Rikki Kersten

Biography

Professor Rikki Kersten specialises in Japanese history, politics, security policy and foreign policy. She has a special interest in Australia-Japan relations, and in the US-Japan alliance. Educated at Adelaide and Oxford universities, Professor Kersten has held research attachments to various tertiary institutions in Japan, including the University of Tokyo and Keio University. Previously, Professor Kersten spent five years in the Australian Foreign Service, and served in the Political Section of the Australian Embassy in Tokyo. Professor Kersten has taught modern Japanese history at Sydney and Leiden Universities and served as Director of the Research Institute for Asia and the Pacific at the University of Sydney. Before joining Murdoch, she was Dean of the College of Asia and the Pacific, Dean of the Faculty of Asian Studies, and a Professor of Modern Japanese Political History at the Australian National University in Canberra.

Research Interest

Modern Japanese History; political thought; foreign policy, security policy, the US-Japan alliance, the US ‘rebalancing’ policy, Australia-Japan relations