Prime Ministers of Postwar Japan, 1945–1995

AkioWatanabe is vice chairman of the Research Institute for Peace and Security.Robert D. Eldridge is former associate professor of Japanese political and diplomatic history at Osaka University.

• Supervising Translator’s PrefacePreface to the English EditionPreface to the Original Japanese VersionChapter 1: Higashikuni Naruhiko: A Liberalist in the Imperial Family, Hatano SumioChapter 2: Shidehara Kijuro: His “Final Public Duty” and the Draft Constitution, Amakawa AkiraChapter 3: Yoshida Shigeru: A Master of Situational Thinking, Watanabe AkioChapter 4: Katayama Tetsu: The First Batter under the New Constitution, Fumio FukunagaChapter 5: Ashida Hitoshi: The Intellectual and Cultured Man as Politician, Masuda HiroshiChapter 6: Hatoyama Ichiro: A Tenacious Attachment to the Restoration of Relations with the Soviet Union and Constitutional Revision, Yamamuro KentokuChapter 7: Ishibashi Tanzan: A Coherent Liberal Thinker, Inoki TakenoriChapter 8: Kishi Nobusuke: Frustrated Ambition, Kitaoka ShinichiChapter 9: Ikeda Hayato: The Man Who Created “The Economic Era,” Nakamura TakafusaChapter 10: Sato Eisaku: The Truth about “The Politics of Waiting,” Kosaka MasatakaChapter 11: Tanaka

The Prime Ministers of Postwar Japan, 1945–1995 is a collection of short and polished biographies of twenty-three prime ministers of post-World War II Japan written by highly respected leading scholars. This book provides the best guidance for understanding the various difficult choices they faced and for understanding postwar Japanese history.