The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan (FCCJ) Library is pleased to announce the upcoming Book Break event.


FCCJ Book Break October 17. 18:15. Gavan McCormack, author of "The State of the Japanese State : Contested Identity, Direction and Role"


Wednesday, October 17, 2018, 2018 from 6:15 pm to 8:30 pm

(The talk will be in English)


Admission: 3,500yen (non-members) / 2,100yen (FCCJ members)

*The price covers a set dinner.

Please sign up by email (front@fccj.or.jp) and pay in advance by Friday, October 12th.


Venue:
The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan
Yurakucho Denki North Building 20F
Yurakucho 1-7-1, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, 100-0006
(http://www.fccj.or.jp/about/access.html)



Gavan McCormack will introduce his new book The State of the Japanese State which casts a cold eye over the contemporary Abe state, especially the relationship with the United States, suggesting that the formula on which the state rests is fundamentally at odds with social, economic, and political realities. Launching it at Daiwa Anglo-Japanese House in London, Oxford University's Arthur Stockwin responded positively to much of the book, conceding that "freedom of speech and human rights are under attack at the present time" and that "Japan may be a client state of the United States," but nevertheless protested that "It is not entirely clear what alternative there might be."



That of course is true. But the historian's task is to understand the present, expose its contradictions and the social and political forces that contest it, not to forecast the future.



Gavan McCormack, Emeritus Professor of Australian National University (ANU), is a graduate of the universities of Melbourne (Law and History) and London (Chinese) with PhD from School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London in 1974 and he taught at the Universities of Leeds, La Trobe, and Adelaide before joining the ANU in 1990. He has lived and worked in Japan on many occasions since first visiting it as a student in 1962. He was co-founder in 2002 of the electronic journal Japan Focus (now The Asia-Pacific Journal - Japan Focus). Much of his recent work appears in Japanese, Korean, and Chinese as well as English. Recent Books include: Target North Korea: Pushing North Korea to the Brink of Nuclear Catastrophe (『北朝鮮をどう考えるのか 』), Client State: Japan in the American Embrace (『属国―米国の抱擁とアジアでの孤立』) , Resistant Islands: Okinawa Confronts Japan and the United States (『沖縄の〈怒〉日米への抵抗』）, and in Japanese『転換期の日本へ ：「パックス・アメリカーナ」か「パックス・アジア」か』(Tenkanki no Nihon he - "Pax Americana" ka "Pax Ajia" ka (For a Japan in Transition - Pax Americana Versus Pax Asia) co-authored with John Dower, NHK Shuppan)



The library committee is offering a cocktail party - "Meet the Author" - starting at 6:15 pm, followed by dinner at 6:45 pm (Menu: TBD). Drinks can be ordered on a cash basis from the bar in the room. Book Break charges are 2,100yen / 3,500yen (members / non-members) per person. The member price is applicable to members' guests.



To FCCJ members: Sign up now at the reception desk (03-3211-3161) or on the FCCJ website. To help us plan proper seating and food preparation, please reserve in advance, preferably by noon of the day of the event. Those without reservations will be turned away once available seats are filled. Reservations cancelled less than 24 hours in advance will be charged in full.



To non-members: Sign up now at the reception desk by email (front@fccj.or.jp). Please reserve and pay in advance by Friday, October 12th. Those without reservations will be turned away once available seats are filled. No refund is available unless the event is cancelled for the reasons on our part.



FCCJ Book Breaks
http://www.fccj.or.jp/events-calendar/book-breaks