The monthly ISS social science dissertation workshop starts the new year on Thursday, January 26.* Presenting will be Tobias Harris, who is currently at Shaken and in the midst of fieldwork for his PhD dissertation at MIT. His topic is Japan's fabled bureaucrats, those who used to comprise such a cohesive and powerful elite, capable of challenging their political masters on the basis of their expertise, their experience, and their networks. Since the 1980s, bureaucrats have come to have different backgrounds, view their careers in different terms, and have different ambitions than their postwar predecessors.
Why the change? What does it imply for the functioning of Japan's central government, and the role of bureaucracy in advanced industrial democracies?

Regular members of the workshop are young social scientists from many nations doing research in Japan (not necessarily just PhD dissertation research).
Presentations are no more than a half-hour and the discussions, which go well beyond Q&A, go on for at least an hour. Guests are always welcome. If convenient, please let me know if you are coming.

John Campbell

*Meetings of the Shaken Social Science Dissertation Workshop start at 12 pm and go to 1:30 and sometimes beyond. The Institute of Social Science provides coffee and tea and you are welcome to bring lunch. The location is a seminar room on the 5th floor in the Akamon General Research (Sougou Kenkyuu) Building.
The building is down a little passage to the right
after you come through Akamon. For a map, go to:

http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/campusmap/cam01_08_02_e.html
__________________________
>From John Creighton Campbell
Professor Emeritus of Political Science
University of Michigan
Visiting Scholar, Institute of Gerontology Tokyo University jccamp at umich.edu