Marking seventy years since the end of World War II, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed “profound grief” on Friday for his country’s actions. While pointing to short comings in the statement, the Stanford scholars said the prime minister’s words represented a genuine effort to reflect on the past and provided opportunities to improve relations in the region.

The highly anticipated statement, issued on behalf of the Japanese cabinet, was closely followed by its East Asian neighbors who have raised concerns over Japan’s views of the wartime era.

Leaders of South Korea and China have said Japan has not apologized fully for crimes committed during WWII and each dispute historical narratives seen in the others’ textbooks, popular culture and other domains.

Advancing historical reconciliation in East Asia is a key research area of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. The center leads a research project, Divided Memories and Reconciliation, which has produced numerous articles and books, including a ground breaking comparative study of high school history textbooks in China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the United States.

In May 2014, the center convened an international conference “Pathways to Reconciliation” on historical issues, co-sponsored by the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat, the governmental organization promoting Japan-China-South Korea trilateral cooperation.

Earlier this year, the Japan Program asked Stanford scholars to write their own version of the 70^th anniversary statement as if they were the prime minister of Japan. The scholars’ statements were compiled into a report, published in May 2015.

Eight scholars contributed to the exercise in an effort “to understand the diversity of reasonable views on the issue of Japan’s responsibility for the cruel and violent war and Japan’s role in building a peaceful and prosperous world,” the introduction stated.

Themes that emerged in the report included a need for Abe to show heartfelt remorse about Japan’s actions during WWII and its desire to work toward a peaceful future.

Three noted Japan experts who contributed to that report offered their analysis of the prime minister’s statement issued yesterday in Tokyo.

Below are brief summaries of their analysis, you may click on each link to expand in full.

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Duus recognizes that Abe’s statement offers a reiteration of the statements made by Prime Ministers Murayama and Koizumi by including four key words – aggression, colonial rule, apology and remorse. Unlike past statements, however, Abe’s begins by putting war in the historical context and offers a more explicit statement of the victims of the war, not only the three million Japanese but also citizens of China, Southeast Asia and the Pacific islands. The statement can be viewed as “a small but important step toward a truce in the history wars that have raged in East Asia for the last three decades,” he says. However, Abe's attempt at reconciliation will have little effect if he does not rein in contrary actions by neo-nationalists in his own party.

Peter Duus is the William H. Bonsall Professor of Japanese History, emeritus; and a senior fellow, by courtesy, Hoover Institution, Stanford University.

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Response by Takeo Hoshi

Hoshi notes that Abe’s statement mentions past apologies expressed by the Japanese government, but has no explicit apology from the current administration. He says there are two surprising elements about the statement. The first is the length – it is much larger than predecessors Murayama and Koizumi at 1,664 words in English and 3,970 characters in Japanese. The second is the emphasis on history rather than on forward-looking components. He says it is commendable that Abe provided an expanded view of history. Hoshi notes that it is nearly impossible to satisfy everyone’s views in such a statement, as scholars witnessed firsthand when working on the Japan Program project.

Takeo Hoshi is the Henri H. and Tomoye Takahashi Senior Fellow in Japanese Studies in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies; a professor (by courtesy) of finance at the Graduate School of Business; and director of the Japan Program at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University.

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Response by Daniel Sneider

Sneider says Abe’s statement must be judged on following criteria: that it is a valid effort to draw lessons from Japan’s wartime past and that it contributes to the improvement of relations in Northeast Asia. He says the statement advances these goals, but there remain a few caveats. Sneider says the version of history communicated “will not satisfy many people, including many historians,” but that it does move away from the idea that revisionist Japan was in a war of self-defense not aggression. To move Japan, China and South Korea toward reconciliation, the prime minister and his cabinet must embrace the spirit of the statement in full and open the door to convening a long-delayed trilateral summit.

A version of this essay was also published by Nippon in Japanese and English.

Daniel Sneider is the associate director for research at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University.

Two key challenges facing Northeast Asia are how to tame the power of nationalism and create shared memories of history, Stanford professor Gi-Wook Shin wrote in The Diplomat. 

Shin, director of the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC), urged action on the 70^th anniversary of the end of World War II. Northeast Asians should use the commemoration as an “opportune occasion to reflect on their unfortunate past to learn lessons,” only then can the region become more peaceful and prosperous.

Shin and Daniel Sneider, Shorenstein APARC’s associate director for research, lead the Divided Memories and Reconciliation research project which examines memories of the wartime experience in Northeast Asia and what steps can be taken to reconcile disputes over history.

One of their latest outcomes is the book Confronting Memories of World War II: European and Asian Legacies (April 2015), edited with University of Washington professor Daniel Chirot, that studies how wartime narratives are interpreted, memorialized and used in Europe and Asia.

The full article in The Diplomat can be accessed by clicking here.

Japan has been actively pursuing internationalization of its higher education, and recruiting foreign students has been a major part of this endeavor. In 1983, Japan announced its plan to recruit 100,000 foreign students by the year 2000, and in 2008 instituted a plan to recruit 300,000 foreign students by 2020. Subsequent government-led projects such as the Global 30 (2009-2014) and the Top Global University (2014-2023) projects have also stipulated international student recruitment as a major requirement.

As a result, the number of foreign students in Japanese universities has increased significantly from 10,428 in 1983 to 139,185 in 2014. Likewise, foreign faculty numbers have grown from just 418 (0.8% of total faculty) in 1994 to 6,034 (6.8%) in 2014. Although the figures are still relatively low compared with those in Europe and North America, they bring a potentially powerful force for social change to a country marked by high ethnic homogeneity.

In particular, the influx of foreign students and faculty to Japanese universities creates more culturally diverse campuses, often cited as a desirable result of and a key motive for pursuing internationalization. In the U.S. and Europe, such changes have led to significant discursive and programmatic efforts to create a culture of respect for diversity and inclusion. For example, Europe has, despite its critics, consistently articulated the value of "interculturality," diversity, and respect for cultural differences as a broader discourse for European higher education.

However, this is not the case with Japan and most other Asian nations. One major reason is that Japanese universities primarily attract foreign students as a means to particular ends, such as enhancing university prestige, creating "education hubs," filling the gap in the declining college student population and improving international higher education rankings. As a result, Japanese campuses have become much more diverse than in the past. However, appreciation of the intrinsic educational value of a culturally diverse student and faculty body has not been embraced.

Our study shows a noticeable disjuncture between structural, educational and interpersonal levels of diversity. That is, Japanese universities have accepted more and more students of varying racial and ethnic backgrounds (structural diversity), but the curriculum still offers limited opportunities for students to think more deeply about assumptions concerning race, ethnicity and other individual/group differences (educational diversity).

However, despite the politeness of the Japanese, many of the respondents indicated that making friends with Japanese students is difficult, with some pointing this out to be "the hardest part about being in Japan." One foreign student seemed puzzled: "Making real friends is hard. But I don't know why." One South Korean student we interviewed provided a clue: "People here are very individualistic and very independent, I think. In my laboratory, I will be the one who will approach my lab mates, especially the Japanese. They are very helpful but I have to be the one who starts the conversation."

The Japanese government and universities have worked closely to attract foreign students but due to the lack of interpersonal interaction between Japanese and foreign students, Japan is missing out on crucial opportunities in its higher education internationalization efforts.

First, international students gain many opportunities to interact with each other and learn intercultural skills for global citizenship while Japanese students much less so. As one foreign student said, "It's a very diverse environment because we all come from different countries. We can communicate different ways of thinking and share different ideas." Yet, most Japanese students are hesitant to interact with foreign students, missing the chance to learn intercultural skills. As the number of young Japanese going abroad to study has been on the decline in recent years (82,945 in 2004 to 60,138 in 2012), the contribution of foreign students to global education in Japanese colleges will be all the more important.

Second, diversity is instrumental in promoting innovation, and Japan should take advantage of the diversity that foreign students bring to its society. Much research demonstrates the positive effects of diversity on various academic and social outcomes (ability to form out-group friendship networks, increased cultural awareness, acquiring global citizenship skills, improving the campus climate, innovation, etc.). Facilitating diversity and recognizing their long-term effects for innovation and development should be a major goal of higher education in Japan.

Finally, foreign students can be valuable social capital for Japan, especially playing the role of transnational bridges between Japan and their home countries. Many come to Japan to learn about Japanese society and economy, with plans to become a bridge between Japan and their home countries after graduation. However, due to the lack of interpersonal interaction with Japanese students, foreign students often end up interacting primarily among themselves. Thus, they are also likely to bridge among themselves, rather than with Japanese, and that is a loss, given that Japan has invested so much in attracting foreign students.

Japan wants to make its top universities "super global," but they should first realize that this requires more than simply recruiting foreigners. What is most urgent is producing "global citizens" with inter-cultural skills and that can be achieved through the creation of a campus environment and culture that appreciates and respects diversity. It should also better appreciate the value of foreign students as transnational bridges with Japan.

To achieve such goals, Japanese universities need to establish institutional frameworks or programs to promote interaction between Japanese and foreign students. For example, they should offer more courses that both Japanese and foreign students can take together. Rather than just focusing on teaching Japanese languages and cultures to foreign students, Japanese students should be encouraged to take more courses in English and also those on other cultures and societies, ideally together with foreign students. These courses can instill values of cultural diversity in higher education in Japan. Japanese universities also need to ensure that structural segregation, either between programs, courses, dormitories and campuses, isn't an obstacle for promoting greater interaction between foreign and local students.

Our focus group interviews with Japanese students show that foreign and Japanese students misunderstand each other to a great extent. Foreign students are disappointed that not many Japanese are willing to approach them, but Japanese students are afraid to inconvenience their foreign visitors with their "poor" English. Foreign students are tired from guessing what their Japanese counterparts really feel and think, or their honne, but Japanese students think it is impolite to be too frank and direct even with other Japanese, let alone towards foreign students. To reduce these and other misgivings and gaps in cultural understanding, Japanese universities need to put in place more cross-cultural programs and opportunities for both sides to come into natural contact.

In short, internationalization efforts by Japanese universities should not stop at recruiting foreigners to their campuses. Rather, fostering a tolerant, inclusive university culture where foreigners are considered full, valued members should be considered an important step toward making Japanese universities truly international.

Stanford professor Gi-Wook Shin and Yonsei University professor Rennie J. Moon lead the research project, Diversity and Tolerance in Korea and Asia. This Nikkei Asian Review article was originally carried on July 16 and reposted with permission.

Demographic change is fast becoming one of the most globally significant trends of the 21st century. Declining fertility rates and rising life expectancy -- two of the patterns triggering demographic change -- will cause vast socioeconomic strains, especially in the Asia-Pacific region, which has some of the world's most populous countries. Stanford health researcher Karen Eggleston says comparison and cross-collaboration are needed to induce creative solutions.

In an interview with the Office of International Affairs, Eggleston discusses her research approaches and partnerships in the study of healthcare systems and health policy in the Asia-Pacific region. She leads a multiyear research initative that examines comparative policy responses to demographic change in East Asia. Eggleston says the goal is to help move global health policy to a place where everyone has an "equal opportunity for a healthier and longer life."

The Q&A may be viewed in full by clicking here.

Analyzing demographic change in China, Japan and South Korea is the focus of the book Aging Asia, an outcome of a conference between the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center and the Stanford Center on Longevity.

Eggleston also coedited a special issue of the Journal of the Economics of Ageing with David Bloom, a professor at Harvard University, looking at a range of economic issues related to population change in China and India.

The United States and European countries can take steps to avoid making the same economic mistakes that Japan committed during the latter's "lost decade," a Stanford economist wrote in a new paper.

The study, published in the IMF Economic Review, describes the reasons Japan was not able to pull out of its long recession in the 1990s, offering some lessons for U.S. and European leaders in the wake of the 2007-09 meltdown.

In particular, the delay in bank recapitalization and the lack of structural reforms in the economic sphere kept Japan from realizing a full recovery, wrote Takeo Hoshi, the Henri and Tomoye Takahashi senior fellow at Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

"Bank recapitalization" refers to a governmental reorganization of failing banks, often involving the use of public money to keep them solvent. "Structural reforms" describes how a government might overhaul its economic structures to increase business competition – such as deregulation to cut costs for firms.

The shortcomings in these two policy areas "retarded Japan's recovery from the crisis and were responsible for its stagnant post-crisis growth," said Hoshi, whose co-author was Anil K. Kashyap, an economics professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Risky bank lending

Japan's "lost decade" originally referred to the 1990s, though the country has still not regained the economic power it enjoyed in the 1970s and 1980s. Some say Japan has actually experienced two lost decades if the 2000s are counted as well.

Faced with a huge financial crisis at the dawn of its lost decade, Japan had to navigate challenges that other advanced economies had not confronted since the Great Depression, Hoshi and Kashyap wrote.

However, government leaders made mistakes, Hoshi said. One was failure to rehabilitate the banks and another was to misunderstand the nature of the problems afflicting the Japanese economy. For example, much like the United States in 2007-09, the Japanese banks had made many dubious loans to risky customers.

"Instead of recognizing that major structural adjustments were needed, much of the policy response was calibrated under the assumption that Japan faced a simple cyclical problem that could be addressed with indiscriminate fiscal stimulus," wrote Hoshi, the director of the Japan Program at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

For example, on the demand side, monetary policy was not as expansionary as it could have been, he said. Deflation persisted for a long time. And fiscal stimulus packages – such as tax cuts – were inconsistent. Meanwhile, much of Japan's fiscal spending took the form of public works projects that had low productivity.

As for structural reforms, the Japanese government lacked a sense of urgency. For example, even in the reform-minded administration of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, only eight of the proposed 35 reform initiatives would have directly boosted growth. Of the others, 16 might have indirectly supported growth and 11 would have had no effect on growth, Hoshi said.

Drastic change needed

Unfortunately, some European nations seem to be following Japan's lead, Hoshi said.

"In France, Italy and Spain, bank recapitalization has been delayed and the structural reforms have been slow. Without drastic changes, they are likely to follow Japan's path to long economic stagnation," Hoshi and Kashyap wrote.

The problems that held back Japan seem to be less serious in the U.S., Hoshi said: "Employment protection is low in the United States and the labor market shows high mobility. The regulatory advantage for incumbent firms is smaller than in Europe or Japan and starting new business is relatively easy."

As the researchers noted, the United States and Germany are in a bit better economic shape, partly due to the fact that they did undertake structural reforms sooner rather than later. The U.S. was able to recapitalize its banks more quickly, for example.

Still, five years after the failure of the Lehman Brothers investment bank left the world's financial markets in chaos, the U.S. and Europe are not yet back to what had looked normal before the crisis, according to the research. For instance, employment levels have not reached the levels seen before the 2007-09 crash.

"The U.S. recovery has been tepid despite a number of extraordinary macroeconomic policies (at least in the traditional sense). This suggests that the U.S. economy also has problems, but they are just different from those in Japan and in Europe," Hoshi said.

In the years leading up to the financial crisis, the researchers wrote, U.S. growth was fueled by a consumption boom from rapid housing price increases and rising debt levels.

"In a broad sense, the U.S. economy before the crisis was similar to the Japanese or Spanish economies," noted Hoshi, adding that in Japan, the speculative investment boom in the late 1980s masked structural problems.

Clifton Parker is a writer for the Stanford News Service.