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Book Japan and the Shackles of the Past

Download or read book Japan and the Shackles of the Past written by R. Taggart Murphy and published by What Everyone Needs to Know (H. This book was released on 2014 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A penetrating overview of Japan, from a historical, social, political, economic, and cultural perspective"--

Book Japan and the Shackles of the Past

Download or read book Japan and the Shackles of the Past written by R. Taggart Murphy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2014-11-07 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Japan is one of the world's wealthiest and most technologically advanced nations, and its rapid ascent to global power status after 1853 remains one of the most remarkable stories in modern world history. Yet it has not been an easy path; military catastrophe, political atrophy, and economic upheavals have made regular appearances from the feudal era to the present. Today, Japan is seen as a has-been with a sluggish economy, an aging population, dysfunctional politics, and a business landscape dominated by yesterday's champions. Though it is supposed to be America's strongest ally in the Asia-Pacific region, it has almost entirely disappeared from the American radar screen. In Japan and the Shackles of the Past, R. Taggart Murphy places the current troubles of Japan in a sweeping historical context, moving deftly from early feudal times to the modern age that began with the Meiji Restoration. Combining fascinating analyses of Japanese culture and society over the centuries with hard-headed accounts of Japan's numerous political regimes, Murphy not only reshapes our understanding of Japanese history, but of Japan's place in the contemporary world. He concedes that Japan has indeed been out of sight and out of mind in recent decades, but contends that this is already changing. Political and economic developments in Japan today risk upheaval in the pivotal arena of Northeast Asia, inviting comparisons with Europe on the eve of the First World War. America's half-completed effort to remake Japan in the late 1940s is unraveling, and the American foreign policy and defense establishment is directly culpable for what has happened. The one apparent exception to Japan's malaise is the vitality of its pop culture, but it's actually no exception at all; rather, it provides critical clues to what is going on now. With insights into everything from Japan's politics and economics to the texture of daily life, gender relations, the changing business landscape, and popular and high culture, Japan and the Shackles of the Past is the indispensable guide to understanding Japan in all its complexity.

Book The Weight of the Yen

Download or read book The Weight of the Yen written by R. Taggart Murphy and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1997 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discusses how America went from being the world's largest creditor to world's largest debtor in the eight years between 1980 and 1988, due to excessive borrowing from Japan during the Reagan presidency.

Book Tales of Times Now Past

Download or read book Tales of Times Now Past written by Marian Ury and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1979 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book A Different Kind of Luxury

    Book Details:
  • Author : Andy Couturier
  • Publisher : Stone Bridge Press
  • Release : 2011-11-06
  • ISBN : 1611725224
  • Pages : 321 pages

Download or read book A Different Kind of Luxury written by Andy Couturier and published by Stone Bridge Press. This book was released on 2011-11-06 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 11 portraits from rural Japan to inspire choices in meaningful work, art, and sustainable living

Book Peak Japan

    Book Details:
  • Author : Brad Glosserman
  • Publisher : Georgetown University Press
  • Release : 2019-04-01
  • ISBN : 1626166706
  • Pages : 272 pages

Download or read book Peak Japan written by Brad Glosserman and published by Georgetown University Press. This book was released on 2019-04-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The post-Cold War era has been difficult for Japan. A country once heralded for evolving a superior form of capitalism and seemingly ready to surpass the United States as the world’s largest economy lost its way in the early 1990s. The bursting of the bubble in 1991 ushered in a period of political and economic uncertainty that has lasted for over two decades. There were hopes that the triple catastrophe of March 11, 2011—a massive earthquake, tsunami, and accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant—would break Japan out of its torpor and spur the country to embrace change that would restart the growth and optimism of the go-go years. But several years later, Japan is still waiting for needed transformation, and Brad Glosserman concludes that the fact that even disaster has not spurred radical enough reform reveals something about Japan's political system and Japanese society. Glosserman explains why Japan has not and will not change, concluding that Japanese horizons are shrinking and that the Japanese public has given up the bold ambitions of previous generations and its current leadership. This is a critical insight into contemporary Japan and one that should shape our thinking about this vital country.

Book Reworking Japan

    Book Details:
  • Author : Nana Okura Gagné
  • Publisher : Cornell University Press
  • Release : 2021-01-15
  • ISBN : 1501753045
  • Pages : 191 pages

Download or read book Reworking Japan written by Nana Okura Gagné and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2021-01-15 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reworking Japan examines how the past several decades of neoliberal economic restructuring and reforms have challenged Japan's corporate ideologies, gendered relations, and subjectivities of individual employees. With Japan's remarkable economic growth since the 1950s, the lifestyles and life courses of "salarymen" came to embody the "New Middle Class" family ideal. However, the nearly three decades of economic stagnation and reforms since the bursting of the economic bubble in the early 1990s has intensified corporate retrenchment under the banner of neoliberal restructuring and brought new challenges to employees and their previously protected livelihoods. In a sweeping appraisal of recent history, Gagné demonstrates how economic restructuring has reshaped Japanese corporations, workers, and ideals, as well as how Japanese companies and employees have resisted and actively responded to such changes. Gagné explores Japan's fraught and problematic transition from the postwar ideology of "companyism" to the emergent ideology of neoliberalism and the subsequent large-scale economic restructuring. By juxtaposing Japan's economic transformation with an ethnography of work and play, and individual life histories, Gagné goes beyond the abstract to explore the human dimension of the neoliberal reforms that have impacted the nation's corporate governance, socioeconomic class, workers' subjectivities, and family relations. Reworking Japan, with its firsthand analysis of how the supposedly hegemonic neoliberal regime does not completely transform existing cultural frames and social relations, will shake up preconceived ideas about Japanese men and the social effects of neoliberalism.

Book The Courage to Be Disliked

Download or read book The Courage to Be Disliked written by Ichiro Kishimi and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An international bestseller and TikTok sensation with more than 10 million copies sold worldwide, The Courage to Be Disliked is a transformative and practical guide to personal happiness and self-fulfillment. Now you can unlock your full potential and free yourself from the shackles of past traumas and societal expectations to find true personal happiness. Based on the theories of renowned psychologist Alfred Adler, this book guides you through the principles of self-forgiveness, self-care, and mind decluttering in a straightforward, easy-to-digest style that’s accessible to all. The Courage to Be Disliked unfolds as a dialogue between a philosopher and a young man, who, over the course of five enriching conversations, realizes that each of us is in control of our life’s direction, independent of past burdens and expectations of others. Wise, empowering, and profoundly liberating, this book is a life-changing experience that shows you a path to lasting happiness and how to finally be the person you truly want to be. Millions are already benefiting from its teachings—and you can be next.

Book Health in Japan

    Book Details:
  • Author : Eric Brunner
  • Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
  • Release : 2020-06-11
  • ISBN : 0198848137
  • Pages : 369 pages

Download or read book Health in Japan written by Eric Brunner and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2020-06-11 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Health Inequalities in Japan brings together the expertise of Japan's leading social epidemiologists in English for the first time. Providing a balanced perspective on the determinants of wellbeing and illness, it gives a valuable insight into the epidemiological underpinnings of one of the world's healthiest populaces.

Book Japan from Anime to Zen

    Book Details:
  • Author : David Watts Barton
  • Publisher : Stone Bridge Press, Inc.
  • Release : 2021-04-27
  • ISBN : 1611729459
  • Pages : 303 pages

Download or read book Japan from Anime to Zen written by David Watts Barton and published by Stone Bridge Press, Inc.. This book was released on 2021-04-27 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This friendly guide offers concise but detailed demystifications of more than 85 aspects of ancient and modern Japan. It can be read in sequence, or just dipped into, depending on the moment’s need. Explanations go much deeper than a typical travel guide and cover 1,500 years of history and culture, everything from geisha to gangsters, haiku to karaoke, the sun goddess to the shogunate . . . and anime to Zen.

Book Japan

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jeff Kingston
  • Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
  • Release : 2019-01-18
  • ISBN : 1509525483
  • Pages : 129 pages

Download or read book Japan written by Jeff Kingston and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2019-01-18 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Japan, anchored by its traditions, transformed by American post-war Occupation, and globally recognized for its technological innovations, manufacturing prowess, and pop culture, faces powerful challenges from within and without. How Japan chooses to handle these problems and opportunities will determine its future for decades to come. In this book, Jeff Kingston – one of the most lucid analysts of Japan today – takes readers on a fascinating journey through this country's contemporary history, exploring the key developments and forces, both at home and abroad, that are shaping Japan in the twenty-first century. Whether Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s transformative agenda of “Abenomics” and “proactive pacifism” toward a rising China and a belligerent North Korea can set Japan on the path to greater prosperity and security remains to be seen. But having won a third term as president of the Liberal Democratic Party in 2018, Japan’s ongoing transformation is very much in Abe’s hands.

Book Japan in the Heisei Era  1989   2019

Download or read book Japan in the Heisei Era 1989 2019 written by Noriko Murai and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-02-21 with total page 493 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Japan in the Heisei Era (1989–2019) provides a retrospective and multidisciplinary account of a society in flux. Featuring analyses from leading scholars around the globe, this textbook examines the evolving contexts of Japan throughout the Heisei era and how longstanding verities and values have been called into question. Asking what this holds for Japan’s future relations with the world and within its own communities, chapters delve beneath the layers of a complex and increasingly diverse society, exploring topics including simmering ethnonationalism, economic torpor, political stagnation, and cultural dynamics. Features of this textbook include: • Analysis of key social issues ranging from immigration, civil society, press freedom, politics, labour and the economy, to diversity, the marginalisation of women, Shinto, and Aum Shinrikyo • Evaluation of the legacy of Emperor Akihito on war memory, the imperial institution, art, regional relations, and constitutional revision • Multidisciplinary insights from both the social sciences and humanities • Rich illustrations for visual analysis of developments in contemporary Japanese literature, film, art, and pop culture Providing students with dynamic analyses of how contemporary Japanese society continues to transform, this textbook is essential reading for students of Japanese Studies, including Japanese culture, society, history, and politics.

Book Rethinking Sino Japanese Alienation

Download or read book Rethinking Sino Japanese Alienation written by Barry Buzan and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-09 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bitterly contested memories of war, colonisation, and empire among Japan, China, and Korea have increasingly threatened regional order and security over the past three decades. In Sino-Japanese relations, identity, territory, and power pull together in a particularly lethal direction, generating dangerous tensions in both geopolitical and memory rivalries. Buzan and Goh explore a new approach to dealing with this history problem. First, they construct a more balanced and global view of China and Japan in modern world history. Second, building on this, they sketch out the possibilities for a 21st century great power bargain between them. Buzan puts Northeast Asia's history since 1840 into both a world historical and a systematic normative context, exposing the parochial nature of the China-Japan history debate in relation to what is a bigger shared story about their encounter with modernity and the West, within which their modern encounter with each other took place. Arguing that regional order will ultimately depend substantially on the relationship between these two East Asian great powers, Goh explores the conditions under which China and Japan have been able to reach strategic bargains in the course of their long historical relationship, and uses this to sketch out the main modes of agreement that might underpin a new contemporary great power bargain between them in a variety of future scenarios for the region. The frameworks adopted here consciously blend historical contextualisation, enduring concerns with wealth, power and interest, and the complex relationship between Northeast Asian states' evolving encounters with each other and with global international society.

Book Japanese Prostitutes in the North American West  1887 1920

Download or read book Japanese Prostitutes in the North American West 1887 1920 written by Kazuhiro Oharazeki and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2016-08-25 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This compelling study of a previously overlooked vice industry explores the larger structural forces that led to the growth of prostitution in Japan, the Pacific region, and the North American West at the turn of the twentieth century. Combining very personal accounts with never before examined Japanese sources, historian Kazuhiro Oharazeki traces these women’s transnational journeys from their origins in Japan to their arrival in Pacific Coast cities. He analyzes their responses to the oppression they faced from pimps and customers, as well as the opposition they faced from American social reformers and Japanese American community leaders. Despite their difficult circumstances, Oharazeki finds, some women were able to parlay their experience into better jobs and lives in America. Though that wasn’t always the case, their mere presence here nonetheless paved the way for other Japanese women to come to America and enter the workforce in more acceptable ways. By focusing on this “invisible” underground economy, Japanese Prostitutes in the North American West sheds new light on Japanese American immigration and labor histories and opens a fascinating window into the development of the American West.

Book Japan   s Security Renaissance

Download or read book Japan s Security Renaissance written by Andrew L. Oros and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For decades after World War II, Japan chose to focus on soft power and economic diplomacy alongside a close alliance with the United States, eschewing a potential leadership role in regional and global security. Since the end of the Cold War, and especially since the rise of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japan's military capabilities have resurged. In this analysis of Japan's changing military policy, Andrew L. Oros shows how a gradual awakening to new security challenges has culminated in the multifaceted "security renaissance" of the past decade. Despite openness to new approaches, however, three historical legacies—contested memories of the Pacific War and Imperial Japan, postwar anti-militarist convictions, and an unequal relationship with the United States—play an outsized role. In Japan's Security Renaissance Oros argues that Japan's future security policies will continue to be shaped by these legacies, which Japanese leaders have struggled to address. He argues that claims of rising nationalism in Japan are overstated, but there has been a discernable shift favoring the conservative Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party. Bringing together Japanese domestic politics with the broader geopolitical landscape of East Asia and the world, Japan's Security Renaissance provides guidance on this century's emerging international dynamics.

Book The Routledge Handbook of Nationalism in East and Southeast Asia

Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Nationalism in East and Southeast Asia written by Lu Zhouxiang and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-07-31 with total page 641 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook presents a comprehensive survey of the formation and transformation of nationalism in 15 East and Southeast Asian countries. Written by a team of international scholars from different backgrounds and disciplines, this volume offers new perspectives on studying Asian history, society, culture, and politics, and provides readers with a unique lens through which to better contextualise and understand the relationships between countries within East and Southeast Asia, and between Asia and the world. It highlights the latest developments in the field and contributes to our knowledge and understanding of nationalism and nation building. Comprehensive and clearly written, this book examines a diverse set of topics that include theoretical considerations on nationalism and internationalism; the formation of nationalism and national identity in the colonial and postcolonial eras; the relationships between traditional culture, religion, ethnicity, education, gender, technology, sport, and nationalism; the influence of popular culture on nationalism; and politics, policy, and national identity. It illustrates how nationalism helped to draw the borders between the nations of East and Southeast Asia, and how it is re-emerging in the twenty-first century to shape the region and the world into the future. The Routledge Handbook of Nationalism in East and Southeast Asia is essential reading for those interested in and studying Asian history, Social and Cultural history, and modern history.

Book Shifting Power in Asia Pacific

Download or read book Shifting Power in Asia Pacific written by Enrico Fels and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-11-03 with total page 768 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates whether a power shift has taken place in the Asia-Pacific region since the end of the Cold War. By systematically examining the development of power dynamics in Asia-Pacific, it challenges the notion that a wealthier and militarily more powerful China is automatically turning the regional tides in its favour. With a special emphasis on Sino-US competition, the book explores the alleged linkage between the regional distribution of relevant material and immaterial capabilities, national power and the much-cited regional power shift. The book presents a novel concept for measuring power in international relations by outlining a composite index on aggregated power (CIAP) that includes 55 variables for 44 regional countries and covers a period of twenty years. Moreover, it develops a middle power theory that outlines the significance of middle powers in times of major power shifts. By addressing political, military and economic cooperation via a structured-focused comparison and by applying a comparative-historical analysis, the book analyses in depth the bilateral relations of six regional middle powers to Washington and Beijing.