James D.J. Brown

James D.J. Brown

  • International Affairs, Political Science

    Professor /
    Advisor and Coordinator of International Affairs major

    Programs
    • Undergraduate

Areas of Expertise

Russia-Japan relations, Russian foreign policy, Japanese foreign policy.

Research

As well as producing academic articles and monographs, Dr. Brown regularly writes op-eds, including for Nikkei Asia, The Japan Times, and The Diplomat. He also writes in Russian and Japanese, including for the Carnegie Moscow Center and Nikkei Business. He is also frequently quoted in the media, including by The New York Times, The Financial Times, The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, Yomiuri Shimbun, Hokkaido Shimbun, and the BBC.

Representative Publications

Books

Japan’s Foreign Relations in Asia, edited with Jeff Kingston (2018), Routledge.
Japan, Russia and their Territorial Dispute: The Northern Delusion (2017), Routledge.

Peer-reviewed journal articles

  • “Japan-Russia Relations and the Miraculous Revival of Suzuki Muneo,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, vol. 17, 18(3), September 7, 2019.
  • “Japan’s strategy to keep the North Koreans and Chinese down, the Americans in, and the Russians neutral,” Joint U.S.-Korea Academic Studies (Korea Economic Institute of America), 2019, 30: 78-95.
  • “Abe’s Russia policy: All cultivation and no fruit,” Asia Policy, January 2019, 14(1): 148-155.
  • “Japan’s security cooperation with Russia: neutralizing the threat of a China–Russia united front,” International Affairs, July 2018, 94(4): 861-882.
  • “The moment of truth for Prime Minister Abe’s Russia policy,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 16(10, 5), March 15 2018.
  • “Abe’s 2016 Plan to Break the Deadlock in the Territorial Dispute with Russia,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 14(4, 1), February 15, 2016.
  • “Not Even Two? New developments in the territorial dispute between Russia and Japan”, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 13(38, 3), September 21, 2015.
  • “Towards an anti-Japanese territorial front? Russia and the Diaoyu/Senkaku dispute,” Europe-Asia Studies, 67(6): 893-915 (August 2015).
  • “‘A nightmare painted by Goya’: Russian media coverage of the Syrian chemical weapons attacks in comparative perspective,” Problems of Post Communism, 62(4): 236-246 (June 2015).
  • “Hajime!–The Causes and Prospects of the New Start in Russian-Japanese Relations,” Asia Policy, 18 (July 2014).
  • “‘Better one tiger than ten thousand rabid rats’: Russian media coverage of the Syrian conflict,” International Politics, 51(1), 1-22 (Jan. 2014).
  • “The 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Russian-Japanese Relations,” Post-Soviet Affairs, 29(3), 197-236 (Jun. 2013).
  • “Oil Fueled? The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan,” Post-Soviet Affairs, 29(1), 56-94 (Apr. 2013).
  • “A Stereotype, Wrapped in a Cliché, Inside a Caricature: Russian Foreign Policy and Orientalism,” Politics, 30(3), 149-159 (Oct. 2010). This article was the winner of the prize for the best paper published in Politics in 2010.

Chapters in edited books

  • “Japan’s Foreign Relations with Russia: Unfulfilled Potential,” ch.18 in Brown, J.D.J. and Kingston, J. (eds.) Japan’s Foreign Relations in Asia (2018), Routledge.
  • “Japanese and South Korean Relations with Russia since 2014,” in Sevastianov, S. and Youn, I.J. (eds.) The Future Development of Korean-Russian Relations: In Search of Trilateral Cooperation in Northeast Asia (Vladivostok: FEFU Publishing, 2018).
  • “Russia-Japan 2036: Dreaming into the Future,” ch.11 in Panova, V. and Lukin, A. (eds), Russian and Japan: Looking Together into the Future (Far Eastern Federal University, Sept. 2016).
  • “Energy nationalism: Power politics in Asia,” ch. 3 in Kingston, J. (ed.) Asian Nationalisms Reconsidered (Routledge, Dec. 2015).

Further publications

  • “日本人も知っておくべきプーチン大統領の黒い素顔 [The dark face of President Putin that the Japanese should also know],” 日経ビジネス [Nikkei Business], 6 January 2021, https://business.nikkei.com/atcl/seminar/19/00023/122500228/
  • “Japan must hit back at human-rights abusers,” Nikkei Asia, 21 December 2020, https://asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/Japan-must-hit-back-at-human-rights-abusers
  • “Забыть о Москве. Что предвещают России первые решения нового премьера Японии [Forget about Moscow: What the first decisions of the new Japanese prime minister foreshadow for Russia]“, Carnegie Moscow Center, 20 October 2020,

Education

  • PhD International Relations, University of Aberdeen
  • PGDip Russian Language, University of Glasgow
  • MRes Political Research, University of Aberdeen
  • MSc International and European Politics, University of Edinburgh
  • BA (Hons.) Philosophy and Politics, University of York

Previous Academic Appointments

  • Visiting Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Hosei University (2012-2013)
  • Teaching Fellow, University of Aberdeen (2010-2011)
  • Teaching Assistant, University of Aberdeen (2008-2010)

Professional Associations

  • British Association of Japanese Studies (BAJS)
  • British Association of Slavic and Eastern European Studies (BASEES)
  • British International Studies Association (BISA)
  • International Studies Association (ISA)