The Legacy of Shinzo Abe & the Aftermath of His Assassination

Live Webinar

Thursday, July 14, 7-8 pm ET | Calculate your local time

Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japan’s longest serving prime minister, was assassinated during a campaign appearance in Nara, Japan on July 8, 2022. At the time of his death, though no longer prime minister, he was one of Japan’s most powerful and influential figures. In this webinar, Dr. Gerald L. Curtis, Burgess Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Columbia University and Dr. Ryo Sahashi, Associate Professor of International Relations, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia at The University of Tokyo, in conversation with Japan Society Chair Merit E. Janow, discuss former Prime Minister Abe’s legacy and the impact of his murder on Japanese society and foreign policy.

Speakers

Gerald L. Curtis, Burgess Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Columbia University; Chairman, Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation; Core Faculty, Center on Japanese Economy and Business, Columbia Business School; Distinguished Research Fellow, Tokyo Foundation for Policy Research; Member of the Board of Directors, Japan Society

Ryo Sahashi, Associate Professor of International Relations, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of Tokyo; Research Fellow, Japan Center for International Exchange

Moderator

Merit E. Janow, Dean Emerita, School of International and Public Affairs; Professor of Practice in International Economic Law and International Affairs, Columbia University; Chair of the Board of Directors, Mastercard; Chair of the Board of Directors, Japan Society

Agenda

7-8 pm ET   Conversation and Q&A Session

Program Details

This is a free event, with advance registration required. The program will be live-streamed through YouTube, and registrants will receive the viewing link by email the day before the event. Participants can submit questions through YouTube during the live stream.

About the Speakers

Gerald L. Curtis is Burgess Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Columbia University, Chairman of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation, Distinguished Research Fellow at the Tokyo Foundation for Policy Research, Senior Research Scholar and former longtime Director of Columbia University’s Weatherhead East Asian Institute.

Professor Curtis is the author of numerous books and articles dealing with Japanese politics, society, and foreign policy, written and published in English and in Japanese. His commentaries are published frequently in newspapers and magazines in the US, Japan, Australia, Britain and other countries.

Professor Curtis is the recipient of the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Prize, the Chunichi Shimbun Special Achievement Award, the Japan Foundation Award, the Marshall Green Award of the Japan-America Society of Washington D.C., and the Eagle on the World Award of the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in New York. He was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star by the Emperor of Japan, one of the highest honors bestowed by the Japanese government.

Professor Curtis serves on the Board of Directors of the Japan Society of New York, the Japan Center for International Exchange in Tokyo and its affiliate JCIE USA in New York, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He has served as Special Advisor to Newsweek for Newsweek Japan, the international advisory board of the Asahi Shimbun, columnist for the Chunichi and Tokyo Shimbun, the advisory council for the Center for Global Partnership of the Japan Foundation, the Board of Directors of the US-Japan Foundation, and Director of the US-Japan Parliamentary Exchange Program. He serves as consultant and advisor to numerous public and private organizations in the US and Japan.

Professor Curtis has held appointments at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, London; the College de France, Paris; the Lee Kwan Yew School of Public Policy, Singapore; and in Tokyo at Keio, Tokyo and Waseda University, the Graduate Research Institute for Policy Studies and the Institute for International Economic Studies.

Dr. Ryo Sahashi specializes on international politics in East Asia. His recent book is In a Search for Coexistence: the United States and Two Chinas during the Cold War (Tokyo: Keiso, 2015). In English, he recently edited Looking for Leadership: The Dilemma of Political Leadership in Japan (Tokyo and New York: Japan Center for International Exchange, 2015), and wrote on the impact of rising China on Asian order, Japan’s security policy and Japan-Taiwan relations. Now he is writing his next book on US-China competition and leading two group studies on the alliance and order after the end of the Cold War.

Concurrently, he serves as Research Fellow, Japan Center for International Exchange. He regularly contributes to NHK, Nikkei, Asahi, Mainichi, Yomiuri and other major media outlets.

Dr. Sahashi has taught at Kanagawa University as professor until March, 2019 and has been Visiting Associate Professor, Walter H. Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center, Stanford University and Shigeru Yoshida Chair, Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM). He joined University of Tokyo from April, 2019, and concurrently, Associate Professor, Future Vision Research Institute, the University of Tokyo.

He also served as adjunct Senior Research Fellow at Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo Foundation-German Marshall Fund of the United States Partnership Fellow, and Guest Researcher for First Special Committee Research Office, House of Councilors. He is the member of UK-Japan 21stCentury Committee.

He received his B.A. from International Christian University and his Ph.D. from the Graduate Schools for Law and Politics at the University of Tokyo. He also studied at Department of Political Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

About the Moderator

Merit E. Janow is an internationally recognized expert in international trade and investment. She has extensive experience in business, academia and government, and has had life long involved with Japan and the Asia-Pacific region. Janow has been on the faculty of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) and Columbia Law School since 1994, and served as Dean of SIPA from July 2013 until December 2021. She has written three books and numerous articles. Professor Janow has had three periods of government service: In December 2003, while at Columbia University, she was elected as one of the seven Members of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Appellate Body. In the course of her four years of service, she reviewed more than 30 appeals. From 1997-2000, Janow served as the Executive Director of the first international antitrust advisory committee to the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust of the US Justice Department. From 1989 to 1993, prior to joining Columbia, Janow served as Deputy Assistant USTR for Japan and China in the Executive Office of the President. Janow has also had extensive corporate and nonprofit board experience. She currently serves on the board of Mastercard (Chair), several boards within the American Funds/Capital group, and Aptiv. She was previously Chair of the Nasdaq Stock Market for nearly a decade, Trimble Corp. and Rockefeller Financial. Janow also serves on non profit boards of Japan Society and the National Committee on US China Relations. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. She is on the global advisory council of MUFG and was an inaugural member of the international advisory council of China’s sovereign fund, the China Investment Corporation (CIC). Early in her career, Janow was a corporate lawyer specializing in cross-border mergers and acquisitions with Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom in New York. She grew up in Tokyo, Japan and speaks Japanese. She has a JD from Columbia Law School where she was a Stone Scholar and a BA in Asian Studies with honors from the University of Michigan.