The Human Rights and Security Research Group seeks to reassess the impact of U.S. human rights diplomacy on East Asia in light of the recent availability of primary sources that enable more detailed analyses of U.S. foreign policy in the 1970s and 1980s. Taking Samuel Huntington’s proposition that U.S. human rights diplomacy contributed to democratization in East Asian countries as a point of departure, the group aims to provide empirical verification of this claim, which has rarely been systematically tested. At the same time, the group examines the “blind spots” of human rights diplomacy, particularly the tendency for the United States and other advanced countries to remain outside the scope of criticism, as well as the role of human rights discourse in shaping the foundations of transitional justice in East Asia. Through these approaches, the group seeks to analyze these phenomena from multiple perspectives.
Based on these research concerns, the group is currently preparing an edited volume within the International Reconciliation Studies Book Series that comprehensively reassesses U.S. human rights diplomacy in East Asia. Integrating insights from diplomatic history and comparative politics, the volume examines how U.S. pressure and engagement contributed to democratization in the region, while also analyzing how human rights discourse influenced historical memory conflicts between Japan and its neighboring countries and contributed to the formation of anti-American sentiment. Particular attention is given to Okinawa as a structural blind spot in U.S. human rights diplomacy, highlighting the unintended consequences that emerged from these policies.
By reexamining the interrelationship among American power, human rights norms, and regional transformation in East Asia, this volume aims to present a new theoretical framework for understanding interstate tensions and divisions in the region from the perspective of reconciliation.
