Betting on the Farm: Institutional Change in Japanese Agriculture

In response to a long-term demographic and economic crisis in the agricultural sector, some Japanese agricultural cooperatives are transforming themselves into profitable, market-oriented business enterprises. But others remain stuck in traditional approaches to cooperation.  What explains these variations in responses to shifting market forces? In an event moderated by Johns Hopkins SAIS Interim Dean and Director of the Reischauer Center Dr. Kent Calder, speaker Dr. Patricia Maclachlan will share what these shifts tell us about the processes of institutional change and the future of farming in Japan.

Speaker Biography:

Patricia L. Maclachlan is Professor of Government and the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. A student of interest group politics and political-economic reform in Japan, her publications include Consumer Politics in Postwar Japan: The Institutional Boundaries of Citizen Activism (Columbia University Press, 2002) and The People’s Post Office: The History and Politics of the Japanese Postal System, 1871-2010 (Harvard University East Asia Center, 2011). She is also the author, with Kay Shimizu, of Betting on the Farm: Institutional Change in Japanese Agriculture, which is forthcoming in March 2022 from Cornell University Press.

Moderator: 

Dr. Kent Calder serves as the Interim Dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and the Director of the Edwin O. Reischauer Center for East Asian Studies. He previously served as Vice Dean for Faculty Affairs and International Research Cooperation from 2018 to 2020 and as Director of Asia Programs from 2016 to 2018. Before arriving at Johns Hopkins SAIS in 2003, Calder served as Special Advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Japan Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Professor at Princeton University, Lecturer on Government at Harvard, and as the first Executive Director of Harvard University’s Program on US-Japan Relations. Calder received his PhD from Harvard University in 1979, where he worked under the direction of Edwin O. Reischauer. A specialist in East Asian political economy, he has spent eleven years living and researching in Japan and four years elsewhere in East Asia. In 2014, he was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon. Calder’s most recent works include Global Political Cities: Actors and Arenas of Influence International Affairs (Brookings, 2021); Super Continent: The Logic of Eurasian Integration (Stanford, 2019); Circles of Compensation: Economic Growth and the Globalization of Japan (Stanford, 2017).

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Johns Hopkins University - SAIS, Rome Building (Room 806), Washington, D.C., United States