Books & ideas

A New Conflict Era

Floriano Filho — 2020-07-13T07:17:46Z

Japan and the Korean peninsula share a troubled history, and the already tense relationships of these areas have been deteriorating over the past few years. Floriano Filho maps out these tensions as well as their symptoms—which include an arms race—while bringing light to their historical roots.

Discrimination Against Japan's Burakumin Community

Caroline Taïeb — 2020-01-09T08:00:00Z

Discrimination against the Burakumin people has infiltrated Japanese society for centuries and still exists today, proving particularly difficult to stamp out as the ways in which members of this minority group are marginalised change from one era to the next.

Music and Politics

Editorial Team — 2019-07-22T07:00:00Z

Books & Ideas is slowing down for the summer. In the meantime, here is a selection of essays, reviews and interviews published over the past year, exploring the relationship between music and politics.

Japanoise: Affect at the Edge of Music

Edouard Degay Delpeuch — 2018-11-29T07:00:00Z

In the 80's, a peculiar genre of underground music emerged: Japanoise—or Japanese Noise. Based on feedback, without melody nor structure, this genre is often perceived as the end of music. Drawing on the tools of media anthropology, David Novak traces the history of the construction of this genre.

Kenzaburō Ōe: The Barbarism of Reality

Antonin Bechler — 2014-09-25T08:00:00Z

Kenzaburō Ōe, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, is a controversial figure in Japan. And rightly so, for there are a great many contradictions in both his fictional and theoretical work. He is a fierce opponent of nuclear weapons and nuclear energy, and yet continues to celebrate the heroism of the soldier who finds glory through sacrifice.

Are Asian Economies Converging Towards American Capitalism?

Bernard Thomann — 2012-05-23T06:21:16Z

Should East Asia's economic takeoff and the new hegemony of capitalism in that region be interpreted as parts of a convergence towards a global model based on Anglosphere economic liberalism, or should we see them rather as the onset of a process by which a new form of capitalism is being constructed, based on the region's economic integration? The two books reviewed here tackle this issue head on, from the angle of regulation theory.

Fukushima: The Unremitting Disaster

David Bornstein & Bernard Thomann — 2012-04-13T13:21:30Z

Paul Jobin, who has been monitoring workers at the Fukushima nuclear plant, provides an analysis of the Japanese government's denial of the health implications for these workers and, more broadly, the long-term effects of the disaster. This censorship is, however, being challenged by the social mobilization that has followed, particularly on the Internet.

Back to Asia

Émilie Frenkiel & Bernard Thomann — 2011-12-20T20:08:38Z

This dossier examines the recently reopened debate on regional integration in Asia. What are the obstacles to the construction of an Asian Union? How is the issue tackled in Japan, China or Australia?

The Impossible Asian Union

Bernard Thomann — 2011-12-20T07:56:00Z

François Godement reminds us that the process of economic and cultural integration that is currently taking place in Asia is undermined by the heavy militarization of the countries in that region, by their competing visions of history and by diverse political factors of instability.

Japan and Asia: The Implications of an Improved Relationship

Guibourg Delamotte — 2011-09-09T10:33:51Z

As China's power increases, Japan is moving closer to other Asian countries. This return to Asia is not univocal, and the newly elected Democratic Party is not in a position to change the direction of Japanese foreign policy.