Nakasone memories: I got my first intro to Japanese politics as an undergrad in 1982, when I spent a summer as a Diet intern for Defense Minister Soichiro Ito. Given that opportunity, I decided to write my senior thesis on defense policy. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/11/29/national/japan-prime-minister-yasuhiro-nakasone-obit/#.XeE2N797lE4

I argued that the Liberal Democratic Party was making a slow but notable shift toward military realism, with Nakasone as a prominent voice on the more hawkish side. That shifted has continued, but more slowly than I thought, setting the stage for Koizumi, Abe.

Then in 1983 I went back to Tokyo as a reporter for the Japan Times. Nakasone was now prime minister. The big stories: Tanaka found guilty, the 1983 election, US-Japan trade friction, the Yen-Dollar talks.

I wrote a feature story on Nakasone's foreign policy. He mastered the symbolism of international leadership, inching toward the center in Summit photos and cultivating the famous "Ron-Yasu" relationship with Reagan. He also strengthened Japan's defense posture.

Then it was back to Nakasone as a grad student, with my dissertation on the neoliberal turn: Thatcher, Reagan, and - yes - Nakasone. The Japanese version was similar in rhetoric - get the government out of the market - and yet remarkably different in practice.

Nakasone focused more on fiscal balance plus privatization. The government carefully orchestrated "deregulation" to make sure incumbents survived. Yet Japan's neoliberal turn still had some long-term negative effects, undermining the government's capacity to guide the economy.