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WHY should war memories and reconciliation matter in International Relations? Pretty obvious, you might say – memories of the Holocaust remains highly important in Germany’s relations with the rest of the world, as does Japan’s history of invading and colonising states in Asia. Any denials of historical wrongs committed by these two countries often results in wide-spread international condemnation. Also recall Austria’s (brief) isolation within the EU following the emergence of a coalition government which included Jörg Heider’s Freedom Party, which had been accused of being anti-Semitic and praising Nazi policies. Yet, International Relations (IR) theory has traditionally been somewhat silent about how historical memories affects international politics. Neorealism, for instance, reduced fear and insecurities in interstate relations to the anarchical structure of the international system. While neoliberal-institutionalists did acknowledge how ‘reputation’ and ‘image’ could affect states’ capacities into entering meaningful cooperative relations with one another, their focus was firmly on the present – i.e. how state behaviour of today could affect cooperation in the future. War memory has only recently generated greater attention as a result of the IR’s renewed interest in issues such as identity, norms and their effects on international politics, as well as global ethics.
The focus of this course is two-fold, and in many ways is a child of this new development in IR: first, we are interested in why and what kind of historical memories of wars matter. Second, we are interested in the ethical question of whether and how the pernicious effects of past memories can be overcome. We will think of these questions through the case studies of war memories in East Asia. This particular geographical region makes an excellent ‘laboratory’ to explore issues of war memory and reconciliation. This is because historical memories matter a great deal in East Asia, to the extent that even scholars with realist sympathies tend to agree that insecurity in the region is exacerbated by negative images emanating from memories of World War II. Furthermore, because of strategic concerns during the Cold War era, very few mechanisms designed to bring about a degree of inter-state reconciliation were introduced in East Asia, and this continues to this very day. Nevertheless, there have been several attempts by states and civil society actors to overcome the negative effects of the past, with varying degrees of success. The lessons and insights that East Asia can provide us could be (and I believe it to be) resonate and can be applied universally. And while this class may not be able to ‘change the world’, I certainly hope that it can further our thinking about how we can strive for a more ‘ethical’ and ‘moral’ international life...
Seminar outline
1. Introduction (4 February)
2. Historical Background: the origins of ‘contested history’ in East Asia (video presentation) (11 February)
3. Memory in International Politics: Does it Matter? (18 February)
4. Historical Memories and Nationalism in China (25 February)
5. Historical Memories and Nationalism in Japan (4 march)
6. Contested Memories (11 March)
NO TEACHING ON 18 MARCH, 25 MARCH, and 1 APRIL
7. Student Symposium: Comparing contested histories in Asia and Europe (8 April)
8. Reconciliation: How can it be achieved? (15 April)
9. Case Study of Reconciliation I: The ‘Comfort Women’ Issue (22 April)
10. Case Study of Reconciliation II: Joint History Writing (29 April)
11. Historical Memory and Reconciliation in Comparative Perspective: what can East Asia and the Rest learn from each other? (6 May)
12. Assessed Essay Workshop Part 1 (13 May)
NO TEACHING 20 MAY (PUBLIC HOLIDAY)
13. Assessed Essay Workshop Part 3 (for international students) (27 May)
* To compensate for loss of teaching hours on 18 March, I will hold two hours of essay supervision office hours, when you are free to drop by and discuss your essay with me. Dates will be announced at a later date.
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