INTRODUCTION

SHIJURO OGATA WAS an active and articulate internationalist Japanese who made many British and American friends through his role at the Bank of Japan. He was the husband of Sadako Ogata, UN High Commissioner for Refugees from 1991 to 2000 and President of the Japanese Agency for International Cooperation (JICA) from 2003 to 2012. She was more famous than her husband but responsible for international affairs at the Bank of Japan he had greater influence than most of his Japanese contemporaries in international finance. During an era when Japanese financial policies came under increasing criticism Ogata's frank and clear exposition of the issues and friendly approach helped to promote ways of mitigating if not solving the problems faced by Japan's foreign partners.

UPBRINGING

Shijuro Ogata was born in Tokyo in 1927. He was the third son of Ogata Taketora (1888–1956), who in 1934 became editor-in-chief of the Asahi Shimbun, one of the giants of the Japanese daily press, and later played significant political roles. The Ogatas were descendants of Ogata Koan who had become proficient in Western medicine through his studies of Dutch texts and who had established the Tekijuku in Osaka, the forerunner of Osaka University. Shijujro’s father had studied in London from 1920 to 1922. Internationalism was thus in the family's genes.

Shijuro was brought up in a relatively wealthy family. Before the war they often visited the mountains and the seaside and he learnt to ride with his father. But his health was delicate and having little interest in sport he devoted himself to study. The day school that he attended in Tokyo was strict and Spartan. He records in his memoir Haruka naru Showa (A Far Off Era) (2005) that the pockets of their trousers were sewn up so that however cold it was they could not put their hands in their pockets. It was quite a walk from the station to the school but they were not allowed to take the bus unless they had specific written permission from a parent.

As war approached life became increasingly tough. In the war years lessons were frequently interrupted and the boys including Shijuro were sent to workshops and farms to perform manual labour.