Library Talk: Japan’s Development Assistance ― Foreign Aid and the Post-2015 Agenda

On 29 January 2016, the UNU Library will host the launch of the book Japan’s Development Assistance: Foreign Aid and the Post-2015 edited by Hiroshi Kato, John Page and Yasutami Shimomura (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016).

In 2014, Japan marked 60 years since 1954, when it began providing official development assistance (ODA). This book represents the results of the research “Japan and the Developing World: 60 Years of Japan’s ODA and the Post-2015 Development Agenda.” The 21 chapters in this volume are the work of experts and development practitioners drawn from Japan and around the world. They offer a critical review of Japan’s past bilateral development assistance and its role in multilateral development institutions. They look at the origins, characteristics and historical changes in Japan’s development cooperation, investigating its interactions with major partners including its Asian neighbours and international organizations. The authors demonstrate that Japan, with its own aid philosophy, experiences, and models of aid, has ample lessons to offer to the international community as the latter seeks new paradigms of development cooperation. In one of the chapters, for example, the book discusses how Japan has made use of the United Nations aimed at achieving its strategic goals.