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The mediating role of reflective functioning and general psychopathology in the relationship between childhood conduct disorder and adult aggression among offenders
- Karen Yirmiya, Matthew Constantinou, Elizabeth Simes, Anthony Bateman, James Wason, Jessica Yakeley, Mary McMurran, Mike Crawford, Alison Frater, Paul Moran, Barbara Barrett, Angus Cameron, Zoe Hoare, Elizabeth Allison, Stephen Pilling, Stephen Butler, Peter Fonagy
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- Journal:
- Psychological Medicine , First View
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 02 April 2024, pp. 1-12
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Background
The nature of the pathway from conduct disorder (CD) in adolescence to antisocial behavior in adulthood has been debated and the role of certain mediators remains unclear. One perspective is that CD forms part of a general psychopathology dimension, playing a central role in the developmental trajectory. Impairment in reflective functioning (RF), i.e., the capacity to understand one's own and others' mental states, may relate to CD, psychopathology, and aggression. Here, we characterized the structure of psychopathology in adult male-offenders and its role, along with RF, in mediating the relationship between CD in their adolescence and current aggression.
MethodsA secondary analysis of pre-treatment data from 313 probation-supervised offenders was conducted, and measures of CD symptoms, general and specific psychopathology factors, RF, and aggression were evaluated through clinical interviews and questionnaires.
ResultsConfirmatory factor analyses indicated that a bifactor model best fitted the sample's psychopathology structure, including a general psychopathology factor (p factor) and five specific factors: internalizing, disinhibition, detachment, antagonism, and psychoticism. The structure of RF was fitted to the data using a one-factor model. According to our mediation model, CD significantly predicted the p factor, which was positively linked to RF impairments, resulting in increased aggression.
ConclusionsThese findings highlight the critical role of a transdiagnostic approach provided by RF and general psychopathology in explaining the link between CD and aggression. Furthermore, they underscore the potential utility of treatments focusing on RF, such as mentalization-based treatment, in mitigating aggression in offenders with diverse psychopathologies.
93 Acceptability and Usability of Tablet-Based Neuropsychological Tests among South African and Ugandan Adolescents With and Without HIV
- Christopher M Ferraris, Rebecca Dunayev, Nour Kanaan, Courtney E Kirsch, Corey Morrison, Nana Asiedu, Daphne Tsapalas, Anthony F Santoro, Nicole J Phillips, Jacqueline Hoare, Angel Nanteza, Joy L Gumikiriza-Onoria, Victor Musiime, Sahera Dirajlal-Fargo, Reuben N Robbins
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- Journal:
- Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society / Volume 29 / Issue s1 / November 2023
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 21 December 2023, pp. 495-496
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Objective:
Neuropsychological (NP) tests are increasingly computerized, which automates testing, scoring, and administration. These innovations are well-suited for use in resource-limited settings, such as low- to middle- income countries (LMICs), which often lack specialized testing resources (e.g., trained staff, forms, norms, equipment). Despite this, there is a dearth of research on their acceptability and usability which could affect performance, particularly in LMICs with varying levels of access to computer technology. NeuroScreen is a tablet-based battery of tests assessing learning, memory, working memory, processing speed, executive functions, and motor speed. This study evaluated the acceptability and usability of NeuroScreen among two groups of LMIC adolescents with and without HIV from Cape Town, South Africa and Kampala, Uganda.
Participants and Methods:Adolescents in Cape Town (n=131) and Kampala (n=80) completed NeuroScreen and questions about their use and ownership of, as well as comfort with computer technology and their experiences completing NeuroScreen. Participants rated their technology use -comfort with and ease-of-use of computers, tablets, smartphones, and NeuroScreen on a Likert-type scale: (1) Very Easy/Very Comfortable to (6) Very Difficult/Very Uncomfortable. For analyses, responses of Somewhat Easy/Comfortable to Very Easy/Comfortable were collapsed to codify comfort and ease. Descriptive statistics assessed technology use and experiences of using the NeuroScreen tool. A qualitative question asked how participants would feel receiving NeuroScreen routinely in the future; responses were coded as positive, negative, or neutral (e.g., “I would enjoy it”). Chi-squares assessed for group differences.
Results:South African adolescents were 15.42 years on average, 50.3% male, and 49% were HIV-positive. Ugandan adolescents were 15.64 years on average, 50.6% male, and 54% HIVpositive. South African participants were more likely than Ugandan participants to have ever used a computer (71% vs. 49%; p<.005), or tablet (58% vs. 40%; p<.05), whereas smartphone use was similar (94% vs 87%). South African participants reported higher rates of comfort using a computer (86% vs. 46%; p<.001) and smartphone (96% vs. 88%; p<.05) compared to Ugandan participants. Ugandan adolescents rated using NeuroScreen as easier than South African adolescents (96% vs. 87%; p<.05).). Regarding within-sample differences by HIV status, Ugandan participants with HIV were less likely to have used a computer than participants without HIV (70% vs. 57%; p<.05, respectively).The Finger Tapping test was rated as the easiest by both South African (73%) and Ugandan (64%) participants. Trail Making was rated as the most difficult test among Ugandan participants (37%); 75% of South African participants reported no tasks as difficult followed by Finger Tapping as most difficult (8%). When asked about completing NeuroScreen at routine doctor’s visits, most South Africans (85%) and Ugandans (72%) responded positively.
Conclusions:This study found that even with low prior tablet use and varying levels of comfort in using technology, South African and Ugandan adolescents rated NeuroScreen with high acceptability and usability. These data suggest that scaling up NeuroScreen in LMICs, where technology use might be limited, may be appropriate for adolescent populations. Further research should examine prior experience and comfort with tablets as predictors NeuroScreen test performance.
15 - Handling and Moving the African Buffalo
- from Part IV - Management
- Edited by Alexandre Caron, Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD), France, Daniel Cornélis, Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD) and Foundation François Sommer, France, Philippe Chardonnet, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) SSC Antelope Specialist Group, Herbert H. T. Prins, Wageningen Universiteit, The Netherlands
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- Ecology and Management of the African Buffalo
- Published online:
- 09 November 2023
- Print publication:
- 23 November 2023, pp 407-430
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Summary
Conservation, management and research require buffalo to be handled and sometimes moved from one place to another. Techniques providing more efficiency and a safer environment for buffalo capture and handling, including mass physical and individual chemical capture techniques, have been developed over the past few decades. These techniques, which are based on the experience and skills of staff, retain some room for improvement, e.g. using new drugs especially non-opioids for chemical immobilization, adapting technological advances (e.g. drone, scent technology) or new concepts (e.g. virtual boundary) to physical capture. The cardinal rule of buffalo or any wildlife capture, translocation and release is to regard all human interventions as potentially stressful to the animals, and therefore to strive to conduct them as far as possible as ‘short-term and low-stress management exercises’.
32 - Erik Cornell. North Korea under Communism: Report of an Envoy in Paradise
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 328-329
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Summary
Until the early 1970s, all Western countries argued that the existence of the United Nations Commission for the Unification and Rehabilitation of Korea (UNCURK) in 1950 precluded them from recognizing the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, more popularly known as North Korea. The United Nations (UN) had only recognized one legitimate government on the Korean peninsula, the Republic of Korea, or South Korea. By 1973, however, there seemed little possibility of UNCURK ever fulfilling its role, and in a new atmosphere created by the first talks between the two Koreas since the end of the Korean War it was quietly wound up by agreement on all sides. At that point, a number of Western countries, most prominently the Nordic group, established relations with North Korea. However, they did not establish diplomatic missions in the North's capital, Pyongyang, preferring to cross-accredit staff from their embassies in Beijing.
After about a year, however, Sweden broke ranks and established a diplomatic presence in Pyongyang. This, as the first head of the post now recounts, was not for ideological reasons, but because Sweden had a practical problem that needed solving. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the North Koreans had gone on a buying spree in Europe to update machinery and equipment installed after the Korean War that was outdated and had begun to run down. Many Western European companies, including Swedish companies, responded positively to North Korean requests. After all, no communist country had defaulted on its debts up to that point, and it was widely assumed that Moscow in particular would come to the aid of any of its ‘satellite’ allies should they find themselves in difficulties. Unfortunately, the North Koreans had got into difficulties with repayments and Moscow showed no disposition to bale them out. So North Korea defaulted on its debts, including debts to Sweden. Under pressure from Swedish business, therefore, the Swedish government decided in autumn 1974 to open an embassy in Pyongyang.
Erik Cornell, a diplomat with experience in development work, was appointed to head this embassy, although the Swedish ambassador in Beijing remained the formal head of post. In addition to his personal story, Cornell spends about a third of the book defining Marxism-Leninism, and in explaining why North Korea is not really a Marxist-Leninist state.
35 - Jane Portal. Art under Control in North Korea
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 336-338
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Summary
Given the general lack of knowledge about the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK – North Korea) in the West, it is not at all surprising that there is an almost total lack of knowledge of the arts in that country. The relatively few visitors to North Korea may notice the architecture and the dramatic posters that mark the capital, and in recent years, the North Koreans have invited visitors to see what are called ‘Mass Games’, but which would be more accurately described as a cross between a mass rally and a gymnastic display. Not many visitors will see the art galleries or museums unless they make a special request. Even long term foreign residents rarely bother to go. Outside North Korea, it is hard to find examples of North Korean painting, ceramics or other art forms, although some of the posters are now marketed on the Internet. In the Republic of Korea (ROK – South Korea), art from the North was banned as propaganda until recently, and it is rarely on show even today.
The only known permanent display of North Korean art in the West is at the British Museum, and it is fitting that Jane Portal, the curator who started this collection, has now provided what she describes as ‘just a beginning’ in introducing this little-known field to a wider audience. She places North Korean art firmly in two contexts: the totalitarian tradition of grandiose monuments and buildings, and the intensely political nature of all activities in North Korea – it is not just art that is under control but all aspects of life. As she indicates, it is impossible to assess art in North Korea without an understanding of the historical background, from which the leadership derives its legitimacy, and the effort that goes into glorifying that leadership. Any monument has a link to Kim Il Sung, who ruled North Korea from the 1940s until his death in 1994, or to his son, Kim Jong Il, who succeeded to his father's role, if not his titles. Visitors will be told that one building has so many blocks, representing Kim Il Sung's life, or that another's height tells the same story. The reconstruction of historical monuments is not something connected with scholarly accuracy, but is to support the system. Painting, sculpture and music echo the same themes.
17 - Potboiler Press: British Media and North Korea
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 235-240
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Summary
British news coverage of North Korea suffers for two primary reasons: an insular attitude toward the outside world and the British public's relative lack of interest in Korean affairs. The result is a triviadominated approach that emphasizes the weirdest stories over substantive issues.
This state of affairs seems unlikely to change as British media are addicted to this style. Falling customer numbers and revenues mean that there is less money available to provide more informed coverage. The rest of the world is of little interest compared with the success of British sports or the antics of celebrities. Korea, little known in Britain except to those with a direct interest, is unlikely to displace such stories.
THOUGHTS ON THE BRITISH MEDIA
The current media age is remarkable. Probably never before has so much news and information flashed around the world, reaching vast audiences. Where once speedy knowledge and analysis of the news was confined to a privileged few, now it is available for all. However, while modern communications produce masses of information and analysis, much of what is presented as news is gossip or trivia, lacking substance and importance. Tabloids and some websites may be the worst but they are not the only offenders. In Britain, even major news outlets such as the BBC, The Guardian, The Times and the Daily Telegraph will present news in bite-sized pieces that, as often as not, take a mocking or jokey tone. The tabloids, for their part, report on most of what passes for foreign news in a flippant tone, with xenophobia never far from the surface. This happens even when a story, such as the recent defection of the London–based North Korean diplomat, Thae Yong Ho, appears to have possible serious repercussions. Thae's alleged addiction to golf and his wife's to shopping played as large a role in the reporting as did any political significance of the move.
The main emphasis in British coverage of North Korea is on the odd and the peculiar. For instance, haircuts are a perennial favorite subject: Kim Jong Un's hair is regularly mocked, even though the style seems to be common all over northern Europe. The supposed compulsory styles forced on young men is frequent feature, even if there is plenty of evidence that many different styles can be seen throughout the country. Even Thae's defection was linked to the haircut story.
16 - A Brush with History: Opening the British Embassy Pyongyang, 2001–02
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 202-234
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Summary
On the morning of 12 December 2000, at a brief signing ceremony in the office of the Permanent Undersecretary, Sir John Kerr, in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) in London, Britain and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK – North Korea) signed a document in which they agreed to exchange diplomatic missions. The signatories were Sir John Kerr for the United Kingdom, and Mr Kim Chun Guk, head of the European Department of the DPRK's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) for the DPRK. Within minutes, the news of this development had appeared on the FCO's website, and was being announced throughout the world. Given the past history of lack of contact between the two countries, some expressed surprise at the apparent speed of developing relations. Among international news services, only Radio China International noted that Britain was the first Western permanent member of the United Nations’ Security Council to establish diplomatic relations with the DPRK.
This essay, which partly derives from presentations to workshops run by the British Association for Korean Studies in December 2001 and December 2002, is both a short history of how that ceremony came about and a very personal account of what came next. Where possible, I have provided references to published or available sources, but for some matters in which I was personally involved, this has not always been possible. The views expressed are my own, and do not necessarily represent British government policy.
BACKGROUND: BRITAIN'S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE DPRK 1948–2000
Before 2000, Britain and the DPRK had tended to ignore each other. Indeed, before the Second World War, and the subsequent division of the Korean peninsula, British involvement in the northern half of the peninsula had been minimal. Britain had briefly maintained a proconsul at Wonsan, and there was some missionary activity. The main British interest at that period was gold mining.
Following the 1945 division of the Korean peninsula, and the emergence of two separate Korean states by 1948, Britain, in common with most Western countries, had recognised the Republic of Korea (ROK – South Korea) as the “only legitimate government” on the peninsula. This recognition did not extend to the ROK's claim to the whole peninsula, but nevertheless Britain had no dealings with the authorities north of the 38th parallel. The Korean War (1950–53), though it made no legal difference, reinforced the position taken in 1948.
7 - William Keswick, 1835–1912: Jardine's Pioneer in Japan
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 74-81
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Summary
William Keswick was an important figure in Jardine-Matheson's role in China and Japan, and in the London-based Matheson and Company, from the mid-nineteenth century onwards until his death in 1912, yet he has scarcely received the attention that might have been expected from this long involvement in East Asian trade. He is curiously absent from the current Dictionary of National Biography, though several of his Jardines’ relations are so honoured. His Who was Who entry, based on his own account of himself, is amazingly brief, omitting both his wives, and what many would see as his major role in the China Association, for example, though noting his onetime membership of the Hong Kong Legislative Council. His role as a Conservative MP from 1899 and his appointment as JP and High Sheriff for Surrey receive as much prominence as his work in Asia. His years in Japan, where he established Jardine's presence immediately after the 1858 treaties allowed foreign residence, go wholly unnoticed.
William Keswick was born on 1 January 1835, according to his Who was Who entry, though most sources say 1834, in the Scottish lowlands. A nephew of William Jardine, he attended Merchiston's school in Edinburgh, and went out to China in 1855, the first of five generations of the Keswick family to be associated with Jardines. His younger brother, James Johnstone Keswick, also joined the company in China. By that stage, Jardine, Matheson, which can trace its origins back to 1782 and a bewildering collection of intermediate names, was well-established on the Chinese coast, though faced with major rivals such as Dent and Company, and was distancing itself from its early role in the more questionable aspects of the China trade.
Naturally enough, Jardines was interested in the new trading possibilities opening up in East Asia in the 1850s, as the pressure increased on Japan to abandon its isolation. Before the treaties permitted formal trade with Japan, Jardines had traded in Japanese products usually through the Ryukyu islands or Taiwan, although there was also contact with Chinese merchants established at Nagasaki. The trade, officially forbidden by the Japanese authorities, was always small, but no doubt it served to whet appetites.
The earliest treaties with Japan, concluded by United States’ and British naval officers in 1853 and 1854, had been little concerned with trade.
18 - Reflections on North Korea: Myths and Reality
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 241-256
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INTRODUCTION
In December 2000, Britain and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK – North Korea) signed an agreement to establish diplomatic relations. It had been no easy journey. From the formal establishment of two states on the Korean Peninsula in 1948, Britain had been a firm supporter of the Republic of Korea (ROK – South Korea). This support had been maintained even when there were grave doubts about the policies of the Presidents Syngman Rhee and Park Chung Hee. The Scandinavian countries regarded the dissolution of the Korean War-era United Nations Commission for the Unification and Rehabilitation of Korea in 1973 as a removal of any legal barrier to recognizing the North, an interpretation shared by Britain's senior legal officers, but Britain continued to deny recognition to the North. There was some modification of this position after the two Koreas joined the United Nations in 1991, at which point Britain recognized the DPRK as a state. Nevertheless, ministers on both sides of the political spectrum declined to go any further and, even as late as July 2000, a proposal from officials for a change in policy was firmly turned down.
Yet the international relationship with North Korea was changing rapidly. Early in 2000, Italy had broken European Union ranks and established relations. South Korea, especially after the June 2000 North- South Summit, was keen that more countries should open relations with the North to end its isolation. The DPRK itself was reaching out. These factors all contributed to a change of position by ministers at the time of the Europe–Asia meeting in Seoul in September 2000.
The December signing (agreeing to establish diplomatic relations) led to the question of whether and how the relationship would be carried forward. Although it was decided that Britain would not open an embassy in Pyongyang, it was felt there should be at least one dedicated person to take relations forward. At that point, I was the only person at the right grade in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) who had expressed a wish to go to North Korea if we ever established relations. Now I was taken at my word and I readily agreed.
LIFE BEFORE PYONGYANG
In 1981 I was asked to go to the embassy in Seoul as head of chancery and consul. We spent nearly four enjoyable years there.
13 - The Centenary of Korea-British Diplomatic Relations: Aspects of British Interest and Involvement in Korea, 1600–1983
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 150-177
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INTRODUCTION
At the end of October 1883, Sir Harry Smith Parkes, long the doyen of British diplomats in East Asia, arrived in Seoul to complete the negotiations for a treaty which was to replace that negotiated in 1882. That had aroused widespread opposition and had finally been abandoned. The negotiations in Seoul were successful, and a new Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation was signed in the Kyŏngbok Palace on 26 November 1883. Parkes left Seoul the next day, before the Han River froze for the winter, but he was to return the following April to exchange ratifications.
Thus began formal relations between Korea and Britain. To mark the anniversary, numerous events were planned. The first ever official visit by a member of the British Royal Family took place in May, when His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester came at the same time as the Royal Ballet. There was a second Royal visit in October, when the Duke of Kent led a British Overseas Trade Board mission to Korea. Other British visitors to Korea included the novelist Iris Murdoch, the playwright Arnold Wesker and the economist Professor Frank Hahn. From both countries, there were ministerial and other official exchanges. If the Royal Ballet is the major British cultural manifestation to mark the centenary, the exhibition of Korean art in london from February 1984 is a fitting reminder of Korea's cultural importance. In addition to these high-level contacts, there have been numerous others, covering the whole range of contacts between the two countries.
This paper traces the history of British interest in Korea from long before Parkes's treaty to the present. It seems particularly appropriate that such a paper should be given to a Royal Asiatic Society audience, for the British in Korea were very much in the forefront of the move to found the RAS, and were certainly in the forefront of its activities until the Pacific War. Since then, the changes in Britain's position in East Asia have been reflected in the RAS, no less than in other fields.
The paper does not claim to be a piece of original research. Others have covered the ground, sometimes indeed in front of RAS audiences. But it does include some new material, and attempts to bring the story up to the present, which has not been done before.
10 - Korea, Taiwan and Manchuria: Britain's Consular Service in the Japanese Empire, 1883–1941
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 112-124
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INTRODUCTION
Britain's Japan Consular Service was not designed to operate outside Japan. Its members were trained for work there, with emphasis on acquiring the language and knowledge of the country, its people and its customs. Three factors changed this. In times of need, the availability of trained and capable staff was a great temptation. Second, promotion was always slow. Finally, with the spread of Japanese influence and the establishment of an empire, it made sense to send members of the consular service to these new places.
KOREA
The first use of staff in Korea arose from Sir Harry Parkes’ interest in Korea that began when he was Minister in Japan from 1865 to 1883. Parkes’ concern was strategic: to keep Korea out of Russian hands. To this end, in the 1870s, he campaigned for the occupation of Komundo (Port Hamilton), a group of islands off Korea's southern coast. This was at variance with the Foreign Office view of Britain's interests in East Asia and Parkes was told that Her Majesty's Government were not in the habit of appropriating other country's territory. Meanwhile, two members his staff, Ernest Satow and W.G.Aston, began studying Korean from the late 1870s because of its links with Japanese, but also providing Parkes with a solid understanding of Korea.
Vice-Admiral Willis negotiated Britain's first treaty with Korea in 1882. Aston accompanied him but Willis appears to have paid little attention to his adviser. The result was a treaty generally deemed unsatisfactory. It was abandoned, and under Parkes’ guidance, a new treaty was negotiated in 1883. To effect this, Aston, with Walter Hillier and C.T. Maude from China, went to Korea in 1883. As well as treaty negotiations, Aston leased the land on which the British Embassy still stands. In November 1883, Parkes, now Minister at Beijing, arrived to finalize and sign the new treaty.
Parkes (and the Treasury) felt there was no need to establish a diplomatic presence in Korea. The minister in Beijing would be sideaccredited, an arrangement that lasted until the late 1890s. However, there was a need for a consular establishment since British merchants were already arriving, and Parkes proposed Aston as consul general. The Treasury would only agree to temporary appointments. Other staff came from China.
Aston's appointment did not last long.
29 - Hugh Cortazzi, ed. Carmen Blacker – Scholar of Japanese Religions, Myth and Folklore: Writings and Reflections
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
- Published by:
- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
- Print publication:
- 20 October 2023, pp 317-320
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Summary
I only met Dr Carmen Blacker (1924–2009) once, towards the end of her life, when she was already very ill. Although our only previous contact had been a somewhat scratchy exchange of letters over a possible contribution to a volume of Biographical Portraits that I edited, I found her easy to talk to and charming. Our main common ground was her first book, on Fukuzawa Yukichi, which had been published in 1964, as I started my own far less distinguished career in Japanese Studies. Reading this fascinating mixture of Dr. Blacker's diaries, more formal Writings, and reminiscences by those who knew her makes me wish I had known her better. Her companion and later husband, Dr Michael Loewe, and several former students and friends, contribute memoirs. These inevitably overlap, but they bring out the many formative influences that made her what she was.
Clearly important was family life and school. It was through school that she met Julia Piggott. Carmen was already interested in Japan and the Japanese language but the meeting with Julia Piggott was to provide a strong boost to that interest. Julia, who had actually lived in Japan, was the granddaughter of F. T. Piggott, a legal adviser to the Meiji Government, and the daughter of his son, Major General F. S. T. Piggott, twice military attaché’ in Tokyo. The friendship would last until Julia's death, and the encounter would consolidate Carmen's interest in things Japanese, and eventually lead to her career in Japanese studies. General Piggott, perhaps recognizing a fellow enthusiast, encouraged her and provided her with formal training in the language. He was something of a controversial figure, who could see no wrong in the Japanese, but Carmen clearly regarded him with affection and benefitted from his training as her account of ‘Two Piggotts’, published in 1991, makes clear.
Piggott's tutoring and her own efforts meant that by the time war came with Japan in 1941, she already had a good command of Japanese. After some intensive training in military Japanese at SOAS, she joined Bletchley Park. lt was not a happy experience. She felt undervalued both in terms of salary and the work she was given. However valuable it might have been as war work, she did not enjoy the monotony of carding Japanese words that might just be useful in decoding.
36 - Felix Abt. A Capitalist in North Korea: My Seven Years in the Hermit Kingdom
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- Book:
- East Asia Observed
- Published by:
- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
- Print publication:
- 20 October 2023, pp 339-340
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Summary
Felix Abt's account of his seven years in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK-North Korea) is a first on two counts. While there are a few accounts by foreign experts and diplomats, as far as I know it is the only such work by a businessman. There are plenty of photographs in it, though they are not quite as unusual as the author seems to believe. And for the RSAA's Journal, this is the first ever review of a book only available in e-book format.
The book is well worth reading for the picture it gives of a country that, unlike the conventional Western image, is not full of mad people following the instructions of mad leaders. Some issues may be avoided but Abt tells what he saw rather than what others told him was there. He is Swiss, with a long record of work in Europe, Africa and South East Asia with multi-national companies such as F. Hoffman-La Roche and ABB. He took up his appointment as ABB's representative in North Korea with enthusiasm. That enthusiasm led him to co-found the European Business Association in Pyongyang and to serve as its first chair, and to establish a short-lived Pyongyang Business School. He also created a successful pharmaceutical company, along the way selling the idea of advertising to the North Koreans. He learnt to work closely with his Korean staff and, like others, found that Korean women, whether in North or South Korea, often provide a more capable and efficient body of staff. They are as well-educated as their male counterparts but do not suffer from the same status hangups of the latter.
Abt also discovered that while his North Korean colleagues and partners were willing and eager to do business, international sanctions and restrictions, the result of the DPRK's nuclear programme, often made it difficult. He is scathing about the Western approach to North Korea and about the methods used to try to make it conform, which, he argues, hit ordinary people and legitimate business in North Korea, despite claims to the contrary. He dismisses stories about North Korean production and sales of illicit drugs and, in particular, about US claims that the country is the source of the counterfeiting of US $100 bills.
11 - John Carey Hall (1844–1921): A Career in the Japan Consular Service
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- Book:
- East Asia Observed
- Published by:
- Amsterdam University Press
- Published online:
- 22 February 2024
- Print publication:
- 20 October 2023, pp 125-133
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INTRODUCTION
John Carey Hall never acquired the fame of some of his contemporaries in the Japan consult service. Yet he was one of the early student interpreters and was among the longest serving members of the service, holding senior positions at all the main posts. He was particularly attached to Kobe, but ended his career as consul-general in Yokohama. He qualified in Japanese, was called to the Bar and did important legal work at various stages in his career.
EARLY CAREER
Like many of the China and Japan consular services, Hall was from Ireland. He was born in Coleraine on 22 January 1844, and was one of five brothers. In family memory, he was Presbyterian and a ‘moderate Irish nationalist’. He attended Coleraine Academical Institute and then studied at Queen's College Belfast. Applying to the Foreign Office (FO) in August 1867 for a student interpreter post, he wrote that he ‘held a scholarship in each year of [his] undergraduate course, [was] a senior scholar in Ancient Classics and at the last annual examination, had graduated with first class honours in the same subject…’ Hall passed and asked to go to Japan, about which he claimed to know as much as the study of books in English would allow. All the Japan slots were filled, but one of those selected withdrew and Hall took the place. Japan would be his home for forty-six years.
He arrived early in 1868. He later recalled that the ship had briefly anchored off the port of Hyogo, where the new foreign settlement at Kobe was in the process of being established. On arrival in Tokyo, he settled down under the guidance of Ernest Satow, the Japanese Secretary, on a salary of £200 a year. Hall was somewhat handicapped by physical problems. A fall while a student left him partially deaf and he grew deafer as the years went by. His eyesight was poor and also deteriorated over the years.
Yet he seems to have made a good start. He applied himself to language study. Then as a junior assistant he served as acting vice-consul at Tokyo, and become involved in legal work. As early as 1870, he was seconded to the Japanese commission established to devise a new scheme for prisons.
Notes
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 365-406
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12 - Memories of the Past: The Legacy of Japan's Treaty Ports
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 134-149
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Summary
This chapter is more of an essay than a specialised paper. It looks at the way the Japanese treaty ports, once seen as the forward thrust of an alien world, have been steadily incorporated in the canon of history in Japan. Although some of its ideas have been inspired by works such as The Invention of Tradition and some of the writings of Robert Bickers on the Chinese treaty ports, it is not theoretical. Rather, it represents the reflections of one trained as a historian. In addition, it also looks at the wider legacy of the treaty ports, in an attempt to assess their role in the development of Japan since the 1860s. This last section is a return to a subject that I only ever properly looked at in an unpublished presentation on “Yokohama – key to modern Japan?” that I gave at the University of Sheffield in May 1972 and to which I had always intended to return one day. Here, I consider it in the context of the positive way the Japanese view the treaty ports.
I did not return to the subject until now for a variety of reasons. By 1972, my career had largely moved away from things Japanese. As a member of the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office's Research Department, my focus shifted to China and, from the 1980s onwards, to the Korean Peninsula. Only in the 1990s did I ever spend much time on Japan, mainly concerned with issues such as the treatment of prisoners of war between 1941 and 1945 and on post-war Japanese apologies. Treaty ports played no part in this work, even if the historical background some-times proved useful. The treaty ports never entirely disappeared from my life, and I produced a few academic papers about them. Later, I found myself playing a role in Sir Hugh Cortazzi's major project on Britain and Japan: Biographical Portraits, writing about subjects such as Britain's Japan consular service, newspapers and foreign employees. A break from the office in 1992–1993 at last allowed me some time finally to focus on turning my PhD into a book. This involved a certain amount of updating, but relatively little fresh work had appeared on the subject. Where I failed was not to take sufficient account of the great increase in works on the ports in China and the new themes and issues being considered.
28 - Ian Nish. The Japanese in War and Peace 1942–1948: Selected Documents from a Translator's In-tray
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 315-316
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Summary
We have all done it. An interesting paper comes across the desk or is picked up along the way. One glances at it, perhaps even makes some cursory study and then tosses it into a box against some future need or just because it looks too interesting to throw away. That is just what Second Lieutenant Ian Nish of the Intelligence Corps did while working on Japanese documents as part of the British Commonwealth occupation force in Western Japan from 1946 to 1948. Now, as Professor Emeritus in International History at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Britain's leading scholar of matters Japanese, he has brought out some of the contents of the box, to throw light on Japanese attitudes on a range of subjects during and after the war.
That is not all. Nish gives his personal account of what it was like to live and work among Japanese far away from the centre as they came to terms with defeat. A small section of Nish's photographs and ephemera add to the interest, and, for good measure, he also includes a brief memoir by the late Professor William Beasley of the School of Oriental and African Studies, who worked as a naval intelligence officer in Tokyo just after the war ended. Beasley's experience, living in the former British Embassy, now recommissioned as a naval station, was very different but the account is equally valuable. We have much information on the making of high policy during the occupation, and it is useful to be reminded that orders issued from above could look very different at ground level. Young occupation officers might be called upon to explain democracy or to sort out black marketing. And whatever official injunction there may have been about non-fraternization, even the lowest-ranking intelligence officers had to deal with Japanese people on a day-to-day basis, which gave them some insight into what they were thinking both about the war and about the new world that descended on them after Japan's surrender. Travel was also possible, and, even if travelling conditions left much to be desired, it provided further opportunities for learning. For both Nish and Beasley, their time in Japan and their increasing skill in the language would provide the basis for their future academic careers as well as giving them Japanese and other friends for the rest of their lives.
23 - Charles Stephenson. Germany's Asia-Pacific Empire: Colonialism and Naval Policy, 1885–1914
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- Amsterdam University Press
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 300-302
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Summary
Germany's quest for colonies came late, partly because Germany itself came late. Only after the establishment of the German Empire in 1871 did the country begin the search for colonies. Until then, the issue of unification, and the struggle between Prussia and Austria as to which would dominate a unified German Empire, absorbed German energies. Given that much effort was still required after 1871 to mould the new entity – no easy task given that German kingdoms such as Bavaria continued to exist and free cities such as Hamburg were not eager to see their privileged position disappear – historians have struggled to explain the German quest for colonies. Charles Stephenson states that Germany's colonial empire was not acquired in a fit of absentmindedness, as Britain's was supposed to have been, but he struggles to find an answer to the question why it was acquired. No doubt it was partly because that was what other European states were trying to do, and it may also have been to distract attention from issues at home. Stephenson seems to think that it was the latter motive which lay behind Bismarck's initial interest in the acquisition of overseas colonies, but he is not sure. Germany's first colonial interest was Africa; East Asia and the Pacific came later, and had more of a feel of absent-minded acquisition than Germany's first colonies. In the end, however, it was perceived naval needs that pushed Germany towards the acquisition of its Pacific and Chinese territories. Coal-powered ships needed readily available supplies, and the way that such supplies could be guaranteed was by the acquisition of coaling stations. Up to the 1890s, Germany had relied on Hong Kong to fuel its ships in East Asian waters but there was growing concern that Hong Kong would not be available if Britain and Germany were on bad terms. It was thus that, in 1897, the Germans acquired the enclave on China's Shandong peninsula known today as Jiaozhaou, but which Stephenson prefers to refer to by one of its many contemporary variations, Kiautschou. The main town in that enclave, now Qingdao, is referred to as Tsingtau throughout. While no doubt both forms will strike a responsive cord with those who have only used the German archives, their usage in a modern work is only likely to confuse the reader.
Dedication
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp v-vi
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44 - Hugh Baker. Ancestral Images: A Hong Kong Collection
- James Hoare, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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- East Asia Observed
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- 22 February 2024
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- 20 October 2023, pp 358-359
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Summary
It was always worth going to hear a lecture by Hugh Baker, now Emeritus Professor of Chinese at the School of Oriental and African Studies. He had the knack of picking out the interesting tit-bit that turned a scholarly presentation into a performance delivered with verve. There was no doubt about the scholarship but he went beyond mere knowledge, bringing things Chinese to life.
The same is true of Ancestral Images. In one sense, this is not a new work. Back in the 1970s, Baker did a series on Hong Kong television on Hong Kong life and history, which drew on his research work in a clan village in the New Territories. From this developed a series of short pieces in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), which were subsequently published in three slim volumes, with the same title as the present book. These went out of print when the SCMP withdrew from book publishing. A selection appeared in 1990, published by the Hong Kong University Press, which has now decided to publish all the original 120 articles in one volume. We are the beneficiaries. Baker has slightly revised the articles, to make them reflect the huge changes that have taken place in Hong Kong and the New Territories since the 1970s, but their essential freshness is there. Baker's own photographs provide charming illustrations. Baker is somewhat dismissive of his photographic skills but the pictures chosen are apt and informative. They are also historical records in their own right, since much of what they depict has long since disappeared. The material is primarily concerned with Hong Kong, but the reader will find many reflections on Chinese society more widely, historical matters, such as the Imperial Customs Service, and the wrestling of Chinese students with the vagaries of the English language. There is no claim to original scholarship, but one would have to put in many long hours to accumulate what Baker presents in easily understood and digestible form. Food and death and burials are perhaps the most recurring themes, but there are also many reflections on gods and religion. Baker is always stimulating, occasionally provocative, but never boring. Reading the collection straight through throws up some repetition but, taken as it should be, dipping in here and there, one does not notice this but rather enjoys the clever linking of the past and the present.
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