More Opinion Articles - The Japan Times

September 05, 2025

Today's print edition

Subscribe for more access

COMMENTARY

Dec 31, 2007

Censorship serves to flag our own limits

By Tom Plate

LOS ANGELES — It appears that many mainland Chinese moviegoers are traipsing over to Hong Kong in droves to view the uncensored version of Ang Lee's latest blockbuster, "Lust, Caution." With their feet, in effect, they are voting for lust — and as if wishing for official Beijing caution to be gone...

EDITORIALS

Dec 31, 2007

The falsity of 2007

The kanji for the Japanese word "nise," meaning fake or false, has been chosen by the Kyoto-based Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation as the kanji that most appropriately defines domestic events in 2007. Unveiled at Kiyomizu Temple in the ancient capital, the choice underscores flawed ways of thinking...

EDITORIALS

Dec 30, 2007

Foundation for better ties

Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's visit to Beijing has shown that Japan and China have almost completely overcome the chilly bilateral relations caused by then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's repeated visits to Yasukuni Shrine, Japan's war shrine.

COMMENTARY

Dec 30, 2007

Living with war and a warmer planet

By Gwynne Dyer

LONDON — 2007 was the year in which global warming finally began to be taken seriously. Climate-change deniers were in full retreat, and the realization that we face a long and grave crisis was finally dawning on the general public. However, it remains to be seen whether the world will agree on effective...

EDITORIALS

Dec 30, 2007

Assassination of Benazir Bhutto

Like her father, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, a Pakistani prime minister who was executed by the military in 1979 after being ousted from power, Ms. Benazir Bhutto, the charismatic opposition leader died an unnatural death — shot to death by an assassin Thursday. Her death, which occurred only 12 days after...

COMMENTARY / World

Dec 29, 2007

Barack Obama's American revolution

By Dominique Moisi

WARSAW — For eight years, U.S. President George W. Bush has managed to incarnate and reinforce all the prejudices and negative stereotypes the world has of the United States. He has antagonized the world more than any other American president before him, seriously damaging America's "soft" power by...

EDITORIALS

Dec 29, 2007

Changing of the guard at NHK

The management committee of NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corp.) has chosen Mr. Shigeo Fukuchi, adviser of Asahi Breweries Ltd., as its next president. Mr. Fukuchi will replace current NHK president Genichi Hashimoto, whose three-year term expires in January. Circumstances surrounding the selection of Mr....

EDITORIALS

Dec 29, 2007

Education proposals lack coherence

The Education Resuscitation Council, which was set up under the leadership of then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, has submitted its third report to Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda. The report includes a variety of proposals for consideration: a grade-skipping system, government guidelines for school integration,...

COMMENTARY

Dec 28, 2007

World leader for president

By Frank Ching

HONG KONG — The 187 countries meeting to discuss climate change in Bali, Indonesia, this month narrowly averted a total breakdown by agreeing to set 2009 as the deadline for a new treaty to limit greenhouse-gas emissions. For that deadline to be met, China and the United States will both need to agree...

EDITORIALS

Dec 28, 2007

Drain of public trust in 2007

In the past year, Japan has been rocked by political turmoil — especially the devastating defeat of the ruling coalition in the July 29 Upper House election, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's abrupt resignation in September and Mr. Yasuo Fukuda's ascent to power. An attempt to form a grand coalition between...

EDITORIALS

Dec 27, 2007

Reflecting on a year of anxiety

Citizens the world over must be eager to close 2007, a year marked by profound anxiety as vulnerabilities in the political and economic order have become visible and been repeatedly tested. Thus far, the system has survived, but strains are intensifying. If 2007 offers a taste of what lies ahead, we...

COMMENTARY / World

Dec 27, 2007

The 'browning' of African technology

By G. Pascal Zachary

PRAGUE — Forget MIT. Hello, Tsing Hua University. For Clothilde Tingiri, a hot young programmer at Rwanda's top software company, dreams of Beijing, not Cambridge, animate her ambitions. Desperate for more education, this fall she plans to attend graduate school for computer science — in China, not...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.

From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.

We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER

international-reports