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Pankaj Mishra
For Pankaj Mishra's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 16, 2022
Why so many countries want to sit out the new Cold War
Some countries' distrust of aggressive regional powers such as Russia and China is balanced by suspicions that the U.S. is a profoundly weakened and highly unstable superpower.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 5, 2022
Boris Johnson and the woeful and costly Tory war on woke
While freedom-loving Tories make their last stand, the evidence shows that coordinated action by governments and solidarity among citizens are what will contain the pandemic.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 19, 2021
Israel faces greater dangers than Hamas
The mob violence between Jews and Arabs should not be underestimated: It represents a watershed in the history of Israel.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 8, 2021
U.S.-China cold war will have more than two sides
The real danger ahead, however, is not so much a new cold war as binary modes of thinking that see stark divisions and antagonisms where none exist.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 2, 2021
COVID-19 exposes the cracks in the world's big democracies
The U.S., U.K. and India have suffered at the hands of incompetent leaders and a severe lack of preparedness.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY
Nov 15, 2020
Macron doesn’t need to insult Islam to defend free speech
It is one thing to defend freedom of expression u2014 an obligation of all democratic leaders. It is quite another to deploy a whole nation behind a particular expression of that freedom.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 11, 2020
America’s age of anger is just getting started
There is little respite from clownish demagoguery once a long-standing political order loses credibility and legitimacy among a significantly large proportion of the population.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 17, 2020
Pandemic could foster new attitudes toward immigration
In recent weeks, doctors, nurses and care workers for the British National Health Service u2014 in particular, immigrants u2014 are presently being hailed for their gritty sense of duty, for standing between many people and premature death.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 14, 2020
With crisis, old media suddenly has the upper hand
After failing to anticipate the financial crisis, networks and major newspapers have earned a good chance of flourishing in the future.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 23, 2020
Coronavirus outbreak will revive the all-powerful state
Much maligned in recent years, big government will come back — and with it, the potential for both greater good and evil.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 20, 2020
Get ready, a bigger disruption is coming
The COVID-19 pandemic reflects a systemic crisis akin to the seminal crashes of the 20th century.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 26, 2019
U.S. trade wars expose an abiding truth
Free trade turns out to be something that helps a rising great power, until it doesn't.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 5, 2019
Democracy is on the march worldwide, not in retreat
Mass protests in country after country show how powerful the demand for social equality remains
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 22, 2019
So what if Trump plays the race card
He's hardly the only politician to realize that ethnic nationalism is a means of creating a cohesive political community.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 12, 2019
See Iran's revolution as Iranians do
It was not about "Muslim rage." It was a rebellion against a Westernized, undemocratic technocracy.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 22, 2018
The America before Trump wasn't so fantastic either
Making a better future requires an unsentimental reckoning with the past.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 15, 2017
Why the media keeps missing political earthquakes
The widely embraced political certainties of the 1980s and 1990s are dead, and those who still cling to them are condemned to repeat, "I was wrong."
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 20, 2017
The media must embrace a new mission
Trump's much-derided, frequently written off and ultimately successful candidacy has exposed the intellectual inadequacies and political perils of mono-journalism.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 23, 2016
Suu Kyi's greatest challenge is to share power
Myanmar's new government should strive to accomodate the country's ethnic minorities through greater autonomy and federalism.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 29, 2016
A brutal majority in Kashmir and elsewhere
The rise of a rabid majoritarianism is part of a larger rejection of politics based on reason and dialogue.

Longform

A statue of "Dragon Ball" character Goku stands outside the offices of Bandai Namco in Tokyo. The figure is now as recognizable as such characters as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man.
Akira Toriyama's gift to the world