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BUSINESS
Mar 12, 2009

Dip in machinery orders sets record losing streak

Orders for machinery fell for a fourth month in January, the longest losing streak on record, as exports crashed and profits evaporated, the Cabinet Office said Wednesday.
COMMENTARY
Mar 10, 2009

Warming up for the bottom line on climate

SINGAPORE — Researchers from around the world meet in Denmark this week to discuss the latest scientific findings on climate change, following recent warnings that the severity of global warming this century will be much worse than previously expected and that changes to the climate will be difficult...
EDITORIALS
Mar 7, 2009

China's growth challenge

As the annual session of China's National People's Congress has started, achieving sufficiently high economic growth will be indispensable for helping to stabilize Chinese society. It is also something other countries want to see as the world economy is rapidly cooling down due to the financial crisis...
BUSINESS
Mar 7, 2009

Toyota suppliers taking hit

Toyota Motor Corp.'s production cuts will cause bankruptcies among suppliers if the government restricts aid to large manufacturers, a car parts group said.
Japan Times
CULTURE
Mar 6, 2009

Redefining defiance for a modern Japan

More than 3 million people are likely to tune into the second installment of NHK drama "Jiro Shirasu" on Saturday night — and chances are, most will be waiting expectantly for the re-enactment of one particularly famous episode from the subject's life.
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Mar 6, 2009

International Anime Fair brings enthusiasts to Tokyo

The golden age of manga was the 1960s and '70s, and anime shot to mainstream acceptance in the '80s and '90s. Now, this decade has spawned a craze for Japanese animation that has spread around the world. Back home, too, the Tokyo International Anime Fair has bloomed, with more than 120,000 visitors and...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 6, 2009

Edo to Meiji

The popularity of ukiyo-e (genre painting) woodblock prints is partly due to aesthetic reasons and partly symbolic ones. In terms of sheer beauty, there is much to recommend in the better examples in the genre, from bright blocks of color and sinuous lines to lively compositions and intriguing details,...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC
Mar 5, 2009

Japan ready to defend title

When the second World Baseball Classic begins on Thursday, all eyes will be on Japan.
BUSINESS
Mar 5, 2009

Toyota U.S. sales dip record 40%

Toyota Motor Corp., facing its first loss in 59 years, suffered a record drop in U.S. sales last month as the recession in the world's top car market cut industrywide demand to the lowest level since December 1981.
COMMENTARY
Mar 3, 2009

Tackling the dangers of mercury

SINGAPORE — Fear sparked by global recession, strains on banks and volatile paper currencies has brought the glitter back to gold. Its value has been rising rapidly in recent months, as investors seek a safe haven from the economic and financial storm.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 3, 2009

Rape victim fights for justice against U.S. military, Japan

Around the nondescript Tokyo suburb where she lives with her three children, Jane is a well-known face. Foreign in an area crowded with Japanese, she has taught English for years here among neighbors who greet her warmly on the street. Few know that her life is consumed by a fight against one of the...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / GLOBAL ECONOMY SYMPOSIUM
Mar 3, 2009

Falling U.S. demand, investment challenges export-driven Asia

Asia will need to brace for sharply reduced consumption in the United States over an extended period following the global financial crisis, and change the export-dependent structure of its economies and create more regional demand to drive their growth, experts told a recent symposium in Tokyo.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 2, 2009

There's no deleveraging the illusions of politicians

BALI, Indonesia — In response to the current financial and economic turmoil, U.S. politicians wanted to be seen as "doing something" legislatively, even if costly and ineffective, in order to endear themselves to those voters who received benefits. This is evident in that the "stimulus spending" provides...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Mar 1, 2009

Obama please note: Those who fail to 'master the past' are guilty, too

In "Guilt About the Past," based on guest lectures that Bernhard Schlink gave at Oxford University last year, the University of Berlin law professor describes the "long shadow" cast by the perpetrators of war crimes on their descendants.
COMMENTARY
Feb 27, 2009

Econ lessons from Japan

Searching the reasons for Japan's "lost decade" — the deflation and stunted growth said to have plagued Japan ever since the collapse of the "bubble economy" in the early 1990s — has long been popular among U.S. and British commentators seeking an answer to the West's current economic problems.
BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
Feb 24, 2009

Darvish, young pitchers set to play vital role in WBC title defense

Established pitchers Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hisashi Iwakuma will lead defending champion Samurai Japan into the World Baseball Classic, but a host of young arms may end up deciding the nation's place in the baseball world.
EDITORIALS
Feb 22, 2009

The freedom of Mr. Khan

On its face, the decision to release Mr. Abdul Qadeer Khan from house arrest in Pakistan is a slap in the face of international opinion and a blow to efforts to halt the proliferation of nuclear weapons. According to Pakistan's Foreign Ministry, the work of the world's greatest proliferator "is a closed...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Feb 22, 2009

'Sustainability' in a Japanese way

Takeshi Hara is an accomplished journalist, author and educator, and at 70 years of age he could easily choose to rest on his laurels.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Feb 22, 2009

Shiftless apathy to the victims makes all Japanese guilty for the past

"When we speak of guilt about the past, we are not thinking about individuals, or even organizations, but rather a guilt that infects the entire generation that lives through an era — and in a sense the era itself.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Feb 22, 2009

Shiftless apathy to the victims makes all Japanese guilty for the past

"When we speak of guilt about the past, we are not thinking about individuals, or even organizations, but rather a guilt that infects the entire generation that lives through an era — and in a sense the era itself.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 20, 2009

Snow yaks and yetis — an ice man cometh

Fans of Pop Surrealism were no doubt tickled pink to hear of their messiah, painter Mark Ryden, making an appearance in Tokyo for the opening of "The Snow Yak Show" at the Tomio Koyama Gallery. The solo exhibition features eight new works from the masterful painter, each exquisitely detailed in his characteristic...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 20, 2009

New art council jumps right into the action

Two years: That's how long it took Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara to set up a new "arts council," extract from it a range of new policy ideas and get his staff to start putting them into action. It's not rocket-paced, but in a country famous for the slowness of its bureaucracy, it passes for commendable....
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 18, 2009

Stunned Australia starts searching for answers

SYDNEY — The worst natural disaster in Australian history has killed at least 200 people, destroyed 7,000 houses and a dozen villages, and left a nation agonizing over the question — why did we let this happen?
BUSINESS / THE VIEW FROM EUROPE
Feb 16, 2009

Germans, Japanese have good reasons for shunning equities

S tock markets around the world are really beginning to feel the effects of the financial crisis of 2008, with some industry watchers estimating that as much as $30 trillion of total market capitalization has been lost worldwide since 2007. This is hurting investors everywhere, big and small.
EDITORIALS
Feb 15, 2009

EU-China relations back on track

Europe's relations with China appear to be back on track. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's recent tour of Europe was by all accounts a success, with both sides eager to put behind them last year's unpleasantness — a high-level China-EU meeting was canceled because of China's objections to French President...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Feb 15, 2009

Celebrating a life with cranes

In the dim gray light just before a winter's dawn, a wash of sound emanates from some 12,000 tall, long-necked and long-legged birds as they awake in the fields of rural Kyushu.
CULTURE / Books
Feb 15, 2009

Opening your mind to open your heart

21-SEIKI HAIKU NO JIKUU / THE HAIKU UNIVERSE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: Japanese Haiku 2008, edited by Modern Haiku Association. Nagata-shobo, 2008, 216 pp., ¥2,500 (paper)
CULTURE / Books
Feb 15, 2009

Opening your mind to open your heart

HAIKU MIND: 108 Poems to Cultivate Awareness & Open Your Heart, by Patricia Donegan. Boston & London: Shambhala, 2008, 231 pp., $18 (cloth) 21-SEIKI HAIKU NO JIKUU / THE HAIKU UNIVERSE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: Japanese Haiku 2008, edited by Modern Haiku Association. Nagata-shobo, 2008, 216 pp., ¥2,500...

Longform

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