“CENTRAL BANKING AS STATE BUILDING： Policymakers and Their Nationalism in the Philippines, 1933-1964”(National University of Singapore Press in association with Kyoto University Press. 2016)

Yusuke Takagi(Kssistant Professor, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies )

It is a great honor and privilege to receive the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Prize. 　In my book, Central Baking as State Building, I study political process of central bank making and its economic policy management in the Philippines. The Philippines enjoyed a “golden age of industrialization” and stable politics with a two-major party system until 1972 when President Marcos declared the martial law. Because of changing context of international political economy and failed governance by President Marcos with his first lady, Imelda, the Philippines lagged behind the rapidly growing high performing Asian economies in the 1980s. The Philippines is often labeled as “a sick man of Asia” in the 1990s. Most of existing studies focus on the cause of “sickness” of the Philippines and neglect the achievement before the 1960s. I decided to study the time period to which only a few scholar paid attention. 　My mentor, Professor Yamamoto Nobuto of Keio University guided me; however, by asking I should consider why only a few scholars studied the period before jumping into an apparent niche in the field. Thanks to his guidance, I could cast doubt on the utility of dominant framework such as “weak state” and find out a network of policymakers sustaining the “island of state strength”. 　Recently I study policy coalition made of the policymakers who attempted to make a difference in the Philippines which experiences a transformation from the sick man to an emerging economy in Asia. I hope I will be able to provide more nuanced and well-articulated perspectives on politics in the Philippines particular and Asia in general.

Profile
Graduating from the Faculty of Law (majoring Political Science), Keio University, he worked as Research Fellow, Japan Society of Promotion of Science (JSPS), Researcher / Advisor, the Embassy of Japan in the Philippines, Assistant Professor, International Studies, College of Liberal Arts, De La Salle University ? Manila. He received a doctoral degree of the science of law from Keio University. After revising his dissertation, he published it as Central Banking as State Building: Policymakers and their Nationalism, 1933-1964 (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila UP, Kyoto: Kyoto UP, Singapore: NUS Press). As assistant professor, he is now handling the courses in the fields of political science and international relations at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS).