Speakers Biographies

Speakers Biographies

Dr John Nilsson-Wright (University of Cambridge)

John Nilsson-Wright is the Fuji Bank University Senior Lecturer in Modern Japanese Politics and International Relations and a Fellow of Darwin College. He read Politics, Philosophy and Economics (PPE) as an undergraduate at Christ Church, Oxford, from 1984 to 1987 during which time he developed an interest in Japanese politics and foreign policy. From 1988 to 1989 he was a Monbusho visiting researcher at Kyoto University, where he worked under the guidance of Professor Masataka Kosaka, focusing on post-war relations between Japan and Korea.

Sir David Warren (Former UK Ambassador to Japan. 2008 - 2012)

David Warren was British Ambassador to Japan from 2008 to 2012, after a career in the British Diplomatic Service that focused on East

Asian affairs, in which he served three times in the British Embassy in Tokyo as well as two years as head of the China Hong Kong Department in the Foreign Office in London (1998-2000). He retired from the Diplomatic Service in January 2013.

He is Chair of Council at the University of Kent, an Associate Fellow of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) and an Honorary Professor of the School of East Asian Studies at the University of Sheffield. He was Chair of the Japan Society from 2012 to 2018 and is also a member of the Board of the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures at the University of East Anglia, a member of the Advisory Board of Migration Matters Trust, a pro-legal migration campaigning group, and a non-executive Director of Aberdeen Japan Investment Trust.

Roderic Wye (Chatham House)

Rod Wye has more than 30 years’ experience working as a government analyst specializing on China and East Asia for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

He retired as head of research on Asia at the FCO in 2010.

He served twice as a first secretary in the British Embassy in Beijing in the 1980s and the 1990s where he was responsible for reporting on Chinese domestic affairs.

He was also deputy head of the FCO China Hong Kong department from 1999 to 2002.

Moderator

Professor Steve Tsang (Director, SOAS China Institute)

Professor Steve Tsang joined SOAS in 2016 as Director of SOAS China Institute.  His research interests focus on Twentieth-century Chinese history; Chinese foreign policy; China's 'peaceful rise' strategy; China's rising military might; China's soft power; China-UK relations; China-EU relations; China-US relations; China-Taiwan relations; China-Asia relations; Chinese politics; nature of political system in China; the Chinese Communist Party and democracy; human rights in China; Taiwan politics; Taiwan's external relations; Taiwan's democratisation; Taiwan's security; US-Taiwan relations; Hong Kong politics; Hong Kong's relations with mainland China; colonial history of Hong Kong.