Event Date: November 27, 2013 - 4:00 pm
Location: FSS4004, 120 Université Privé , Ottawa
KIMIE HARA, University of Waterloo.
Presented by CIPS, the Chair in Taiwan Studies, the School of Political Studies and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.
Free. In English. Registration is not required.
Many of the present regional conflicts in East Asia originate in the post-World War II disposition of Japan. These include the Senkaku/Diaoyu dispute, the territorial dispute over the Northern Territories/Southern Kuriles, Dokdo/Takeshima, Spratly/Nansha and Paracel/Xisha; the Cross-Taiwan Strait problem and the divided Korean Peninsula; and the status of territory as seen in the “Okinawa problem”. Although these problems tend to be treated separately, they share a common foundation and are related issues in terms of regional security. The 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty significantly shaped the post-World War II international order in East Asia and laid the foundation for the regional structure of Cold War confrontation, since the “San Francisco System” fully reflected the strategic interests of the treaty’s main drafter, the United States. Taking the “San Francisco System” as a conceptual starting point, this presentation will focus on China’s ocean frontier problems in terms of their treatment in the San Francisco Peace Treaty and notable developments thereafter. The future settlements of these disputes will also be considered.
Kimie Hara is the Renison Research Professor in East Asian Studies at the University of Waterloo. She holds cross-appointments in the departments of History and Political Science, and is the Director of East Asian Studies at Renison University College. She received her Ph.D. from Australian National University, and specializes in modern and contemporary international relations of the Asia-Pacific region. Her books include Cold War Frontiers in the Asia-Pacific: Divided Territories in the San Francisco System (2007, 2012), Japanese Diplomacy through the Eyes of Japanese Scholars Overseas – Present, Past and Future (2009, edited in Japanese), Northern Territories, Asia-Pacific Regional Conflicts and the Åland Experience: Untying the Kurillian Knot, (2009, 2013, edited with Geoffrey Jukes), and Japanese-Soviet/Russian Relations since 1945: A Difficult Peace (1998, 2012).