Members of the public will have the rare chance to hear from a world expert on Japan’s history and policy at Cambridge University this week.

Professor Shinchi Kitaoka will describe the mechanisms by which peace and stability have been maintained in East Asia during the last few decades and Japan’s increasingly prominent role in regional security affairs.

Professor Kitaoka is one of the most eminent scholars in the field having served in several governmental posts, both as a consultant and a UN diplomat. He has also taken part in several government panels concerned with Japan’s progression into the 21st century.

In 1999 he was a member of the Japanese Prime Minister’s commission on the country’s goals for the next 100 years. Prior to that, in 1992, he participated in an advisory panel on “Japan and Asia Pacific in the 21st century”.

Professor Kitaoka is currently leading a Japanese team of historians in studying the relations of Japan with one of its most important partners, China. He has won the Yomiuri Prize for the Opinion Leader of the Year and he is the author of a number of books relating to diplomacy, history and political affairs of Japan.

The seminar is financed by the Japanese Embassy and it will be one of just three presentations given by Professor Kitaoka during his stay in Britain.

The lecture is free and open to all and it will take place on Wednesday 5 March in room 1.02 in the Faculty of Classics, Sidgwick Avenue at 5.00 pm. For a map of the location and more information about Professor Kitaoka access the link on the top right corner.

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