Jackson School Professor Robert Pekkanen, an expert on Japan and electoral systems, has co-edited a new book, Japan Decides 2021: The Japanese General Election.  The essays in this volume analyze the October 31, 2021, national parliamentary election in Japan. Individual chapters focus on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the postponed Tokyo Olympics, monetary policy,

Read the annual newsletter of the UW Japan Studies Program! We are excited to share what our faculty, alumni, and students have been doing over the past year. We wish you a safe and healthy holiday season, and appreciate you being a part of our community.

Ghosts in the Neighborhood: Why Japan is Haunted by its Past and Germany is Not is now available for pre-order. In his newest book Walter Hatch debunks the conventional wisdom about why Japan remains haunted by its militarist past in Asia, but Germany does not face such ghosts in Europe. Read about it in his

The Indo-Pacific region is facing big demographic change. Core US allies Japan and South Korea – and adversaries Russia and China — are rapidly aging and have shrinking working-age populations, while other regional states are growing. Despite demographics, Japan’s military is the most powerful it has ever been…

Hafu (2013 Producer/Director/Videographer Megumi Nishikura) With an ever increasing movement of people between places in this transnational age, there is a mounting number of mixed-race people in Japan, some visible others not. “Hafu” is the unfolding journey of discovery into the intricacies of mixed-race Japanese and their multicultural experience in modern day Japan.

In the 1950s, high-rise housing projects called danchi appeared on Japan’s urban perimeters to address the nation’s urgent housing crisis after World War II. With modern kitchens, private baths, and steel doors that locked out intrusive neighbors, and inhabited by aspiring middle-class families that could afford refrigerators, washing machines, electric rice cookers and other new objects of

In anticipation of travel to Japan again being available, applications are now open for a UW Study Abroad program in Matsuyama, Japan, over spring break 2023. The program will focus on “glocal” culture—how the local and the global, including food, culture, and commerce—connect the United States, including the Puget Sound region, with Japan, including Ehime

Robert Pekkanen has recently received the “Outstanding Research Award” by JANPORA (Japanese Association of NPO Research), which is the nonprofit studies association of Japan, for a co-authored article titled, “Distinguishing Providing Public Services from Receiving Government Funding as Factors in Nonprofit Advocacy.” The article, authored by Itaru Yanagi, Yohei Kobashi, Robert J. Pekkanen, and Yutaka Tsujinaka was

Good news for foreign nationals who want to visit Japan. Foreign nationals newly entering Japan for short-term tourism have been allowed to enter Japan since June 10, 2022, but only when a travel agency in Japan, (among other organizations), serves as the receiving organization of the applicants. This is in addition to Japan nationals, relatives,

The UW Japan Studies Program extends its congratulations to Azusa Tanaka who is recipient of the 2022 Distinguished Librarian Award. Through her expertise, creativity, and relationship-building with donors, she has not only greatly expanded the collections of Japanese language materials available from the UW Libraries, but also expanded access through offering information sessions to students