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• Japan Enters the Post-Abe Era: More of the Same or New Directions?

  • When
    30 Sep 2020
  •  
    7:00 PM - 8:00 PM (EDT)
  • Location
    Online

  Register

  
  

  Japan Enters the Post-Abe Era: More of the Same or New Directions?

  
  

  Wednesday, September 30, 2020

  7:00 PM EDT

  4:00PM PDT

  Hosted online via Zoom

  
  

  Just days after becoming the longest sitting Prime Minister in Japan’s history, Shinzo Abe unexpectedly announced on August 28 his resignation citing serious health issues. The next Prime Minister will face unprecedented domestic and foreign challenges ranging from Japan’s demographic crisis, the rise of China’s military and economic power, a global pandemic which is driving a world recession, and doubts about America’s longstanding security commitment to Japan.  What will be the policy priorities of the next Prime Minister, Yoshihide Suga, and how will he differ from PM Abe in content and style of leadership?

  
  

  The Japan Society of Boston and the Japan Society of Northern California are proud to jointly present a program to explore the opportunities and pitfalls of the post-Abe era. Please join us online on September 30, 2020 to hear from Christina Davis and Tobias Harris, top experts on Japan’s domestic and foreign policy talk about what the change in leadership means for Japan and for its relationship with the US.

  Moderator
  

  Larry Greenwood | Member of the Board, Japan Society of Northern California & Senior Advisor, BowerGroupAsiaLarry 

  Greenwood is a consultant advising on government relations and international economic policy, with expertise in trade, finance, development, and Asia. Larry was a career diplomat from 1976 to 2006 and served in a variety of positions in the State Department in Washington, D.C., and at U.S. embassies in Manila, Dakar, Tokyo, and Singapore. After retiring from the Foreign Service, he worked as vice president at the Asian Development Bank in Manila, Philippines, where he oversaw loan and grant operations in East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific Island countries, and as Senior Managing Director for government relations in Asia for MetLife based in Tokyo.  After moving to the Bay Area in 2015, he joined BowerGroupAsia and served as President of the Japan Society of Northern California from 2016-2019.

  Speakers

  Christina L. Davis |Professor of Government, Harvard University, Director, Program on U.S.-Japan Relations

  Christina L. Davis is a Professor of Government in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and Susan S. and Kenneth L. Wallach Professor at the Radcliffe Institute. She is the Director of the Program on U.S.-Japan Relations at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and serves as co-executive editor of the Japanese Journal of Political Science.

  Her research interests include the politics and foreign policy of Japan and East Asia and the study of international organizations, with a focus on trade policy. Professor Davis is the author of  Why Adjudicate? Enforcing Trade Rules in the WTO (Princeton University Press, 2012), which won the International Law Book Award and Chadwick F. Alger Prize from the International Studies Association, as well as the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Prize. 

  Tobias Harris | Senior Vice President, Teneo

  

  Tobias Harris is an expert on Japanese politics, and worked in 2006-2007 on the staff of Keiichiro Asao, at that time a member of the upper house of the Japanese Diet and shadow foreign minister for the Democratic Party of Japan, for whom he conducted research on foreign policy and Japan’s relations with the United States. He was the Fellow for Economy, Trade, and Business at Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA from 2014-2020.  His latest book, The Iconoclast: Shinzo Abe and the New Japan will be published this fall.

  
  

  Keiichiro Asao (浅尾 慶一郎) | Former Member of the House of Representatives
  

  
  

  Keiichiro Asao is a Japanese Politician. After graduating from the Faculty of Law of the University of Tokyo, he joined the Industrial Bank of Japan in 1987 and received an MBA in 1992 from Stanford University while working at the bank. Leaving the bank in 1995, he was elected to the House of Councillors for the first time in 1998 to represent Kanagawa Prefecture.  He was re-elected in 2004, and was appointed the Shadow Foreign Minister by the DPJ leader Seiji Maehara. He was later expelled from the DPJ after announcing he would run for a district seat in Kanagawa during the 2009 General election, joining Your Party as a founding member one month later. He later headed Your Party after the breakout of a scandal of the Party Leader Yoshimi Watanabe. In 2014, he decided to dissolve Your Party over a dispute of the direction of the party and returned $14 million in public grant money to the government for the first time in Japanese political history.  Later that year he was elected to the House of Representatives for the third term.  After failing to reform Japanese politics using a venture party as a vehicle, he joined the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and seeks to reform the system from inside the ruling party.  He has served in the Japanese Diet for 19 years in total.

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

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• A Night of Japanese Traditional Music with Master Kouzan Oyama of Shishido

  • When
    05 Oct 2020
  •  
    7:30 PM - 8:30 PM (EDT)
  • Location
    Online
  • Spaces left
    36

  Register

  
  

  A Night of Japanese Traditional Music with Master Kouzan Oyama of Shishido

  Tsugaru-Jamisen (Shamisen), Koto, and Okinawa Sanshin Workshop

  津軽三味線・箏・沖縄三線ワークショップ

  by　津軽三味線　獅子道

  
  

  Monday, October 5, 2020

  7:30 PM EDT

  Hosted online via Zoom

  
  

  The Japan Society of Boston and the Japan Society of Northern California are proud to jointly present a musical night to remember with Kouzan Oyama (小山貢山)! Master Kouzan is a Tsugaru-Jamisen (a type of shamisen, or three-stringed Japanese guitar) player, master teacher, and two-time winner of the Tsugaru-Jamisen World Championships. He is now a celebrated teacher in Shinjuku as well as New York.

   In this fascinating workshop, Master Kouzan will showcase the allure of traditional Japanese music by demonstrating the Tsugaru-Jamisen, the koto (Japanese horizontal harp) and Okinawa sanshin (three-stringed Japanese banjo). Learn about the differences between traditional Japanese instruments (wagakki) and Western instruments, and enjoy a performance of Japanese wagakki online!

  
  

  Kouzan Oyama was born in the Ehime Prefecture of Japan in 1979. He went on to study the koto at the Sakuyo Junior College of Music in Okayama, graduating in 1999. After discovering the Tsugaru-Jamisen, he was fascinated by the instrument and decided to make it his main focus. He studied the Tsugaru-Jamisen under Mitsugu Oyama and became a master teacher certified by the Oyama School, the largest Tsugaru-Jamisen School in Japan. He went on to win first place at the Tsugaru-Jamisen World Competition in 2018 and 2019. Master Kouzan has frequently appeared in Japanese media, including newspapers and television programs. He is now the president of Shishido Inc. and one of the directors of the non-profit IJCEE (Institute for Japanese Traditional Culture Experience and Education).

  Learn more about Master Kouzan on his website, or watch his videos on YouTube!

                                                                              

  
  

  
  

  Please note that we often take photographs at events for our records and sometimes for use in public media such as Facebook and blog posts. Registering for an event generally signifies acknowledgment that your likeness may be used in these ways. If you are not comfortable with this, please let us know and we can accommodate you.
  

  
  

  As part of registering, we may ask for your email address. You may register for an event without providing your email address. Your email address will not be sold or given to third parties without your permission. By registering with your email address, you may receive emails from the Japan Society of Boston, including updates about event details (e.g., location), announcements about other upcoming events, and special offers.  Please be in touch with us anytime to change your email preferences.

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