12 May 2017
Professor Jeremy Black, Dr John Steel and Ginko Kobayashi joined us to discuss the history of journalism in the UK and Japan in our second Annual Series seminar. In the era of ‘fake news’ and social media, is mainstream journalism facing insurmountable challenges? What can today’s journalists learn from the past?
6 April 2017
In this seminar, Mark Fitzpatrick and Dr Rebecca Johnson will unveil the history of non-proliferation policy in Northeast Asia and offer a perspective on why it must – and probably will – continue.
1 January 2017
2016 was a year of momentous change. To help us assess their likely impacts, in 2017 we will focus on history. What lessons can we learn from our past? And how and why is history still a major factor driving current events in both the UK and Japan?
25 November 2016
Immigration was one of the key campaign issues leading up to the UK’s “Brexit” referendum in June. Japan continues to control immigration tightly, but its rapidly ageing society is putting the government under pressure to allow for more importation of foreign labour. This seminar will discuss the immigration issues currently facing both nations and possible future directions for each.
22 April 2016
The next five-year disaster recovery plan commencing in April 2016 will focus on “Reconstruction and Revitalisation”, spearheaded by local governments in Tohoku and Fukushima. Attention will now be on recovering a radiation-free environment and redeveloping a sustainable local economy, revitalising the disaster area for its future residents. But should more money be spent on regenerating an area that was already in decline before the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011? Or do former residents have the right to return to the place they once knew as home?
In this seminar, we will discuss the economic implications of disaster reconstruction, and how to find a balance between practicality and hope.
3 March 2016
The rapid development of digital media is overwhelming to some people, but for younger generations, digital information is an indispensable part of their lives. Japan still has one of the highest subscription rates in the world for printed newspapers, but the shift to online media is accelerating.
The first seminar on the theme of ‘Finding a Balance’ will discuss the new media and transforming effect of social media on journalism, politics and business.
Japan, of all places, has long had a clear mainstream consensus on many issues, as reflected in the dominance of just one political party for most of the post-War period. But opinions seem to be becoming increasingly polarised – or is it just that new forms of communication make it easier for different voices to be heard? The UK has more of a tradition of divided camps, but the contrast between the avowedly socialist Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the old Etonian Prime Minister David Cameron certainly suggests that the period of Tony Blair’s “third way” is behind us.
Our seminar series this year considers why polarisation is occurring, and how to find a balance when it does.
16 October 2015
Japan has a long history of sexual diversity, but during modern times the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) community has for the most part kept itself out of the limelight. Although there are some signs of change, Japanese society appears less tolerant of sexual diversity than the UK. This seminar discussed the experiences faced by LGBT individuals in both countries, and how LGBT rights may develop in the future.
17 June 2015
How ready is Japan to be a society like Britain, which accepts a diversity of races and cultures in society? And is British society really as accepting of diversity as it claims to be? Join us in the latest of our annual seminars on diversity in the UK and Japan to discuss this important topic.
4 June 2015
A. S. Neill, a Scottish writer and education philosopher, created a community in which children could be free from adult authority, which in 1927 became Summerhill School in Suffolk, probably the world’s best-known “free school”. The school and Neill’s “free school” ideas became famous through his writings and lectures. In Japan, Professor Shinichi Hori was impressed by Summerhill and translated many of Neill’s books into Japanese, later establishing his own schools in Wakayama, based on Neill’s educational philosophy of liberty and democracy exercised by children.
