Seminar Abstract

This seminar will focus on the speaker’s recent book, Sino-Japanese Relations in a US-China-Japan Trilateral Context: The Origins of Misperception (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017). In the book, the speaker explains the increasingly turbulent Sino–Japanese relations since the 2000s by innovatively investigating the formation mechanism of mutual misperception deeply rooted in China-Japan-US trilateral structural dynamics. The political and security relationship has deteriorated despite the high interdependency between the world’s second and third largest economies. More ironically, both sides have also shown the intent and made efforts to improve bilateral ties. The speaker has conducted a focused comparison of the evolution of Sino-Japanese perceptions and policies during the past decade and a half. Empirically, the speaker has examined five case studies that provide insights to international relations students and scholars and policymakers on how misperception and mistrust have formed, replicated and intensified.

About the Speaker

Zhang Yun is an Associate Professor of International Relations at Niigata University in Japan and a Research Fellow at Center for Global Governance of Peking University. He obtained a Ph.D. in law from Peking University and Ph.D. in international relations from Waseda University. His research expertise includes China-Japan-U.S. trilateral relations, international relations in the Asia Pacific, international relations theory, and Chinese diplomacy. He has served as a visiting scholar at the Center for International Studies of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as a visiting scholar for Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), as a visiting scholar at the Japan Institute for Social and Economic Affairs of the Federation of Japanese Business (Keidanren), as a nonresident senior fellow at the Rajaratnam School of International Studies of Nanyang Technological University, research fellow at Singapore National University and as a visiting professor at Beijing Foreign Studies University and a visiting fellow at China Ocean University. Dr. Zhang has authored four monographs and many papers in English, Chinese, and Japanese academic journals such as the Pacific Review and Harvard Asia Quarterly, Kokusai Seiji. His latest book is Sino-Japanese Relations in a Trilateral Context: Origins of Misperception（New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017）. He serves as a peer reviewer for several international academic journals such as Pacific Affairs，Asian Security, The Chinese Journal of International Politics，Asian Journal of Comparative Politics. He is also a columnist for Lianhe Zaobao (based in Singapore), where he has regularly published articles on international relations. He also serves an invited commentator for Phoenix TV (based in Hong Kong).