Council on East Asian Studies and The Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership: “Reluctant Warriors, Conflicted Allies: Germany, Japan, and the International Security Order”

Event time: 
Friday, October 12, 2018 - 12:00pm
Location: 
Rosenkranz Hall, Room 241 See map
115 Prospect Street
New Haven, CT 06520
Event description: 

115 Prospect Street, Rosenkranz Hall, Room 241, 12:00 p.m.
The Council on East Asian Studies and The Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership present: 

Ellis S. Krauss, Emeritus Professor, School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California San Diego, USA:  “Reluctant Warriors, Conflicted Allies: Germany, Japan, and the International Security Order.”

Japan and Germany are well-known for their post-1945 American-imposed “peace constitutions” that forbade either country from having armed forces, armaments or engaging in war. Both have strong anti-militarist (but not “pacifist”) sub-cultures. Yet despite this today both are key U.S. allies, have substantial military forces (Japan is 7th in global firepower and has the second strongest nation in the Pacific after the U.S.; Germany is one of the key countries in NATO and 9th in global firepower), and after the Cold War have supported U.S. military operations abroad either in combat (Germany) or support and reconstruction. How and why did this evolution occur? How are the trajectories of the two countries after the end of the Cold War similar or different? We find they are indeed different in both their trajectories and their current security policies. Why? The talk is based on a forthcoming book (probably with Brookings Institution Press) by 3 German and 2 American co-authors, including the speaker.

Ellis S. Krauss (Ph.D. Stanford University, 1973) is Emeritus Professor at the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California San Diego, USA He has published eight authored or edited books and over 70 articles on postwar Japanese politics and on U.S.-Japan relations in professional political science and Asian Studies journals. He published a coauthored book with Robert Pekkanen (U. of Washington) about the development of, and changes in, Japan’s long-time ruling party, “The Rise and Fall of Japan’s LDP: Political Party Organizations as Historical Institutions” (Cornell University Press 2010), and in 2004 he co-edited “Beyond Bilateralism: U.S.-Japan Relations in the New Asia-Pacific” (Stanford University Press, and is a co-author on a forthcoming book “Reluctant Warriors, Conflicted Allies: Germany, Japan, and the International Security Order.” Professor Krauss has also been a Visiting Professor or Researcher at several universities in Japan and in Europe. In April 2015 he was honored as Distinguished Visitor by the Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, Harvard University and in 2018 received the Order of the Rising Sun, 3rd Class with Gold Leaves and Neck Ribbon from the Emperor and government of Japan for his professional accomplishments.

Admission: 
Free
Open to: 
General Public