It is tempting to characterize the recent round of North Korea missile and nuclear tests as only the latest example of the provocative behavior of its brash young leader, Kim Jong Un. A simultaneous launch of three medium-range missiles, mounted on mobile launchers, was defiantly timed to coincide with China’s hosting of the G20 summit in Hangzhou. And the latest nuclear test, the fifth carried out by North Korea, seemed designed to assert its status as a nuclear weapons power ahead of the U.S. presidential vote, Sneider writes.

Failed Democratization in Prewar Japan presents a compelling case study on change in political regimes through its exploration of Japan's transition to democracy. Within a broad-ranging examination of Japan's "semi-democratic" political system from 1918 to 1932, when political parties tended to dominate the government, the book analyzes in detail why this system collapsed in 1932 and discusses the implications of the failure.

By reference to comparable cases—prewar Argentina, prewar Germany, postwar Brazil, and 1980s Thailand—Harukata Takenaka reveals that the factors responsible for the breakdown of the Taisho democracy in Japan replicated those that precipitated the collapse of democracy in Europe, Latin America, and elsewhere in Asia.

While most literature on these transitions focuses on successful cases, Takenaka explores democratic failure to answer questions about how and why political parties and their leaders can behave in ways that undermine the democratic institutions that serve as the basis for their formal authority.

This book is part of the Studies of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center series at Stanford University Press.

No nation is free from the charge that it has a less-than-complete view of the past. History is not simply about recording past events—it is often contested, negotiated, and reshaped over time. The debate over the history of World War II in Asia remains surprisingly intense, and Divergent Memories examines the opinions of powerful individuals to pinpoint the sources of conflict: from Japanese colonialism in Korea and atrocities in China to the American decision to use atomic weapons against Japan.

Rather than labeling others' views as "distorted" or ignoring dissenting voices to create a monolithic historical account, Gi-Wook Shin and Daniel Sneider pursue a more fruitful approach: analyzing how historical memory has developed, been formulated, and even been challenged in each country. By identifying key factors responsible for these differences, Divergent Memories provides the tools for readers to both approach their own national histories with reflection and to be more understanding of others.

"A well-written investigation on the legacy of World War II in Asia, greatly contributes to the field of cultural and military history.” —Mel Vasquez, H-War

"This book is an important counterweight to prevailing tendencies that promote uncritical nationalism and is thus an invaluable resource for this generation’s Asian and American youth to gain a critical understanding of their national histories...[T]he authors’ non-judgmental approach, coupled with persistence in pursuing the multiple interpretations and experiences of these traumatic events, provoke a reconsideration of our notions of justice, equality, and humanity within our nationalist thinking."—Grace Huang, Journal of American-East Asian Relations, Vol. 26.2

This book is part of the Studies of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center series at Stanford University Press.

The history of human civilization has been about managing information, from hunting and gathering through contemporary times. In modern societies, information flows are central to how individuals and societies interact with governments, economies, and other countries. Despite this centrality of information, information governance—how information flows are managed—has not been a central concern of scholarship. We argue that it should be, especially now that digitization has dramatically altered the amount of information generated, how it can be transmitted, and how it can be used.

This book examines various aspects of information governance in Japan, utilizing comparative and historical perspectives. The aim is threefold: 1) to explore Japan’s society, politics, and economy through a critical but hitherto underexamined vantage that we believe cuts to the core of what modern societies are built with—information; 2) articulate a set of components which can be used to analyze other countries from the vantage of information governance; and 3) provide frameworks of reference to analyze each component.

This book is the product of a multidisciplinary, multinational collaboration between scholars based in the US and Japan. Each are experts in their own fields (economics, political science, information science, law, library science), and were brought together in two workshops to develop, explore, and analyze the conception and various of facets of information governance. This book is frontier research by proposing and taking this conception of information governance as a framework of analysis.

The introduction sets up the analysis by providing background and a framework for understanding the conception of information governance. Part I focuses on the management of government-held information. Part II examines information central to economic activity. Part III explores information flows crucial to politics and social life.