So President Bush and Prime Minister Abe have had their first meeting, in the wake of the APEC summit in Hanoi.As the recap provided by the White House indicates, the agenda of their conversation was not particularly surprising and the meeting provided no major changes in US-Japan alliance policy. (Although, as this Yomiuri summary indicates, …
Year: 2006
Setting the record straight
On the sidelines of the APEC summit in Hanoi, Japanese Foreign Minister Aso Taro and Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhao Xing discussed plans to convene a joint Sino-Japanese committee to review Sino-Japanese history. The committee is expected to meet before the end of the year, consist of ten members, and have subcommittees that discuss both …
I move to Kamakura, and the education bill moves to the Upper House
I have now moved out from Kaiyo Gakuen -- where I spent my last night speaking to the students, pegged as future leaders of Japan, about the importance of learning about foreign societies and appreciating Japan's responsiblities as a great power. (I previously wrote about my surveying of students' ideas here.)I have moved to Kamakura, …
Continue reading I move to Kamakura, and the education bill moves to the Upper House
What were the Red Sox thinking?
Switching gears, the big news in sports this week is that the Boston Red Sox had the highest bid in the auction for the right to talk -- that's right, talk -- to Seibu Lions pitcher Matsuzaka Daisuke. They reportedly paid $51.1 million.Mull that over for a minute.$51.1 million. To talk....Sorry Red Sox fans, but …
The Susanoo boom?
Once again David Pilling, the FT's Tokyo correspondent, has a superb analytic piece on Japan, in this case the Japanese economic recovery (unfortunately subscription only). He reports that forthcoming statistics are expected to confirm that the economic recovery that began in 2001 will surpass the fifty-eight-month "Izanagi" boom that lasted from 1965 to 1970.He cautions …
Takenaka criticizes Fukui (and the Abe cabinet?)
With the Bank of Japan sending signals that it will raise Japan's interest rates soon, Takenaka Heizo, former Prime Minister Koizumi's point man on the economy and structural reform, has criticized the BoJ (and implicitly its president) for prematurely tightening monetary policy, reports the FT.For a high-ranking "Koizumian" to criticize Japan's monetary policy -- which …
Continue reading Takenaka criticizes Fukui (and the Abe cabinet?)
Asia’s hotel lobby
With Vietnam set to host the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit next weekend, a recent spate of news suggests that it will be a busy weekend...but not necessarily because of what's on the official agenda.While this year's formal agenda will consist of the usual calls for greater openness among APEC members and a push to …
Fukui’s itchy trigger finger
It seems that while Prime Minister Abe is busy fending off opposition attacks in the Diet on nuclear weapons, Fukui Toshihiko, the president of the Bank of Japan, has been signaling that the BoJ will be raising interest rates again soon, this despite ambiguous signs about the strength of Japan's recovery.There are serious questions whether …
Recent reading on China
As long as this blog is already banned by China, there's no reason for me not to post on a recent book I read by exiled Chinese writer Ma Jian. Called Red Dust, the book traces the author's journey across most of China in the early 1980s, just as Deng Xiaoping's "Four Modernizations" came into …
Final roundup on the Democratic victory
In the past day several writers have produced worthwhile post-mortems on the elections that have echoed my concerns about the Democratic victory.First, at the New Republic website (free registration required), John Judis -- who must be happy now that he can return to his "emerging Democratic majority" trope -- provides a sober review of the …
Tobias S. Harris 