The Political Coding of Climate Change
Jaguar’s “Copy Nothing” campaign is a major misstep in navigating cultural polarization while promoting the needed economic shift toward electric vehicles.
Tag Archives: United States
Ichiro Hatoyama and the 1955 System
When Ichiro Hatoyama finally gained the premiership from 1954-1956, he had become elderly and was in failing health. This did not stop him, however, from scoring two major achievements: he presided over the creation of the Liberal Democratic Party and reestablished diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union.
Why Trump Won
In a stunning reversal, Donald Trump won the popular vote in the November 2024 election, leading a Republican wave that took control of the presidency and both chambers of Congress.
Shigeru Yoshida and the Conservative Client State
Shigeru Yoshida’s second premiership from 1948-1954 was one of the most transformative in Japanese history, taking the nation from its progressive, unstable early postwar era into a long period of entrenched conservative rule, ostensibly exercising independence but in reality functioning as a client state absorbed into the informal American empire.
Visible Minorities: An Obituary for Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori
What Fujimori did with power became a cautionary tale—of how an outsider, once let in, can corrupt everything.
Hitoshi Ashida and the Cold War
Hitoshi Ashida attempted in 1948 to give a reorganized Democratic Party-Socialist Party coalition a second chance at leading Japan’s government. But at this time the progressive phase of the US Occupation was ending, and pressure to create a conservative regime embracing Washington’s Cold War objectives became irresistible.
Tetsu Katayama and the Socialist Party
Tetsu Katayama served as Japan’s first socialist prime minister in 1947-1948. His moderate approach, however, proved unable to satisfy the increasingly contradictory demands of his political base and the US occupiers.
Shigeru Yoshida and Politics from Below
Conservative diplomat Shigeru Yoshida was thrust into the premiership in 1946-1947 after the US occupation forces blocked the ascendance of general election-winner Ichiro Hatoyama.
Visible Minorities: MAGA’s Roots in Japan
How Japan treats its non-citizen residents and diverse communities is a bellwether for how future neofascist demagogues in other countries will treat their minority voices and views.
Kijuro Shidehara and the New Deal
English-speaking diplomat Kijuro Shidehara served as prime minister in 1945-1946, corresponding with the most progressive phase of a US military occupation which was initially guided by the principles of the New Deal and the American concern that Japan never again pose a military challenge to US hegemony in the Pacific.
