Gavan McCormack, MA, LLB (Melb), BA (Hons), MA, PhD (Lond), FAHA
Emeritus Professor and Visiting Fellow, Division of Pacific and Asian History

Email: gavan.mccormack@anu.edu.au

Biographical Statement

Since coming to the ANU in 1990, I have worked on modern East Asian, especially Japanese, intellectual, political, and environmental history and politics. Recent publications include books on Japanese direction and identity (The Emptiness of Japanese Affluence, 1996, 2001), the constitutional debate in Japan (2001), the North Korean problem (2004) and the Japanese State and the US relationship (2007). Much of my work is translated into Japanese and quite a lot into Korean and Chinese. I have lectured widely in recent years in Australia, Japan, Korea, China, the US, Canada, and Europe.

Research Interests

Modern Japanese (and East Asian) political, intellectual and environmental history; changing views of nature in the course of modernisation in Japan and East Asia, especially in respect of rivers and water; regional environmental history; struggles over the definition of past (especially China and Pacific wars) and future (beyond capitalism and the Cold War) identities in Japan; North Korea as regional and global problem in early 21st century, with especial reference to the Japan-North Korean relationship, Okinawa within the US–Japan alliance system, and state and civil society in Japan.

Key Publications

• The Emptiness of Japanese Affluence, New York, M.E. Sharpe, 1996 (Japanese, Korean and Chinese editions from Misuzu Shobo, Changi and Shanghai People's Publishing Company in 1998-99); 2nd edition, 2001.
• (ed. with Glenn Hook) Japan's Contested Constitution, Routledge, 2001.
• Target North Korea: Pushing North Korea to the Brink of Nuclear Catastrophe, New York, Nation Books, and Sydney, Random House Australia, 2004, with Japanese and Korean editions from Heibonsha and Changbi 2004 and 2006.
• Client State: Japan in the American Embrace, New York and London, Verso, 2007, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese editions from Gaifusha, Changbi, and Social Science Academic Press of China, 2008.

Career Highlights

Taught at University of Leeds (UK), La Trobe University (Melbourne) and Adelaide University before coming to the ANU in 1990; worked in Japan on many occasions since first visiting as a student in 1962; Visiting Professor at Kobe, Kyoto, Ritsumeikan, Tsubuka Universities, International Christian University, and Tokyo Institute of Technology; elected a fellow of the Academy of Humanities of Australia in 1992; awarded the Centenary Medal "for service to Australian Society and the Humanities in Asian Studies and History" in 2003; awarded (jointly, on behalf Japan Focus), Inaugural Ryukyu Shimpo Ikemiyagi Shui Prize for promotion of international understanding of Okinawa, September 2008.