In April China's President Hu Jintao will visit Japan, only the second ever visit by a Chinese head of state to Japan. Both parties are enthusiastic about recovering from nearly a decade of tension since President Jiang Zemin's disastrous 1998 visit. Tokyo and Beijing appear ready to place priority on areas of common interest, such as resolving the North Korean nuclear problem, responding the challenge of climate change, coping with economic turmoil, and maintaining peace and stability in the Asia Pacific region. They strive to minimize differences over history and address competition for natural gas that inflames territorial disputes in the East China Sea. Yet other irritants remain, which can flare up to reveal deeper conflicts in national interest and an enduring rivalry for regional preeminence. While optimistic, both sides recall the dashed hopes of the Partnership of Friendship and Cooperation for Peace and Development, prepared before Jiang's visit, and are proceeding with "cautious friendliness."

Prior to joining the Henry L. Stimson Center in 1998, Benjamin Self conducted extensive fieldwork in Japan. He spent two years as a visiting research fellow at Keio University in Tokyo on a Fulbright Graduate Research Fellowship. He has lectured at Temple University Japan and interned at the Research Institute for Peace and Security in Japan. Mr. Self has served as a program associate in the Asia Program of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Mr. Self attended Johns Hopkins University, where he earned his MA, and holds a BA from Stanford University.

Professor Mito will offer a critical analysis of the constitutional revision debate in contemporary Japan and its implications for Japan's foreign relations. He argues that the justification for constitutional revision is based on political myth rather than historical reality. It is strongly felt that a militarized Japan will not enhance its independence or its international prestige. Some fear that a new Japan will end up as part of the American defense mechanism supporting US hegemony and its global strategy. Mito argues that any constitutional revision and the resultant remilitarization can affect the balance of power in the international system beyond its national borders. His major objective is to critically assess the argument for constitutional revision and the implications of the current revision debate.

Takamichi Tam Mito is professor of International Political Economy in the Department of Japanese Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. A graduate of International Christian University (B.A.), he studied also at the Universities of Keele, Toronto, London, and Tsukuba (M.I.A. & Ph.D. in Law). Prior to his current appointment, he taught at the Universities of Cambridge, London, and Toronto and at Monash and Kyushu Universities. At Kyushu he was Foundation Professor of International Japanese Studies and Study Abroad Program. He also worked as a manager in the Department of Financial Engineering at Citicorp Investment Bank Ltd in London.

His major publications include: State Power and Multinational Oil Corporations: a Study of Market Intervention in Canada and Japan (Fukuoka: Kyushu University Press, 2001); The Political Economy of the Oil Market: A Comparative Study of Japan and Canada (Fukuoka: Kyushu University Press, in Japanese 2006); Sengo Nihon Seiji to Heiwa Gaiko (Postwar Japanese Politics and Peace Diplomacy) (Kyoto: Horitsubunkasha, 2007). His 2001 publication received an award by Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Currently, he is completing six books on Japanese studies in the Asia-Pacific Region as a co-editor and contributor (forthcoming in 2008 and 2009) and also a book length study of the impact of government policy on the industrial growth, structure, and performance of the oil industry in modern Japan as a single author. He is the recipient of many research grants from various prestigious bodies including the governments of Australia, Canada, Hong Kong and Japan.

He has served for many professional and governmental bodies including Japan Agency for International Cooperation as a visiting professor of Japanese studies, Public Policy Studies Association in Japan, as the founding director; and the Japan Association of International Students' Education, as a founding vice president.

In the past decade, academia has experienced a remarkable revival of interest in India. This is largely based on the perception of India emerging as a significant global economic power.

However, there is a non-economic reason as well. The sons and daughters of America's highly educated and prosperous Indian-American community drive this second reason. These students are eager to learn about the culture, religion, literature, and the languages of their parents' and grandparents' homeland.

Goldman will discuss these interesting trends in an effort to contextualize the state of Indian Studies in American higher education today.

Professor Goldman is professor of Sanskrit at UC-Berkeley. His areas of scholarly interest include Sanskrit literature and literary theory, Indian epic studies, and psychoanalytically oriented cultural studies. Goldman's work has been recognized widely, having been awarded several fellowships and research awards. He is also a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Rapid population aging in many Asian countries poses an increased burden of care for elderly people with disabilities. Traditionally, care for the disabled elderly was provided by family members co-residing or living nearby. However, declining fertility rates, eroding social norms, and growing rates of labor force participation among females have changed the overall picture of informal care. 

One important policy question is whether informal caregiving affects caregivers' labor force participation. This question is particularly relevant for rapidly developing economies including newly industrialized countries, because a shrinking working-age population is another major concern with population aging. Providing different answers to this question leads to different policy implications for long-term care policy and labor market policy. 

Most of the existing literature on this issue comes from the United States and Europe. Using data from the first wave of the "Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging", Do's research not only provides results from a less-studied Asian society, but also takes into account different patterns of living arrangements and labor force participation. His talk will deal with the methodological issue of endogeneity between informal caregiving and labor force participation, and explore gender and age group differences.

Young Kyung Do is currently completing his PhD in health policy and administration at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Public Health. He has also earned both an MD and a master of public health degrees from Seoul National University (in 1997 and 2003, respectively). Young earned board certification in preventive medicine from the Korean Medical Association in 2004.