Akiko YAMANAKA

Bio

Prof. Akiko Yamanaka serves as Special Advisor to the President of the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)、Special Affiliate of Cambridge Central Asia Forum and Visiting Fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs (JIIA).

She served as Former Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs and Special Ambassador for Peacebuilding of Japanese Government as well as Special Ambassador for Awareness of the World Tsunami in addition to Elected Member of the Diet of Japan.　She also served as President of International Tsunami Disaster Prevention Society.

She has been active in both academia and the political arena. 　
She pursued her academic career as Bi-Fellow at Churchill College of University of Cambridge, Visiting Professor at the United Nation University and Graduate School of Hokkaido University. She also pursued her studies as Senior Researcher at St. Antony’s College of University of Oxford in UK and Harvard University, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and Brookings Institute in USA.

She served other posts in the Diet included Director of Foreign Affairs Committee and Acting Director General of Defence Committee and Foreign Affairs Committee as well as Director General of the Women’s Bureau of the LDP. She launched “The Human Resources Development Program in Asia for Peacebuilding” as Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs and she also launched “The World Assembly for Women (WAW!)”for Prime Minister and UK-Japan Global Seminar with Chatham House.

Her expertise is Security which includes non-traditional security such as International Peacebuilding, International Negotiation and Strategic Studies, Natural and Human Induced Disaster Prevention, Preventive Diplomacy and Human Security on which she has written and gives lectures extensively.
She has published many books such as “Think, or Sink: Preventive State Theory” “Human Security for the Future with Dreams” and “The 23 Most Fabulous Women in the World” etc.

She was awarded OISCA Award (for Contributions to Asia) and the International Soroptimist Japan’s Sen Kayoko Prize (for Contributions to International Understanding)”