Seoul faces challenges that are not very different from other global cities, said Mayor Park Won Soon, the public figure who leads the South Korean city of over 10 million people, concluding that the key to solving them ­is by better engaging and empowering citizens.

“We tore down the silos,” said Park, speaking to a Stanford audience about his efforts to improve Seoul’s bureaucracy and access for citizens.

At McCaw Hall, Park discussed his background as a scholar, civic activist and philanthropist, emphasizing how it provides him perspective as a leader, and the acumen to think differently to address a wide range of issues affecting Seoul, including poverty, climate change and an aging population.

Park’s visit to Stanford University was sponsored by the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center (APARC) in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. The event was part of the Asia-Pacific Leaders Forum, a seminar series that brings Asian leaders to Stanford to share their experiences. In 2013, the series hosted Ban-Ki Moon, U.N. Secretary General, and in 2009, then-South Korean assembly member, now president, Park Geun-hye.

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Gi-Wook Shin, director of Shorenstein APARC, introduced Mr. Park, referencing their connection and past projects to a crowd of nearly 275 people, including Korean community members and media.

“We’ve known each other as colleagues and friends for a number of years," Shin said, "so it is a pleasure to host Mayor Park, and hold a public forum to hear [his] vision."

Shin and Park established a fellowship for Korean NGO leaders, and awarded it to 30 leaders over three years.

Fighting for equality

As a university student in 1975, Park protested against South Korea’s government led by President Park Chung-hee, a military leader who ruled under highly authoritarian law. Mr. Park was imprisoned for his activism and eventually expelled from school, but his enthusiasm for justice and democracy never waned, he said.

He said the political and social chaos during those years in South Korea motivated him to pursue justice through other channels, going on to become a human rights lawyer and into public office as mayor in 2011.

South Korea gradually transitioned into a democracy in the 1980s, influenced in large part by many sweeping civil movements. The country has since stabilized, and now enjoys cultural and economic success in the world today. 

Park speaks to the audience about governance, emphasizing the importance of communication.

But, there is a “shadow behind the miracle,” said Park, referring to the myriad of societal problems that Seoul still faces, like many cities dealing with the effects of urbanization.

He said the only way to identify and address problems is through a highly participatory system of governance, and one that isn’t afraid to think of new solutions to old problems.

“A city that constantly collaborates and innovates to improve the quality of life for citizens,” he said, those are the efforts that create an environment “where people live in harmony and where people are happy.”

Park said listening to the voices of Seoul citizens is a cornerstone of his administration’s approach. And he has a motto that matches.

“Citizens are the mayor,” is the saying that Park administration attempts to fulfill through a variety of initiatives, including those led by the Seoul Innovation Bureau, a new administrative branch established to bring fresh ideas into the city’s paradigm.

Park’s administration holds town hall meetings and uses some of the latest technology to initiate dialogue with citizens, including SNS text messaging, social media and Wikiseoul, an online blog-style platform, to communicate policies and receive feedback.

[[{"fid":"216092","view_mode":"crop_870xauto","fields":{"format":"crop_870xauto","field_file_image_description[und][0][value]":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","field_credit[und][0][value]":"","field_caption[und][0][value]":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","field_related_image_aspect[und][0][value]":"","thumbnails":"crop_870xauto","pp_lightbox":false,"pp_description":true},"type":"media","attributes":{"alt":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","title":"Park meets community members and media following his talk.","height":783,"width":870,"style":"margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 15px; padding: 0px; float: left; width: 230px; height: 200px;","class":"media-element file-crop-870xauto"}}]]He said he checks the city’s social media accounts personally because it allows him to keep a close eye on what issues are important to citizens, and often follows-up with constituents who write him “tweets,” messages received via Twitter.

Park says Seoul’s success is because of 10 million citizens and many institutions that have supported the city’s growth. He holds popular support in the city, and was recently reelected for a second mayoral term in June 2014, winning by a wide margin.

He said other countries are beginning to replicate his administration’s model, from e-governance activities to energy policy, calling it the “Seoul effect.”

Closing out the speech, Park said inclusiveness is the essence of good governance.

“If you want to travel fast go alone, but if you want to travel far, go together,” he said, citing a well-known proverb.

Below is the full video and transcript of his presentation.

The 40-day disappearance from public view of North Korea's young leader Kim Jong Un and his sudden reappearance on Monday, walking with a cane but otherwise apparently well, made headlines around the world. International media ran countless reports that Kim was either seriously ill or had even been deposed. Why was this such a big story, and why did so many get it wrong?

David Straub, a Korea expert at Stanford University's Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center who formerly served as the State Department’s Korean affairs director, was one observer who consistently challenged that media narrative. In the following interview, he offers his analysis of both the North Korean situation and the way it was misinterpreted by a majority of the media.

Why didn’t you give credence to the reports that Kim Jong Un was seriously ill or had lost out in a power struggle?

I've been following North Korea professionally on and off since 1978. Looking at similar incidents, I've grown wary of poorly sourced reports about North Korea, and especially speculation, even when it comes from so-called “experts.” Because North Korea is a black box, mostly closed to outside view, almost anyone can get away with claiming that he or she is an expert. There are also many governments, groups and individuals that have axes to grind. Ignorance, wishful thinking and even disinformation are all too common when reporting on North Korea.

What was the evidence that led you to believe that Kim Jong Un wasn’t seriously ill, much less deposed?

There were only a few facts that we actually knew to be true during his absence. His last public appearance was on Sept. 3. In July and August, there was video of Kim Jong Un walking with a pronounced limp. Later in Sept., North Korean media reported that he was suffering an uncomfortable physical condition. Kim is now quite overweight, and there are also photographs of him wearing platform shoes. Therefore, the most likely explanation for his disappearance from public view was that he was receiving treatment for whatever caused the limp, and that he needed to stay off his feet until he was better. At age 31, it was unlikely that he was suffering from a more serious ailment. Moreover, just like his grandfather and father, Kim has previously dropped out of public view for many weeks at a time.

What about the reports that Kim was deposed?

There were zero credible sources that Kim had been deposed or that his leadership position had even been challenged. And, a great deal of speculation existed about the Oct. 4 visit of three top North Korean officials to South Korea, who attended the closing ceremony of the Asian Games there. But if there had actually been trouble in Pyongyang, the last thing one would have expected is for those officials to visit South Korea in such a manner. Meanwhile, one North Korean defector has been arguing for a long time that Kim has only been a figurehead and that real power in North Korea is wielded by officials in his party. The issue of just how much power Kim actually holds is an important one. The answer remains unclear to observers outside North Korea, and is a different issue from the stories about Kim's health and whether he had been overthrown.

Why did Kim suddenly reemerge?

The short answer is probably that his physical condition had improved enough. The photographs that North Korea media published on Monday show him walking with a cane but otherwise apparently in good health and in good spirits, and leading some of the same North Korean officials who recently visited South Korea, speculated by the media to be the ones who encouraged a coup.

Do you think that North Korea felt the need to show that Kim was still in charge after the media attention?

That too is speculation, but it is quite plausible. It is likely that Kim wanted to show not only the international community, but even more so, his own people that his physical condition is not serious. Ordinary North Koreans were of course not able to access international reports about Kim, but they knew that he was not appearing in their national media and presumably were wondering how he was.

But isn't it a problem for Kim to be seen in a weakened physical condition?

Kim's power and legitimacy in North Korea derive from the fact that his grandfather Kim Il Sung was the country's first leader, not from his physical condition or personal qualities. It’s no longer taboo in North Korea to show the top leader suffering from ailments. In fact, Kim's father Kim Jong Il was shown repeatedly looking extremely unwell after his stroke in 2008. Similarly, Kim Jong Un himself had already been shown in July and August on North Korean television suffering from the limp. In both cases, the North Korean media characterized the two Kims as hardworking leaders even when they were unwell. Moreover, as Yonsei University Professor John Delury has pointed out, actually showing Kim using a cane may be intentional because it makes him look a bit older and more mature.

What are we to make of the attention on Kim’s absence over the past several weeks?

I think it would be valuable if the international media would begin to apply better standards for its reporting on North Korea. North Korea poses important challenges to the international community, and citizens need to be informed about what's actually happening there, not what people imagine or those with ulterior motives would have us believe.

There is another, even more basic lesson to be drawn from this episode. With the rise of the Internet, information and misinformation have proliferated about North Korea, along with the ability to store and recall all of that information quickly. In addition, in popular imagination, the end of the Cold War transformed North Korea from an adjunct of the Soviet Union to an entity in itself, one that is both abhorrent and ridiculous. The result has been an exponential increase in the number of people throughout the world producing, circulating and consuming any information even remotely plausible about North Korea, and the established media in turn report on what those people are saying.

An increase in global attention to all things North Korea is important because it means North Korea can no longer hide itself from the international community. Already, this has contributed to the United Nation’s current consideration of legal action against the regime and its leaders over the human rights situation in the North. That is what North Korea’s leaders must have been worrying about over the past month as they watched the media reports—not Kim Jong Un’s bad leg.

Straub also spoke with Public Radio International (PRI) just before Kim’s reemergence, audio from “The World” radioshow is available on the PRI website.

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South Korean activists continue to send balloons into North Korea filled with leaflets that reportedly contain information that is critical of Kim Jong Un’s regime. The latest campaign coincided with the anniversary of the founding of the North’s ruling Worker’s Party. The Koreas exchanged gunfire over the incident in the first-ever North Korean attack after such a balloon launch.

“The possible benefits of sending such balloons into the North are far outweighed by giving North Korea a pretext to attack the South,” said David Straub, the associate of the Korea Program at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC), in an interview the Voice of America.

Straub’s commentary coincides with recommendations in “Tailored Engagement,” a policy report published in Sept. 2014 by Straub, Gi-Wook Shin, director of Shorenstein APARC and Joyce Lee, research associate for the Korea Program, which argues for increased engagement with the North through a series of precise steps taken on behalf of the South Korean government. Among those steps, the scholars recommend the South Korean government should not permit balloon launches.

The full article can be found on the Voice of America online, and the policy report can be found on the Shorenstein APARC website.

Economic and demographic transition pose major challenges for countries worldwide, particularly in large developing countries like China; however, strengthening social welfare programs can offset negative effects and help promote a sustainable future, according to Karen Eggleston, a scholar of Asia health policy at Stanford University.

“Unprecedented economic growth in China spanning the last three decades has lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty and restored China to the prominence in the world economy that it once enjoyed centuries ago,” said Eggleston, who is a Center Fellow at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

“Demographic change not only shapes the trajectory of [its] development, but interacts with macroeconomic and microeconomic forces” in numerous ways.

Eggleston, who presented “China’s Demographic Change in Comparative Perspective: Implications for Labor Markets and Sustainable Development” at the Jackson Hole 2014 Economic Symposium “Re-evaluating Labor Market Dynamics,” says a combination of societal changes makes China distinctive, and that the country can offer insights in comparative perspective. She joined two other experts for a panel discussion on demographics during the three-day conference led by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, which draws dozens of central bankers, policymakers, academics, and economists from around the world.

The research stems from a project that Eggleston heads on policy responses to demographic change in Asia. The initiative, which is a part of the Asia Health Policy Program, grew out of a 2009 conference cosponsored by the Global Aging Program at the Stanford Center on Longevity. Its outcomes have included the publication, Aging Asia, a special issue of the Journal of the Economics of Aging focused on China and India co-edited with David Bloom of Harvard University, and two forthcoming books on urbanization and demographic change in Asia.

China in flux

China is the most populous country in the world with more than 1.3 billion people. Its sheer size alone creates heavy demands as demographics change, and the economy continues its shift from a centrally-planned system to a market-based system.

China’s population age 60 and older is projected to increase from one-tenth of the population in year 2000 to a staggering one-third by year 2060. Simultaneously, the population age 14 and under is projected to decrease by one-third between years 2010­ and 2055 (Figure 2).

Eggleston, and others who closely watch the situation, say these demographic changes will bring a myriad of challenges to the labor market and to cultural norms related to intergenerational support, work and retirement.

China’s low birth rates have largely been influenced by family planning campaigns that begun in the early 1970s, and later, the “one child policy,” a population control policy that allowed for the birth of only a single child in many families. Recently, the government has relaxed that policy, and analysts believe the change will eventually help to balance the population age structure and infuse the workforce with new employees, filling the void caused by retiring workers in the coming years.

In the meantime, preparing support structures for the older generations’ departure from the labor market is essential. Social welfare programs, including health insurance and retirement and childcare services, will see significant demand, and require restructuring to handle the influx.

China’s aging population experience is similar to other countries in Asia. Japan, South Korea and India are also projected to see significant increase in median age over the next 30 years (Figure 1). 

Eggleston says China has made positive steps toward restructuring its institutions, including establishing government-subsidized health insurance programs and reforming pension systems. Most notably since 2002, China took a large step towards universal health care by implementing the New Rural Cooperative Medical Scheme for rural residents. Now, nearly all citizens have access to basic medical care, which can support healthy aging as well as mitigate large “precautionary savings” and help those struck by medical conditions requiring significant services.

A pension system for people in China’s rural areas, developed by the government in 2009, also set up a supportive system by providing increased transfers for seniors, and, interestingly, supporting labor markets by easing the worries of adult children who migrate to urban areas for work.

China has been forward thinking with its related public policies, but it certainly can do more, Eggleston says. Integrating technology into its health systems, and making its services more fiscally responsible could improve efficiency, and expand access to care.

The full paper and handout from Eggleston’s presentation at the conference are available on the Federal Reserve of Kansas City website.

With tensions between Japan and South Korea continuing over historical and territorial issues, Beijing is more than willing to use the history card to woo Seoul. In a recent visit to South Korea, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that "in the first half of the 20th century, Japanese militarists carried out barbarous wars of aggression against China and South Korea, swallowing up Korea and occupying half of China." Earlier this year, China opened an elaborate memorial hall in Harbin to honor Ahn Jung-geun, who killed Hirobumi Ito, the first Japanese resident-general of Korea. To Koreans, Ahn is a national hero; to Japanese, a terrorist. Xi's visit to Seoul was to repay South Korean President Park Geun-hye's own visit to Beijing last year. Neither Park nor Xi has visited Tokyo yet.

China is apparently seeking to pull South Korea over to its side in its widening strategic competition with the United States and Japan. Xi's "charm offensive" toward Seoul is based on the calculation that South Korea's strategic value will only increase in coming years.

For South Korea, there are compelling reasons to improve relations with China. Ties had been strained by Park's predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, emphasizing South Korea's alliance with the U.S. She must take into account that China is becoming ever more important to South Korea's economy. (Apart from Taiwan, South Korea enjoys the world's largest merchandise trade surplus with China, approaching $100 billion). Park also wants China to support her North Korea policy focused on ending Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program and preparing for unification. 

While China actively asserts its claim to leadership in Northeast Asia in courting South Korea, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seems to deliberately ignore, if not dismiss, the importance of South Korea. Japanese policymakers argue, wrongly, that the Park government is "pro-China" and that Japan needs only to worry about China itself. Conservative Japanese media regularly bash the South Korean government and South Korea more broadly, and anti-Korean sentiments in Japan are on the rise.

Japanese focus is understandably on its alliance with the United States. But American policymakers openly worry that continuing tensions between its main allies in the region will undermine its strategic position regarding China and North Korea. President Barack Obama brought Abe and Park together in March on the sidelines of the Nuclear Security Summit, but with little to show for it. The United States is also concerned that the Abe government's nontransparent dealings with North Korea on the abductee issue could further damage Japanese-South Korean relations and vitiate U.S. efforts to press Pyongyang on the nuclear issue.

Northeast Asia is in flux. With its economic and military power growing, China is seeking to regain the dominant position in the region that it ceded to Japan over a century ago. In the process of reshaping a regional order, the Korean Peninsula will again be very important. Already, two major wars occurred over Korea when old and new powers competed for hegemony -- the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95 and the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05.  It is crucial for both Japan and South Korea to maintain friendly relations with a rising China, but it is just as important that they improve their own bilateral relationship. Both have much to lose if the current trajectory in the region is not corrected. Moreover, Japan and South Korea have much in common, from their social and economic systems to democratic values, much more in fact than either has with China.

So, what should be done?  Above all, both Japan and South Korea must work much harder to resolve the issues that continue to arise out of their shared history of colonial rule and war. South Korea needs to move beyond victim consciousness, and Japan needs to show more farsighted political leadership. Specifically, Japan should unequivocally reaffirm the Kono Statement regarding the "comfort women" issue, and Abe should make it clear that he won't visit Yasukuni Shrine again during his tenure as prime minister.

The 1993 statement was a key marker on the history question for South Koreans; the recent review of it sent the wrong message to Koreans. Japanese leaders are certainly entitled to honor those who sacrificed their lives for their country, but paying tribute also to convicted war criminals is an entirely different matter -- not only in the eyes of South Koreans but also of the international community as a whole. For its part, Seoul should make clear how much it values good relations with Japan and state that it is ready to work with Tokyo in a constructive fashion to fully and finally resolve the remaining historical issues.

Next year will be the 50th anniversary of the normalization of relations between Japan and South Korea. It should be an occasion to celebrate what that has meant for both countries -- regional peace and stability and economic prosperity. But even more importantly, both Tokyo and Seoul should also use the anniversary as a golden opportunity to develop a new vision for their relationship. The future of Northeast Asia will be brighter for all the countries in the region if its two major democracies show greater wisdom.

Gi-Wook Shin is a professor of sociology and director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) at Stanford University. Shin's article (with Daniel Sneider, the associate for resarch at Shorenstein APARC), "History Wars in Northeast Asia," appeared in Foreign Affairs (April 2014).

This article was originally carried by Nikkei Asian Review on 17 Sept. and reposted with permission.

Stanford researchers have introduced a major new study on North Korea policy at a hearing at the South Korean National Assembly. Entitled “Tailored Engagement,” the report concludes that South Korea is the only country today that may be both willing and able to try a new approach toward the worsening North Korea problem.

“There is considerable urgency for Seoul to act,” according to the report released by the Korea Program at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, which comes in response to increasing tensions and heightened nationalism in Northeast Asia.

“Only the Republic of Korea has both the need and the potential influence to change this dangerous trajectory on the Korean Peninsula.”

Published by Gi-Wook Shin, the director of Shorenstein APARC; David Straub, the associate director of the Korea Program; and Joyce Lee, the research associate for the Korea Program, the report is the culmination of more than a year of intensive research activities at Stanford University, including three international conferences focused on Northeast Asia’s security and political situation.

During the past year, North Korea continued to develop nuclear weapons and North-South Korean relations worsened, while increasing U.S.-China strategic mistrust has made it less likely that those two countries can cooperate to change North Korea's behavior.

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“I was very impressed by the concern that the Korean Congressmen showed about the current situation on the Korean Peninsula and by their interest in our reasoning and recommendations,” Shin said. “Almost all of the Committee’s 18 members attended, and engaged in a lively exchange of views during the three-hour-long hearing.”

In their report, Shin, Straub and Lee propose a process that involves a series of increased exchanges with North Korea. This would be applied in a principled, systematic way, based largely on expanding a domestic consensus in South Korea that treats South Korean engagement of the North as necessary for improving the situation on the peninsula, not as incompatible with maintaining pressure on Pyongyang to abandon its pursuit of nuclear weapons.

The report lays out four main steps that South Korea can implement to reduce the risk of regional conflict, while also creating a foundation for peaceful unification with North Korea.

• Focus on the pursuit of mutual interests and benefits rather than on symbolism and appeals to national sentiment.
• Apply market principles and international standards in economic activities.
• Collaborate with other countries and third-party companies in both economic and people-to-people projects.
• Be pragmatic and flexible in pursuing engagement at both the state-to-state and grassroots levels in complementary ways. 
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South Korea is well suited to engage the North because of their shared history, and its status as a major middle-power status has also increased its sway with both China and the United States.

No longer a “shrimp among whales,” South Korea has transformed since democratization, leaving that modest proverb behind and gaining an influential role in the region.

Now the country has an opportunity to begin to bridge the gap with North Korea, but first, it must create an internal structure that supports engagement.

In implementation

The North Korea problem is complex and wrapped in a varied history of engagement efforts by South Korea and other countries. Lessons of success and failure from past administrations provide important insight, the report says.

“The main impediment to South Korea’s assuming a greater international leadership role on the Korean question is not a lack of national power,” the report states, “but a lack of domestic political consensus about how to deal with North Korea and the consequent inconsistency in ROK policy across administrations.”

The South Korean government changes executive leadership every five years, and with it, there has been great inconsistency between conservative and progressive policies. The current administration that assumed office in 2013, led by President Park Geun-hye, pursues a North Korea policy of trustpolitik, wherein the government aims to build trust through a step-by-step process.

According to the report, the tailored engagement approach can inform and build on President Park’s policy. Three main actions can be taken by South Korea’s administration to implement productive engagement, the report states:

• Reorganize the Korean government itself to facilitate a more coordinated formulation and implementation of North Korea policy.
• Achieve much more consensus within South Korea on how to deal with North Korea.
• Seek to win support of the major powers, especially the United States and China for its approach to North Korea.

Developing trust is essential to de-escalate tension between the Koreas. Without progress in confidence-building, the two countries can hardly collaborate on even straightforward projects, such as expanding the existing Kaesong Industrial Complex, a bi-lateral industrial park located just north of the North-South border.

Solving more basic issues and participating in joint initiatives can help pave the way toward inter-Korean reconciliation during President Park’s administration, and the next.

“Reconciliation and convergence would improve many aspects of the situation on the Korean Peninsula, including eventually facilitating North Korea’s abandonment of its nuclear weapons program and the achievement of unification,” the reports says.

Asia Economy Daily wrote an article (in the Korean language) about the research team's presentation. A version of this article was also carried as a news release by the Stanford News Service. NK News, a news oufit focused on North Korea-related news, also wrote an article (in the English language) and can be found on NKNews.org. The Voice of America covered the presentation by Shin and Straub at the Brookings Institution. The article, written in Korean, can be accessed on the Voice of America online.

Stanford University seeks candidates for a tenured or tenure-track faculty position in the social sciences. The position would be a dual appointment in an academic department in the social sciences and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), affiliated with the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. The successful candidate will have an outstanding record in teaching and research with a focus on contemporary Korea. S/he would be expected to provide leadership for further development of the study of Korea at Stanford University. All applicants in the social sciences with expertise in Korea will be considered.

All qualified applicants should apply via the web by November 1, 2014, at: http://www.AcademicJobsOnline.com (listing under Stanford/Freeman Spogli Institute/Korea studies).

Junior applicants should submit a letter that includes a brief statement of research interest, curriculum vitae, and selected writing samples. In addition, junior applicants should arrange for submission of three confidential letters of recommendation sent directly to:

Belinda Byrne

Freeman Spogli Institute, Room C132

616 Serra Street, MC 6055

Stanford, CA 94305-6055

All other applicants should submit a letter that includes a brief statement of research interest, curriculum vitae, the names of three referees, and selected writing samples. Stanford University is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to increasing the diversity of its faculty. It welcomes nominations of and applications from women, members of minority groups, protected veterans and individuals with disabilities, as well as from others who would bring additional dimensions to the university’s research, teaching and clinical missions.

All other applicants should submit a letter that includes a brief statement of research interest, curriculum vitae, the names of three referees, and selected writing samples. Stanford University is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to increasing the diversity of its faculty. It welcomes nominations of and applications from women, members of minority groups, protected veterans and individuals with disabilities, as well as from others who would bring additional dimensions to the university’s research, teaching and clinical missions.

Yves Russell, reviewing Shorenstein APARC's Divided Memories: History Textbooks and the Wars in Asia for the 2014/2 issue of China Perspectives, says that the volume "makes two major contributions to existing literature on the problem of history textbooks in East Asia" with its parallel excerpts from textbooks on eight controversial themes and its "inclusion of American textbooks" in the debate on historical memories in Asia. Russell continues to note that "one of the book's great strengths [is showing that] Japanese textbooks do not highlight patriotism, revisionism, or nationalism or seek to justify the war—rather the contrary." 

Divided Memories is just one of the outputs of a multi-year history project on the effects of historical memories on postwar reconciliation. Most recently released was Wartime History Issues in Asia: Pathways to Reconciliation Final Report, a summary report of a Track II dialogue on the continuing impact of wartime history issues.