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Australian Institute of International Affairs - National Office

Strategic Dynamics of the Indo-Pacific in the Post-COVID-19 World

Thu, 26 Nov 2020
18:30 - 19:30

Professor Akio Takahara, The University of Tokyo

Welcome by Griffith Asia Institute Director Professor Caitlin Byrne FAIIA

Moderated by AIIA National Executive Director Dr Bryce Wakefield

 

Foreign ministers from four countries, Japan, Australia, India and the United states, gathered in Tokyo in October and affirmed the importance of broadening cooperation with more countries for the realisation of a Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP). They claimed the vision serves for the peace and prosperity of the region and that its importance in the post-COVID world is increasing. Does this mean, as a number of media reports stated, that FOIP is designed to counter the rise of China? Are the four countries ready to decouple economically with China, even when China alone is likely to achieve positive economic growth in 2020?

 

Professor Akio Takahara explores the way Japan has pursued a two-pronged approach of competition and cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, and discusses whether FOIP and China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) are compatible.

 

Akio Takahara is Professor of Contemporary Chinese Politics at the Graduate School of Law and Politics and the Graduate School of Public Policy (GraSPP) at The University of Tokyo. He received his DPhil in 1988 from Sussex University, and later spent several years as Visiting Scholar at the Consulate-General of Japan in Hong Kong, the Japanese Embassy in Beijing, Harvard University, Peking University, and at the Mercator Institute for China Studies. Before joining The University of Tokyo, he taught at J. F. Oberlin University and Rikkyo University. He served as President of the Japan Association for Asian Studies, and as the Secretary General of the New Japan-China Friendship 21st Century Committee. Akio was Dean of GraSPP from 2018 to 2020. He currently serves as Senior Fellow of the Tokyo Foundation for Policy Research, Senior Adjunct Fellow of the Japan Institute of International Affairs, Distinguished Research Fellow of the Japan Forum on International Relations, and Director of JICA Ogata Sadako Research Institute for Peace and Development. His publications include The Politics of Wage Policy in Post-Revolutionary China, (Macmillan, 1992), and Japan-China Relations in the Modern Era, (co-authored, Routledge, 2017).

 

This event is online only. Registrations close on Thursday 26 November at 3pm AEDT, after which you will receive a follow-up email containing details of how to join the Zoom webinar. The webinar will commence at 6:30pm AEDT (Canberra time, UTC+11), 5:30pm AEST (Brisbane time, UTC+10).

 

 

This event is supported by the Government of Japan. 

Ticket Type Price
General Admission $0.00 Sale Ended

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