“This is a masterful and brilliant account of the rise and fall of the Pax Americana from the perspective of Japan and northeast Asia. Working through and beyond the pitfalls and shortcomings of area studies, Naoki Sakai opens new and often unexpected angles on racism, nationalism, and the nation form in a time of transition. There is much to learn from this book, on Japan and northeast Asia, but more generally on the world we live in.”
- Sandro Mezzadra, University of Bologna “Ranging widely across texts, languages, times (conventionally understood as the premodern and the modern), and places (typically called ‘Asia’ and ‘the West’), these essays interrogate the bordering practices of knowledge production about areas while demonstrating how rethinking modernity through Japan may enable ethically engaged and concretely situated critiques of nationalism, imperialism, racism, sexism, violence, humanism, and more across the globe. A singular and timely achievement from one of our most learned, theoretically rigorous, and profound thinkers.”
- Takashi Fujitani, author of (Race for Empire: Koreans as Japanese and Japanese as Americans during World War II) "For those who want to push area studies and Japan studies to their limits and to finally pose real problems instead of offering paltry solutions in the world of ideology, The End of Pax Americana can inspire us to theorize new problems for research in the humanities and the social sciences that not only interpret the reality of our present conjuncture but that seek to change it."
- Ken C. Kawashima (Journal of Japanese Studies) "True to the critical theory tradition, the book is sure to provoke many thoughts, especially regarding what roles Japan might play as the US-China rivalry continues to intensify."
- Yuji Maeda (Journal of Asian Studies)
