EVF Richard J Samuels: Security in East Asia (2015-2019)
Richard J Samuels
Image Credit: Pablo Castagnola Fotograf and Einstein Stiftung, Berlin
"After decades of accepting U.S. supremacy in Asia as the foundation of its foreign and security policies, finding the right distance between the U.S. and China is the most important strategic choice facing Japan today. 'Getting it just right' with these two powers requires military and economic readjustments. The Japan-U.S. alliance is still the bedrock of Tokyo's grand strategy, but it was designed for a bipolar world that many Japanese strategists understand has passed. A rising China and a United States in relative decline are today at least equals in Japan's strategic calculus. My research in Berlin - based upon field work in Japan - will explore the shifting dynamics of East Asian security and its impact on Japan's evolving national security strategy, particularly the evolution of Tokyo's intelligence capabilities." Richard Samuels (March 2015), Einstein Foundation Close-Up
Richard Samuels is Ford International Professor of Political Science and director of the Center for International Studies and Einstein Visiting Fellow for the Research group East Asia Security at GEAS. He has been head of the MIT Political Science Department, Vice-Chair of the Committee on Japan of the National Research Council, and chair of the Japan-US Friendship Commission. His study of the political and policy consequences of the 2011 Tohoku catastrophe, "3:11: Disaster and Change in Japan," was published by Cornell University Press in 2013. Samuels' Securing Japan: Tokyo's Grand Strategy and the Future of East Asia, was a finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize for the best book in international affairs. Machiavelli's Children won the Marraro Prize from the Society for Italian Historical Studies and the Jervis-Schroeder Prize from the International History and Politics section of American Political Science Association. His articles have appeared in Foreign Affairs, International Security, Political Science Quarterly, International Organization, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, National Interest, Journal of Japanese Studies, and Daedalus.