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COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2001

Wanted: a leadership strategy

Japan has stepped into the 21st century under not-so-comfortable political circumstances. Public approval ratings for the Cabinet of Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori remain extremely low, and half of the nation's voters say they have no political party to support. While the government has launched one stimulus...
CULTURE / Books
Dec 26, 2000

Cold War roots of a noisy marriage

AMERICA AND THE JAPANESE MIRACLE: The Cold War Context of Japan's Postwar Economic Revival, 1950-1960, by Aaron Forsberg. Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. 332 pp. $45. Recurring Japan-U.S. trade disputes have hogged the limelight for way too long, forcing assiduous readers...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 23, 2000

Volunteerism: not just a Western idea

Even before global observance of the International Year of Volunteers begins in January, Japanese are deeply involved in a search for the spirit of international volunteerism. Some insist that it is based on the wisdom of Oriental thought.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Dec 10, 2000

Japan's new goodwill ambassador to the UNEP

Tokiko Kato Tokiko Kato is every bit as energetic and candid in person as she appears on stage. Best known as a singer and musician, Kato is also a poet and painter, and serves on the board of the World Wide Fund for Nature Japan. Though her schedule is hectic, it is by choice, and she has energy to...
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Dec 9, 2000

The tiny treasures of Hikaru Shimamura

The great 20th-century Japanese potter Kanjiro Kawai (1890-1966) marveled at items that were small and most people overlooked: a stone, a leaf, a box of matches. He would toss them over and over again in his hands.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Dec 2, 2000

The new American autism

George W. Bush, Al Gore or civil war? This is the question being asked now by alarmists, especially those with a taste for theatrical overstatement.
SOCCER / J. League
Nov 30, 2000

Alex: Dreadlocks in deadlock at S-Pulse

SHIMIZU, Shizuoka Pref. -- It's an image that sticks very firmly in the mind. Sixty seconds into a crucial game against the Yokohama F. Marinos, a brilliant 60-meter pass out of defense by Kazuyuki Toda catches a flurry of dreadlocks on the run.
CULTURE / Books
Nov 28, 2000

When writing Asia-Pacific history, the rhetoric is the reality

JAPAN AND PACIFIC INTEGRATION: Pacific Romances 1968-1996, by Pekka Korhonen. London/New York: Routledge, 1998, 246 pp., $50 (cloth). The title of this book suggests that it is about the integration of the Asia-Pacific area, about regionalism, and about the role Japan plays in this process.
COMMENTARY
Nov 19, 2000

U.S. credibility put to test

NEW DELHI -- Political scientist Samuel Huntington has aptly described the United States as the "sole state with pre-eminence in every domain of power -- economic, military, diplomatic, ideological, technological and cultural -- with the reach capabilities to promote its interests in virtually every...
CULTURE / Books
Nov 15, 2000

Settle for a least bad worst-case scenario in Korea

AVOIDING THE APOCALYPSE: The Future of the Two Koreas, by Marcus Noland. Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 2000, 431 pp., $22 (paper). The thaw on the Korean Peninsula continues. Every week, history is made: a meeting between Korean officials, a diplomatic breakthrough for North...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Nov 9, 2000

Mets' Payton feels right at home in Japan

"Japan's been very, very good to me," New York Mets center fielder Jay Payton says with a laugh, doing his best impression of Chico Esquela of Saturday Night Live fame. "It's nice because I started the season here and I'm finishing up here."
JAPAN
Nov 7, 2000

Cyberspace expo to be tough on your mouse, not your feet

The government is preparing to launch a cyberspace exposition on the last day of 2000.
EDITORIALS
Nov 6, 2000

Neighbors, yet strangers

The latest round of normalization talks held in Beijing last week between Japan and North Korea failed to reach any specific agreement. Although no statement was issued, it seems clear that the two sides largely agreed to disagree, at least for the moment. The two nations remained divided over the pivotal...
SOCCER / World cup
Nov 3, 2000

FIFA likely to get 2002 tax exemption

The Japanese government plans to exempt soccer's world governing body FIFA from taxes on profits from commercial projects related to the 2002 World Cup, mostly by utilizing existing taxation measures, government sources said Thursday.
CULTURE / Stage
Nov 1, 2000

International performers take to Shizuoka's streets

Shizuoka City has a problem. Mount Fuji is an hour east, a decent beach is an hour west. Outside of green tea and clean air, Shizuoka City itself doesn't have much going for it.
EDITORIALS
Oct 29, 2000

Glamour in a good cause

There was a gathering at the United Nations in New York last Monday that nobody paid much attention to. The World Series and a high-wattage Senate race were distracting New Yorkers. A murderous flareup in the Middle East and a surreal encounter in Pyongyang were distracting the rest of the world.
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Oct 28, 2000

Coal-crusted, ash-glazed, long-fired

From aspiring lawyer to automatic washing machine salesman to master potter, life has been an interesting but rocky road for Shigaraki ceramist Shiho Kanzaki.
COMMENTARY
Oct 25, 2000

When leaders fail to lead

LONDON -- Countries and peoples that make peace after years or even generations of enmity require very strong leaders. Just as it needed a Charles de Gaulle to tell the French to stop fighting the Algerians, a Konrad Adenauer to tell the Germans to love the French, a Harry Truman or a Douglas MacArthur...
JAPAN
Oct 21, 2000

Japan still No. 1 ODA donor

Japan's official development assistance of $15.32 billion in 1999 made it the world's top donor to developing countries for the ninth consecutive year, according to an annual report on ODA endorsed Friday by Cabinet.
MORE SPORTS
Oct 16, 2000

Halard-Decugis, Schalken claim Japan Open tennis titles

It was death by a thousand cuts or, to put it another way, victory by a thousand errors.
CULTURE / Books
Oct 9, 2000

From nothingness, a celebration of life

A DREAM LIKE THIS WORLD: One Hundred Haiku, by Nagata Koi, translated by Naruto Nana and Margaret Mitsutani. Tokyo: Todosha Publishers, 2000, 147 pp., 2,381 yen (cloth). Dream and waking life. Reality and illusion. Where does one begin and the other end? This question radiates at the heart of Nagata...
SOCCER / J. League
Oct 6, 2000

Troussier vows victory for Japan

"We'll get the Asian Cup back home," said Japan soccer manager Philippe Troussier on Thursday at the Japan National Press Club in Tokyo, only a few hours before his senior team's departure for the upcoming Asian Cup.
COMMENTARY
Oct 4, 2000

Putin's key mission to India

NEW DELHI -- On the heels of a marked pro-U.S. shift in its foreign policy, India is now welcoming the president of its old friend, Russia. The focus of President Vladimir Putin's four-day visit is on reviving Russia's sagging ties with India.
OLYMPICS
Oct 3, 2000

Time for Japan to look forward

SYDNEY -- Nippon, Nippon, Nippon! Banzai!
OLYMPICS
Sep 30, 2000

Japanese synchro team swims to silver

SYDNEY -- Japan lifted perfect 10s from the Sydney International Aquatic Center on Friday but had to be satisfied with a second Olympic silver in the battle with Russia for world dominance in synchronized swimming.
COMMENTARY
Sep 29, 2000

An Olympic Games message of peace

A Japanese media report on the Sydney Olympics said the Games marked "the end of a war-filled century." Japan's women athletes put in brilliant performances at the Games, as if to remove dark shadows of World War II, which imposed terrible suffering on countless women.
LIFE / Travel
Sep 27, 2000

Cultivating coral gardens

IHURU, Maldives -- A sudden change in the weather sends staff at the resort on Ihuru Island grappling for the groins. Jetty-like piles of sand-bags that jut out from various parts of the island, these "groins" help lessen the effect of destructive tides. For the time being at least, they are Ihuru's...

Longform

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The rise of AI companionship in a lonely Japan