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COMMENTARY / World
May 5, 2008

Spurious link between education, economy

LOS ANGELES — When Japan's Central Council for Education recently announced its plan to move the nation's schools away from yutori kyoiku, the "more relaxed education" policy adopted in the 1990s, its decision was largely based on the belief that effective schools are responsible for a robust economy....
COMMENTARY / World
May 3, 2008

Rule of law comes under fire

The government's reactions to the Nagoya High Court's April 17 decision that Japanese operations in Iraq are unconstitutional, raise profoundly disturbing questions about the rule of law and the democratic separation of powers in Japan.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 15, 2008

Method in the madness?

In November, Japan became only the second country in the world (after the United States) to introduce mandatory fingerprinting and photo-taking at all international entry points, as part of beefed-up "antiterrorism" measures by the Ministry of Justice.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 24, 2008

Asian art for art's sake

WHAT'S THE USE OF ART? — Asian Visual and Material Culture in Context, edited by Jan Mrazek and Morgan Pitelka. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2008, 314 pp., with illustrations, $58 (cloth) The question is rhetorical, that is, uttered for effect, to make a statement rather than to obtain an...
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Jan 28, 2008

Nightmare becomes reality: Classic credit crunch leaves policymakers floundering

In this column last month, I talked about the nightmarish possibility of a global financial crash. Well, a month is a long time in economics, and the nightmare has well and truly become reality.
COMMENTARY
Dec 31, 2007

Censorship serves to flag our own limits

LOS ANGELES — It appears that many mainland Chinese moviegoers are traipsing over to Hong Kong in droves to view the uncensored version of Ang Lee's latest blockbuster, "Lust, Caution." With their feet, in effect, they are voting for lust — and as if wishing for official Beijing caution to be gone...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 23, 2007

Europe remiss in dealing with Russia

BRUSSELS — Friend or foe, or something uneasily in between? That's the question Europe is asking about Russia, and Russia about a newly aggressive Europe. President Vladimir Putin's choice of Dmitri Medvedev, Chairman of Gazprom, the gas company with an emerging stranglehold on European energy supplies,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Dec 21, 2007

Inspired by repression

I am a very private person," says Marjane Satrapi, author of "Persepolis" and co-director of the new film based on her graphic novels. It's a curious statement coming from someone who's poured her own life into an autobiographical novel, but as she repeatedly pointed out to The Japan Times, it's not...
Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Dec 18, 2007

Mistletoe

Dear Alice,
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 11, 2007

Should we study race-intelligence links?

PRINCETON, New Jersey — The intersection of genetics and intelligence is an intellectual minefield. Harvard's former President Larry Summers touched off one explosion in 2005 when he tentatively suggested a genetic explanation for the difficulty his university had in recruiting female professors in...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Oct 23, 2007

Human rights survey stinks

On Aug. 25, the Japanese government released findings from a Cabinet poll conducted every four years. Called the "Public Survey on the Defense of Human Rights" ( www8.cao.go.jp/survey/h19/h19-jinken ), it sparked media attention with some apparently good news.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 8, 2007

Japan's Antiterrorism Special Measures Law and confusion over U.N. authority

Once again there is political debate over military-related legislation under the shadow of Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution, and once again it has revealed confusion over the international law and constitutional issues involved. The debate is over the extension of the Antiterrorism Special Measures...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 21, 2007

Ozawa dances around the U.S. alliance

Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) president Ichiro Ozawa's success in orchestrating the downfall of Prime Minister Abe Shinzo is a major victory for his party. It is also arguably the first time since the resignation of Abe's grandfather, Prime Minister Kishi Nobusuke in 1960, that a prime minister has...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Sep 13, 2007

Blue Man Group: Attack of the 'Smurfs'

Butoh dance, attack art and the band Devo have all had a role in influencing Blue Man Group — which is bringing a two-month run of avant-garde theater to Japan.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Aug 5, 2007

Antiwar activist Steven L. Leeper

In a sense, it is the ultimate irony: The man appointed to oversee the memorial to victims of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945 by an American B-29 aircraft is . . . an American.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 20, 2007

Serving up some piping-hot salsa

Calling Oscar D'Leon a salsa superstar doesn't do justice to his stature in the world of Latin music. Over the course of his 36-year-career, the bassist and singer has acquired more nicknames than the late James Brown.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 28, 2007

Just who is Gordon Brown?

BRUSSELS — At long last, Gordon Brown is taking over from Tony Blair as Britain's prime minister, thus attaining his lifelong ambition, as if by right. That is his first problem. He has not been elected by anyone — not by the Labour Party, and not by Britain's voters; he has merely come into an inheritance...
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Jun 19, 2007

Crime victims get their day, say in court

The Diet is expected to pass a controversial bill this week to revise the Criminal Procedure Law to enable people victimized by crime to participate in trial proceedings.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / EAST ASIA SYMPOSIUM
Jun 4, 2007

Take your partners for economic integration

See related stories: U.S. presidential election casts long shadow Sustained economic growth is a question of balance for China
JAPAN
Jun 2, 2007

Victims' trial-role bill clears Lower House

The House of Representatives passed a controversial bill Friday to allow crime victims to directly question defendants in court, prompting legal experts to express deep concern that the measure could undermine the criminal justice system and foster feelings of revenge.
EDITORIALS
May 25, 2007

Juvenile Law revision

A bill to revise the Juvenile Law, which passed the Lower House with the backing of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito, is now in the Upper House. The bill is designed to provide harsher treatment of juvenile offenders. Lawmakers must question whether such a move will really help to prevent juvenile...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 27, 2007

'Multicultural Japan' remains a pipe dream

In February, education minister Bunmei Ibuki called Japan "an extremely homogenous country." Eighteen months earlier, now Foreign Minister Taro Aso described Japan as having "one nation, one civilization, one language, one culture, and one race." What was notable about these comments is that they were...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Mar 25, 2007

There's a world of languages Japanese too can learn

It seems to be conventional wisdom -- if "wisdom" is the word -- that Japanese people do not excel at mastering foreign languages. Some surveys of the results of international English-proficiency tests have them occupying the murky depths, below even the likes of North Koreans. Does the "Dear Leader,"...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 23, 2007

B-girl boppers

'Maybe they can smell something on us!" says Halca, 18, one half of hip-hop- meets-J-pop duo HalCali.
COMMENTARY
Mar 5, 2007

To move without U.S. cues

In their talks Feb. 21, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and visiting U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney reaffirmed the "unwavering" Japan-U.S. security alliance. This raises a question: Why did Abe have to reaffirm an alliance that is said to have already benefited from the long honeymoon between former Prime...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Feb 18, 2007

Whose Japan deserves youth's patriotism now?

'I for one, cannot believe that love of one's country must consist in blindness to its social faults, in deafness to its social discords, in inarticulation of its social wrongs. Neither can I believe that the mere accident of birth in a certain country or the mere scrap of a citizen's paper constitutes...
COMMENTARY
Feb 8, 2007

Asia's transformation and the future of Japanese diplomacy

Prior to World War II, Japan's position in the international community was dependent on its power and status in Asia. From the time of the Meiji Restoration in 1868, it was essential for Japan to have considerable stature within Asia so that the country could associate on equal terms with Western nations...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Dec 31, 2006

Test where you stand on 'shared Japanese values'

Perhaps it is fitting on this, the last day of 2006, to look back at the year and reflect on the state of Japanese culture, society and life.
COMMENTARY
Dec 28, 2006

Turkey's gaze is shifting East

LONDON -- The ambiguous attitude of Western European countries toward Turkish entry into full membership of the European Union has produced a flood of comments, as well as a good deal of anger and confusion in Turkey.
Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Dec 19, 2006

Men's restrooms

Dear Alice,

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?