Annual Newsletter of the Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University		Japanese English	-->List of All Publications-->Annual Newsletter-->no.17
No.17, January 2010

The Slavic Research Center Held the International Symposium, "The South Ossetian Conflict and Trans-border Politics in the Black Sea Rim" on March 5–6, 2009

The SRC SRC International Symposium
"The Elusive Balance: Regional Powers and the Search for Sustainable Development" Was Held on July 9–10, 2009

Joint Forum Series in Washington D.C.

International Symposium on "Environmental Conservation of the Sea of Okhotsk: Cooperation between Japan, China, and Russia"

Foreign Visitors Fellowship Program

Our Current Staff

Ongoing Cooperative Research Projects

Visitors from Abroad

Guest Lectures from Abroad

Publications (2008-09)

The Library

Website Access Statistics

Essays by Foreign Fellows
Andrew Gentes	Dariusz Kołodziejczyk	Marina Mongush

First Year in Retrospective and the Beginning of a "New" Slavic Research Center

Iwashita Akihiro

Iwashita Akihiro

It has been more than a year since I took office as director of the Slavic Research Center in August 2008. This last year has been a continuous struggle towards the challenge of creating a “new” Slavic Research Center. From the beginning, we have made efforts to significantly improve the Center’s public relations through enriching the webpage by creating a window and uploading essays on current affairs and new announcements every week. Moreover, we have started to utilize electronic media including the center’s electronic newsletter “Slavic Research Center Report” and the SRC’s mail magazine.

However, the time when I succeeded to the post of director was in many ways a transition period. While the Center of Excellence (COE) Grant-in-Aid project “Making a Discipline of Slavic Eurasian Studies” ended in success with substantial achievements, we were in the midst of searching for the next project. The status of the Center as a “national collaborating institution for Slavic-Eurasian studies” came under review and following the revision of the School Education Act, the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology institutionalized a new policy of “Joint Usage/Research Centers.” Therefore, the Center had to quickly mobilize its resources to prepare for the application procedure to obtain recognition.

After a long struggle, the project “Regional Powers: Cross-disciplinary Studies,” led by Professor Shinichiro Tabata, was adopted as the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas. Along with Grants-in-Aid for Basic Research A and B, B, the Center adopted the Global Center of Excellence “Reshaping Japan’s Border Studies,” and the Center was recognized as a Joint Usage/Research Center. The Center is in a position that we could not have imagined one year ago.

It is to the endless support and guidance of the Slavic and Eurasian studies research comm unity that we owe the series of “successes.” I would like to express my sincere and deepest gratitude once again. While not losing sight of our foundation and roles that have been fostered throughout the years, everyone at the Center, with awareness and determination, is fully comm itted to making progress and development in the projects at hand. Moreover, we are in the midst of facing a new challenge under the strict financial reforms of the new JDP government, as big cuts in project and grant-in-aid funding concerning research and education are expected through meetings of the government’s revitalization unit. It is in these difficult times that we must confirm once again that we shall make small but solid steps and move forward with persistence.

We kindly ask for your warm support, understanding, and cooperation in the activities conducted at the Center.

IWASHITA Akihiro