SYLFF ADMINISTRATORS MEETING 2014

Major topics discussed at this quadrennial meeting for Sylff administrators included a new financial scheme, current and future additional support programs for fellows, and emerging issues in higher education. There were also sessions devoted to dialogue on key global issues with Tokyo Foundation research fellows. Participants from over 60 member universities worldwide attended, including more than 15 Sylff fellows—some of whom have become members of their alma maters’ Sylff Steering Committees—who shared their experiences and insights. The meeting was a great opportunity to strengthen the Sylff network and explore ways to further enrich the Sylff program.

SYLFF SUPPORT PROGRAMS

Four fellows were selected as SLI recipients in 2014, and their reports can be read here. In addition, 30 Sylff Research Abroad grants were awarded. The reports of SRA awardees on the Sylff website are classified by fiscal year. We look forward to receiving many more applications in 2015! Also in 2015, a “Sylff Fellows Forum for Global Dialogue” will be held at Jadavpur University in Kolkata, India. Please keep an eye on announcements from us for details.

SYLFF WORLDWIDE

We’re very happy to share news of outstanding achievements by Sylff fellows around the world.

February 3

Conductor and pianist Jimmy Chiang was appointed resident conductor of the famed Vienna Boys’ Choir. Chiang received a Sylff fellowship in 2005 while attending the University for Music and Performing Arts Vienna, where he studied orchestral conducting, chorus conducting, and piano. From late April to mid-June, he was on an extensive tour of Japan, performing at many of the most prestigious concert halls in the country, including Suntory Hall and Tokyo Opera City.

February 14

“Sustaining Life during the Early Stages of Disaster Relief with a Frugal Information System: Learning from the Great East Japan Earthquake,” co-authored by Keio University Sylff fellow Mihoko Sakurai, was published in the January 2014 edition of IEEE Communications Magazine. The paper, based on field research into the ICT systems of local governments, points to the need for municipal governments to build disaster-resilient communication systems. Power outages and the resultant loss of communication and processing capability severely constrained recovery efforts in many municipalities in the wake of March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

February 20

Divna Trickovic, a 2002 fellow at the University of Belgrade, has published the first textbook on kanji (Sino-Japanese characters) ever written in Serbian. She is now an assistant professor in Japanese language and literature at her alma mater. The textbook, published in July 2013, introduces each character in innovative ways, analyzing kanji in ways that Serbians can easily visualize and remember. It has captured the hearts of Japanese learners in Serbia and is being adopted as an official textbook for high school students choosing to learn Japanese as an elective.

April 3

Masaaki Higashijima, a 2008 Sylff fellow at Waseda University, was the recipient of the 2014 Annual International IDEA/Electoral Integrity Project Award for Best Graduate Student Paper on Electoral Integrity. The award is sponsored by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance and the Electoral Integrity Project of Harvard University and the University of Sydney. The winner was selected on the basis of potential significance to aspects of the election cycle.

June 18

The University of Latvia organized a conference featuring nine Sylff fellows on the topic of “World in Change: From Consumption to Sustainability, from Competition to Collaboration, from Hierarchy to Networks, from Being Good to Doing Good.” The university joined the Sylff community in 2002. The opening ceremony featured remarks by Rector Marcis Auzins; Professor Ina Druviete, the former Latvian minister of education and science; Nippon Foundation Chairman Yohei Sasakawa, who described his work towards the eradication of leprosy; and Tokyo Foundation Director for Leadership Development Takashi Suzuki.

July 24

Many universities held fellowship presentation ceremonies in 2014. Members of the Tokyo Foundation attended one at Waseda University, where two graduate students were awarded Sylff fellowships during a ceremony at an administrative building named after university founder Shigenobu Okuma. The recipients for the 2014 academic year are Aya Kudo, who is in the fourth year of a doctoral program at the Graduate School of Political Science, and Nguyen Thi Phuong Thanh, a first-year doctoral student at the Graduate School of Commerce. We extend our warmest welcome to all new fellows around the world!

SYLFF@TOKYO

We welcomed many current and graduated fellows to the Tokyo Foundation in 2014.

May 29

Roger Cliff, a Sylff fellowship recipient in 1991 at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs of Princeton University, visited the Tokyo Foundation on April 4 to participate in a conference on East Asian security. The day-long workshop on extended deterrence in East Asia, organized by the Tokyo Foundation and the Atlantic Council, was attended by security experts from Japan, the United States, and South Korea. Cliff is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security, where he is engaged in the Center’s Asia Security Initiative as a specialist on East Asian security issues.

June 26

Paulo Ravecca, who received a Sylff fellowship while at York University and was awarded an SRA grant in 2011, visited the Tokyo Foundation while in Japan on an invitation from the Embassy of Ecuador. Ravecca is currently enrolled in a PhD program at York University and is writing his dissertation on the “politics of political science” in Chile and Uruguay, showing that the changes in political science in these Latin American countries are a product of power relations at different levels.

October 10

Jonathan Shalfi, who received a Sylff fellowship in 2013 and 2014 while attending the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies at the University of California, San Diego, visited the Tokyo Foundation to discuss Japan’s energy policy with Foundation policy experts. He was attending the University of Tokyo at the time as an exchange student to study Japan’s energy security, particularly the potential steps Japan can take to ensure safe fuel shipments from abroad. Three Foundation research fellows explained the policymaking challenges facing Japan in the field of energy policy and national security.

November 10

Madhuchanda Ghosh, a Sylff fellow from Jadavpur University (2004) and assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Presidency University in Kolkata, India, visited the Tokyo Foundation and met with members of the Foundation staff, including Executive Director Sanae Oda. Ghosh is a preeminent scholar of Japanese studies and was invited by the Japan Foundation to conduct research at the Graduate School of Law and Politics of Rikkyo University in Tokyo. She wrote an article that was published in the Japan Times, a leading English paper in Japan, just before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Japan in September.

November 19

Ahmad Adriansyah, who received a Sylff fellowship from the University of Indonesia in 2002, visited the Tokyo Foundation while in Japan to attend the Ninth International Conference on Business and Management Research, hosted by the Graduate School of Management, Kyoto University, where he made a presentation on the Indonesian banking industry. This was his first visit to Japan, and he said he had a strong desire to visit the Tokyo Foundation to convey his gratitude for the Sylff program. “I wanted to say thank you,” he said, “not only because the Sylff fellowship supported my PhD study but it also opened up opportunities to receive additional awards. It also gave me the opportunity to build a global network with other fellows through my participation in the Chiang Mai Regional Forum in 2003.”

Wishing You Peace and Joy in the New Year!

(on the back row from left to right) Tetsuya, Yoichi, Keita, Eriko, Tomoko
(on the middle row) Yoko, Mari Suzuki(Director), Yumi, Akiko
(on the front row) Akiko Imai(Executive Director), Masahiro Akiyama(President), Sanae Oda(Executive Director), Takashi Suzuki(Director)

Adriansyah, center, with program officers at the Tokyo Foundation

Dr. Ahmad Adriansyah, who received a Sylff fellowship from the University of Indonesia in 2002, visited the Tokyo Foundation on October 28, 2014.

He was in Japan to attend the Ninth International Conference on Business and Management Research, hosted by the Graduate School of Management, Kyoto University, where he made a presentation on the Indonesian banking industry. This was his first visit to Japan, and he had a strong desire to visit the Tokyo Foundation, he said, to convey his gratitude for the Sylff program.

“I wanted to say thank you,” he said, “not only because the Sylff fellowship supported my PhD study but it also opened up opportunities to receive additional awards, including the prestigious Indonesian government scholarship for PhD research. It also gave me the opportunity to build a global network with other fellows through my participation in the Chiang Mai Regional Forum in 2003.”

He has worked at his alma mater as an internal auditor and was recently offered a tenured teaching position at the Indonesia Banking School, a reputed college of economics owned by the central bank of Indonesia.

In addition to his academic pursuits, Adriansyah is interested in contributing to society. He was inspired by his visit to Omron Kyoto Taiyo, a factory in Kyoto where most of the workers are disabled. He is hoping to engage with a social business that will offer jobs to elderly people in Indonesia, who are rarely given an opportunity to work even if they wish to do so.

The Tokyo Foundation wishes him continued success with his budding career.

From left to right, Takaaki Asano, Sanae Oda, Madhuchanda Ghosh, Mami Ino, Mari Suzuki, and Akiko Inagaki.

Madhuchanda Ghosh, a Sylff fellow from Jadavpur University (2004) and assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Presidency University in Kolkata, India, visited the Tokyo Foundation on July 16 and met with members of the Foundation staff, including Executive Director Sanae Oda.

Ghosh is recognized as a preeminent scholar of Japanese studies by the Japan Foundation and was invited to conduct research as a post-doctoral fellow in Tokyo at the Graduate School of Law and Politics, Rikkyo University, for three months.

She is a specialist in Japan-India relations. At the Tokyo Foundation, she met with Research Fellow Takaaki Asano and exchanged opinions on political issues in both India and Japan, as well as on the history and current state of Japan-India relations. During her previous stay in Japan in 2011, she interviewed several Japanese lawmakers, including Shinzo Abe, the prime minister since December 2012, who was then a member of the opposition.

She wrote an article that was published in the Japan Times, a leading English paper in Japan, just before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Japan in September. Excerpts from the article, entitled “Modi’s Focus on the India-Japan Relationship,” are as follows (from the Japan Times Online):

In 2011, Abe opined that the two states would gain significantly from economic complementarities such as India’s growing market of more than 1.2 billion people and Japan’s search for new markets, Japan’s strength in hardware and India’s in software, and India’s huge infrastructural and energy needs and Japan’s technological expertise.

India can offer Japan, the world’s largest pool of skilled manpower. Abe also views that the pattern of relations among the U.S., Japan and India as of crucial importance in the context of the emerging security architecture in Asia.

Given Abe’s strong admiration for India, his friendly ties with India’s new premier and his urge to bolster the India-Japan strategic and global partnership, Modi’s forthcoming visit is likely to bring about a major transformation in India-Japan relations in the changing complex Asian geopolitical and geo-economic scenario.

Shalfi, center, with the Tokyo Foundation members

Jonathan Shalfi, who received a Sylff fellowship in 2013 and 2014 while attending the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies at the University of California, San Diego, visited the Tokyo Foundation in July 2014 to discuss Japan’s energy policy with experts at the Foundation.

He was then attending the University of Tokyo as an exchange student to study Japan’s energy security, particularly the potential steps Japan can take—such as an expanded role for the Self-Defense Forces—to ensure safe shipments of fuel from abroad.

Three Foundation experts—Zentaro Kamei, Hikaru Hiranuma, and Kenji Someno—explained the policymaking challenges facing Japan in the field of energy policy, and suggested that an attempt to link Japan’s energy security with the SDF could prove to be challenging.

Shalfi and Yamaguchi, left

The experts pointed out that in analyzing Japan’s energy policy, it would be helpful to have an understanding of the differing positions of the various stakeholders, notably such key government agencies as the Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry. They also emphasized the importance of having a good grasp of the policymaking process and the complex political system in Japan.

Jonathan has also interviewed such leading national security experts as Tokyo Foundation Senior Fellow Noboru Yamaguchi and former Defense Minister Satoshi Morimoto.

Jonathan has had an interest in Japanese culture and language since an early age. He later developed an interest in energy issues at school. These two, apparently totally unrelated fields came together following the March 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, which triggered the nuclear accident in Fukushima. He was teaching English at a high school in Hyogo, Japan, at the time. Since the “triple disaster,” he has been researching energy policy in Japan.

The Tokyo Foundation wishes him the best of luck with his research and career pursuits.

2014-1Awardees

The Tokyo Foundation is pleased to announce the 11 recipients of SRA awards in the first round of fiscal 2014 (April 2014 to March 2015). We received high number of applications from around the world and it was a very tough, competitive selection.

The applications were carefully screened for eligibility, the feasibility of the proposal, and the relevance of the proposed research to the applicant’s current academic pursuits.

Congratulations to the winning applicants, and many wishes that the opportunity for research abroad turns out to be a fruitful one.

The names of the awardees and their home and the host institutions can be viewed here.

From left to right, Mitsuhide Shiraki, Junichi Hisatsuka, Aya Kudo, Nguyen Thi Phuong Thanh, Naoto Onzo, Mari Suzuki, and Yoko Kaburagi.

Two Waseda University graduate students were presented with Sylff fellowships during a ceremony held on June 18, 2014, at an administrative building named after university founder Shigenobu Okuma. The recipients for the 2014 academic year were Aya Kudo, who is in the fourth year of a doctoral program at the Graduate School of Political Science, and Nguyen Thi Phuong Thanh, a first-year doctoral student at the Graduate School of Commerce.

Naoto Onzo, the university’s executive director for research promotion, public relations, and the graduate school system and the chairman of the Sylff steering committee, congratulated the two awardees and encouraged them to demonstrate academic excellence as well as personal integrity as leaders who can make a positive contribution to global society.

Professor Mitsuhide Shiraki, chairman of the selection committee noted, “I hope that this year’s recipients will utilize their fellowships to assiduously advance their research. We look forward to hearing their progress half a year from now. At the end of the year, they will be presenting their research results to the steering committee and representatives from the Tokyo Foundation.”

Aya Kudo is undertaking an analysis of the state-run Chinese media and how it is affected by both domestic and foreign private capital. Having been enrolled in a double-degree program, she has undergraduate and master’s degrees from both Waseda University and Fudan University, a Sylff institution in China.

Nguyen Thi Phuong Thanh is studying the influence of foreign directors on corporate governance and management performance in Japan. She is from Vietnam and has an MBA from Waseda University. She hopes to return to Vietnam as a researcher in 10 years’ time and to contribute to deepening Japan-Vietnam ties in various ways.

Attending the ceremony from the Tokyo Foundation were Director for Leadership Development Mari Suzuki and Program Officer Yoko Kaburagi, who expressed the hope that the new fellows would take advantage of Sylff’s global network to advance both their academic pursuits and personal development.

Paulo, center, with the Tokyo Foundation program officers

Paulo Ravecca, who received a Sylff fellowship while at York University and was awarded a Sylff Research Abroad grant in 2011, visited the Tokyo Foundation on May 27, 2014. Ravecca was invited to Japan by the Embassy of Ecuador to work on a book with another scholar.

Ravecca is currently enrolled in a PhD program at York University and is writing his dissertation on the “politics of political science” in Chile and Uruguay. It focuses on the trajectory of political science as a discipline in the two countries, with references to Argentina and Brazil as well. Ravecca shows that the changes in political science in these Latin American countries are a product of power relations at different levels.

Ravecca’s analysis is expected to shed new light on the world of political science. We at the Tokyo Foundation wish him all the best with his dissertation.

On May 19, 2014, the University of Latvia organized a conference featuring nine Sylff fellows on the topic of “World in Change: From Consumption to Sustainability, from Competition to Collaboration, from Hierarchy to Networks, from Being Good to Doing Good.” The university joined the Sylff community in 2002.

The opening ceremony featured remarks by Rector Marcis Auzins, who reflected on the impact of the Sylff program at the university; Professor Ina Druviete, the former Latvian minister of education and science; Nippon Foundation Chairman Yohei Sasakawa, who described his work towards the eradication of leprosy and the discrimination that comes with ; and Tokyo Foundation Director for Leadership Development Takashi Suzuki, who encouraged Sylff fellows to take the initiative by referring to Latvia’s rapid economic recovery after the Lehman crisis.

Following the opening ceremony, nine Sylff fellows made presentations on the conference theme. They included six fellows from University of Latvia, two from the University of Leipzig, and one from Jagiellonian University. All presentations are available in PowerPoint at the university’s website.

The Tokyo Foundation thanks Ilona Baumane, a Sylff fellow at the University of Latvia, for organizing the conference and enabling our participation.