Gregory Clark - The Japan Times

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Gregory Clark

Gregory Clark has been around a long time (born 1936) and has done a lot of things. As a result, he likes to comment on foreign affairs, economic policies and education plus events in China, Russia, Japan and Latin America (he speaks all four languages).

For Gregory Clark's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

COMMENTARY

Feb 1, 2003

Changing Pyongyang's ways

The response to my Jan. 10 article "Pyongyang is the real victim," which blames the United States for its mishandling of the North Korean nuclear problem, tells me two things: First, Japan Times articles are followed abroad much more widely than I realized; second, many believe firmly in the incorrigibly...

COMMENTARY

Jan 10, 2003

Pyongyang is the real victim

Western and Japanese reactions to North Korea's recent nuclear activities and warnings have been strange.

COMMENTARY

Dec 22, 2002

Abductee hysteria in Japan

That old saying about democracies being their own worst enemies is getting a good workout in Japan's abductee dispute with North Korea. By any standards, North Korea's willingness to release five Japanese abducted in the 1970s following Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Sept. 17 breakthrough visit to...

COMMENTARY

Dec 1, 2002

Strange public works allergy

Sunday saw the opening of the long-delayed Morioka-Hachinohe extension of the Tohoku Shinkansen (Northeast Japan bullet-train line). Local people will be happy. But don't expect great outbursts of joy elsewhere. Japan is into one of its periodic antipublic works moods.

COMMENTARY

Nov 15, 2002

Economic foolishness deepens

We knew that Japan's economic debate was fairly foolish when Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi told us that structural reforms such as privatizing highway corporations and the post office would somehow revitalize the Japanese economy. But even that looks sensible compared with the latest proposed "reform"...

COMMENTARY

Nov 2, 2002

The Asia-Pacific odd couple

Japan and Australia make a rather odd couple in Asia. Yet their officials spend a lot of time talking to each other. Thursday will see yet another talkfest in Tokyo -- this time to discuss their "creative partnership." One reason for the talkativeness is that neither nation quite has the Asian credentials...

COMMENTARY

Oct 19, 2002

Japan's tail-chasing economy

With the economy still moribund after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's initial round of "structural reforms," we are now told that cleaning up the banking system will save the day.

COMMENTARY

Oct 5, 2002

Japan ill-served by outrage

Japan's powerful rightwing seems determined to use the abduction and other problems with North Korea to wreck Tokyo's stunning breakthrough in relations with that once-secretive nation. Even moderates here have let themselves get involved in the attempted demolition.

COMMENTARY

Sep 22, 2002

Label that foils compromise

Sept. 11, 2002, brought us no closer to sensible thinking about the causes of events a year earlier. The United States concentrated on its own sufferings, and plans for revenge against "terrorists." In Japan, a high-level NHK roundtable dragged out that favorite of aid agencies seeking bigger budgets,...

COMMENTARY

Sep 7, 2002

Scandal's dangerous fallout

The nuclear-plant faults that Tokyo Electric Power Co. tried for years to cover up may not have been serious in themselves, but the effects of the coverups on Japan's nuclear debate will be catastrophic.

COMMENTARY

Aug 31, 2002

Terrorism or simply war?

Soon after last year's Sept. 11 attack on the United States by Islamic militants, I got into a debate with a hawkish member of the private consultative committee set up by then-Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka. He was demanding angrily that Japan should help eliminate something called global "terror."...

COMMENTARY

Aug 15, 2002

The scrapheap of the brave

The fuss surrounding the Diet resignation of former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka has seen Japan and its media at their shallow, group-think, conservative, anti-individualist worst.

COMMENTARY

Jul 31, 2002

The U.S.-Japan management roundabout

What goes round, comes round. In the 1950s and '60s, U.S. experts warned Japanese businessmen that they had to get rid of their feudalistic management systems if they were to go ahead.

COMMENTARY

Jul 13, 2002

New asylum policy would benefit Japan and refugees

In the wake of the May 8 Shenyang consulate incident, Tokyo is reviewing its refugee policy. Predictably, it has set up a committee to think about it all. This writer is a member. What he sees is not encouraging.

COMMENTARY

Jun 30, 2002

Tollgate mentality in Japan

Straddling the Keiyo Expressway linking Tokyo and Chiba is the Funabashi tollgate. A long row of booths collects a 200 yen toll from most drivers. Perennial jams at the tollgate have long caused frustration to me and others heading toward Chiba. People late for planes at Narita suffer even more.

COMMENTARY

Jun 15, 2002

Japan remains very abnormal

When the framers of Japan's postwar Constitution included the much-debated Article 9 prohibiting the nation from ever having armed forces or from ever going to war, they had a reason. They saw Japan as a nation with an incurable propensity to slip into militarism.

COMMENTARY

Jun 5, 2002

Debunking free-market dogmatism

Washington's propensity to say one thing and then do something quite different wins few friends. But U.S. determination to protect its domestic steel industry with high antidumping tariffs may not be quite as wicked as most assume. The move flies in the face of claimed U.S. devotion to free-trade principles....

COMMENTARY

May 17, 2002

Japan at its inconsistent worst

Japan's overheated reaction to the May 8 North Korean refugee incident at the Japanese consulate-general in Shenyang, northeast China, is worrying.

COMMENTARY

May 11, 2002

Koizumi's pain, media's gain

COMMENTARY

Apr 27, 2002

'Cures' are killing the patient

The Japanese economy is said to be showing signs of recovery. And so it should. You can't keep a strong economy down for ever -- though a lot of people have been trying hard to do just that.

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.

[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Things may look perfect to the outside world, but today's mom is fine with some imperfection at home.

How 'Reiwa moms' are reshaping motherhood in Japan

By Mai Yoshikawa

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Vol. 35: Travel in time — and stay there

Vol. 35: Travel in time — and stay there

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