Isami Sawai is a PhD candidate at the Department of International History, London School of Economics and Political Science. He received a LL.B. (2013) and M.Phil. in Political Science (2015) from University of Tokyo. In 2015-16, he worked as a research associate at the University of Tokyo. His research interests lie in modern East Asian international history, particularly in China and Japan’s transformation of foreign relations in the late 19th century. Sawai was a visiting research student at Peking University (Beijing) and at the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica (Taipei), in 2017-18.
Thesis provisional title
Between ‘Foreign Relations’ and ‘Diplomacy’: The Transformation of China and Japan’s Cultures of Foreign Policy-Making 1858-1881