By NAOTAKA FUJITA/ Senior Staff Writer
March 28, 2025 at 07:00 JST
Left: A 1985 photo of Shigeharu Matsumoto, who served as president of the International House of Japan. Right: A 2005 photo of Tadashi Yamamoto, president of the Japan Center for International Exchange (Asahi Shimbun file photos)
The International House of Japan Inc. (IHJ) and the Japan Center for International Exchange (JCIE) are collaborating on an archive of historical documents that will be available for widespread public use, The Asahi Shimbun has learned.
This is the country’s first case where two organizations are working together to preserve historical documents in the field of civilian diplomacy.
Last year, the two public interest incorporated foundations jointly set up a review committee to explore possibilities for an archive of civilian diplomacy.
“Japan’s neighbors include China, Taiwan, North Korea and Russia. We must make full use of civilian diplomacy when the strained international situation has made government-to-government diplomacy difficult,” a representative of the review committee said.
The committee’s discussions cover how to handle documents left by two core figures in their respective histories.
Shigeharu Matsumoto was a journalist involved in establishing the IHJ after World War II and contributed to reconciliation efforts with the international community.
Tadashi Yamamoto founded the JCIE and made recommendations to successive prime ministers.
The organizations intend to spend several years creating an index for about 33,000 pieces of historical materials and publish them online.
They also intend to digitize the materials to make them easily accessible to researchers at home and abroad, in addition to bringing them together at a planned archive center.
“It is a pressing issue to learn from the past through archived documents, studying which methods were available and what led to success or failure,” said the representative.
The nonprofits are also seeking ways to collaborate with other entities that possess their own historical records on civilian diplomacy, the representative added.
While many different private organizations engage in civilian diplomacy, it has become difficult for them to preserve historical materials and pass them on to future generations.
This was before the JCIE and IHJ decided to take matters into their own hands.
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