workers.  Yet, the major goals of Abenomics set at the beginning, such as 2% inflation rate and 2% real economic growth, have not been achieved.  Has Abenomics really succeeded?

This panel features four experts who have been closely watching Abenomics’s impacts on the Japanese economy.  They evaluate what Abenomics has accomplished so far in various areas.

 

Panelists:

Joshua Hausman, Assistant Professor of Public Policy; Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Michigan

Takatoshi Ito, Professor of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University

Nobuko Nagase, Professor of Labor Economics and Social Policy, Ochanomizu University, Japan

Steven Vogel, Professor of Asian Studies; Professor of Political Science; Chair of the Political Economy Program, University of California, Berkeley

Takeo Hoshi (moderator), Director of the Japan Program at the Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center, Stanford University

 

Over the course of more than three decades as a diplomat, William J. Burns served five Presidents and ten Secretaries of State. He played a central role in the most consequential diplomatic episodes of his time—from the bloodless end of the Cold War to the collapse of post–Cold War relations with Putin’s Russia, from post–9/11 tumult in the Middle East to the secret nuclear talks with Iran. Burns is widely regarded as one of the most distinguished and admired American statesmen of the last half century. Upon his retirement in 2014, Secretary John Kerry said Burns belonged on “a very short list of American diplomatic legends,” alongside George Kennan. Now, Burns draws on his decades of experience to make an impassioned argument for the enduring value of diplomacy in an increasingly volatile world in THE BACK CHANNEL (A Random House Hardcover; On Sale 3/12/2019). 

In this memoir, Burns recounts with novelistic detail and incisive analysis some of the seminal moments of his career. Employing a trove of newly declassified cables and memos, he gives readers a rare inside look at American diplomacy in action. His dispatches on war-torn Chechnya and Putin’s opulent dacha outside of Moscow and his prescient warnings of the “Perfect Storm” that would be unleashed by the Iraq War will reshape our understanding of history and inform the policy debates of the future. Burns sketches the contours of effective American leadership in a world that resembles neither the zero-sum Cold War contest of his early years as a young diplomat nor the “unipolar moment” of American primacy that followed. Ultimately, THE BACK CHANNEL is an eloquent, deeply informed, and timely story of a life spent in service of American interests abroad. It is also an urgent reminder, in a time of great turmoil, of the enduring importance of diplomacy.

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“The Back Channel is a masterfully written memoir from one of America’s most accomplished and respected diplomats. Ambassador Burns not only offers a vivid account of how American diplomacy works, he also puts forward a compelling vision for its future that will surely inspire new generations to follow his incredible example.”

–Madeleine K. Albright, former U.S. Secretary of State

“Bill Burns is a treasure of American diplomacy who I had the honor of watching in action and working closely with during my years at the State Department.  He is a model of the American idea and spirit when we need it most. In The Back Channel, Burns provides another great act of public service by giving us a smart, plain-spoken account of America’s changing role in the world and the power and purpose of American diplomacy at its best.”

–Hillary Clinton, former U.S. Secretary of State

“From one of America’s consummate diplomats, an incisive and sorely needed case for the revitalization of our diplomacy—what Burns wisely describes as our ‘tool of first resort.’”

–Henry Kissinger, former U.S. Secretary of State

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Retired from the U.S. Foreign Service in 2014, after a thirty-three-year diplomatic career, Ambassador Burns holds the highest rank in the Foreign Service, career ambassador, and is only the second serving career diplomat in history to become deputy secretary of state. Prior to his tenure as deputy secretary, Ambassador Burns served from 2008 to 2011 as under secretary for political affairs. He was ambassador to Russia from 2005 to 2008, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs from 2001 to 2005, and ambassador to Jordan from 1998 to 2001. Ambassador Burns earned a bachelor’s in history from La Salle University and master’s and doctoral degrees in international relations from Oxford University, where he studied as a Marshall Scholar.

 

EMERGING ISSUES IN CONTEMPORARY ASIA

A Special Seminar Series

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RSVP required by February 22, 2019 at: https://goo.gl/forms/ZCwcHC0qTec2rzj63

VALID STANFORD ID CARD MUST BE PRESENTED UPON ARRIVAL

 

ABSTRACT: The United States has been the world’s dominant power for more than a century.  Now many analysts believe China is taking its place. Is China an emerging superpower? Should the United States gear up for a new cold war in Asia? In this seminar, I show that China actually lags far behind the United States by the most important measures of national wealth and power—and will probably fall further behind in the coming decades. The most likely threat to American security, therefore, is not a confident Chinese peer competitor, but a deeply insecure China that lashes out after failing to live up to the global hype about its rise. I will discuss how the United States can contain this threat without starting a cold or hot war with Beijing.   

PROFILE: Michael Beckley is an assistant professor of political science at Tufts University and a fellow at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. His research focuses on the rise of China and has received “best article” awards from the American Political Science Association and the International Studies Association and has been featured by numerous media, including CNN, Fox News, the Financial Times, the New York Times, NPR, and the Washington Post. Previously, Professor Beckley worked at the U.S. Department of Defense, the RAND Corporation, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He currently consults for the Pentagon’s Office of Net Assessment, the Joint Staff, and the National Intelligence Council. He holds a PhD in political science from Columbia University and his first book, Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower, was published last fall by Cornell University Press. Part of his talk is based on a Foreign Affairs web article that was named one of the ten “best of 2018.”

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Speaker Bio: Dr. Constanze Stelzenmüller is the inaugural Robert Bosch Senior Fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC. Prior to Brookings, she was a senior transatlantic fellow and Berlin office director with the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF). Her areas of expertise include transatlantic relations; German foreign policy; NATO; the European Union’s foreign, security and defense policy; international law; and human rights. Previously, she was a writer and editor at the German weekly DIE ZEIT (1994 to 2005). Dr. Stelzenmüller’s essays and articles have appeared in a wide range of publications, including Foreign Affairs, Internationale Politik, the Financial Times, the Washington Post, and Süddeutsche Zeitung. She is also a frequent commentator on American and European radio and television including Presseclub (ARD), National Public Radio, and the BBC.

Abstract: Judging by media headlines or the agenda of major security conferences, the main issues on the minds of policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic are 1) China and 2) Trump (or vice versa). Russia, it is safe to say, has receded to the back reaches of newspapers and our minds. But the Kremlin continues to engage in hybrid warfare in Europe and to wage a proxy war in Eastern Ukraine that has claimed 13.000 lives. It is gaining influence in other regions where the West is retreating, such as the Middle East and Latin America. How should Europe and America be working together to deal with this challenge—and what‘s stopping us?