is the former governor of Miyagi,

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, and currently university professor & political commentator.

Background

Early life and administrative career

Asano was born in the northern port town of Ofunato, Iwate, where his father was a town doctor. His father moved to nearby

Tome, Miyagi file:Miyagi-tome-cityhall.jpg, Tome City Hall is a Cities of Japan, city located in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 77,897 and a population density of 150 persons per km2 in 27,298 households. The total area of ...

and at age 4 to

Sendai is the capital Cities of Japan, city of Miyagi Prefecture and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. , the city had a population of 1,098,335 in 539,698 households, making it the List of cities in Japan, twelfth most populated city in Japan. ...

, the prefectural capital of Miyagi. He grew up there until finishing high school. Asano graduated from the faculty of law of

University of Tokyo The University of Tokyo (, abbreviated as in Japanese and UTokyo in English) is a public research university in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1877 as the nation's first modern university by the merger of several pre-westernisation era ins ...

in 1970 and joined the Ministry of Health and Welfare. From 1972 to 1974 he was an exchange student at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC, U of I, Illinois, or University of Illinois) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Champaign–Urbana metropolitan area, Illinois, United ...

, Graduate School of Political Science. He returned to Japan until 1978, when he was stationed at the Japanese embassy in Washington D.C. as second and first secretary. The position in Washington lasted until 1980. Back in Japan he worked a number of posts in the Ministry of Health and Welfare and in 1993 he was posted to

Miyagi Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Miyagi Prefecture has a population of 2,265,724 (1 August 2023) and has a geographic area of . Miyagi Prefecture borders Iwate Prefecture to the north, Akit ...

Political career

A few months after Asano arrived in Miyagi, the prefectural governor and the mayor of the city of

were indicted in bribery charges that shocked the population. With little time to prepare he decided to run for the prefecture where he had grown up. He won, and his grass-roots approach to campaigning would carry him two more terms to the position of governor. In 2005 he stepped aside and started a new career as an academic (now professor at

Keio University , abbreviated as or , is a private university, private research university located in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. It was originally established as a school for Rangaku, Western studies in 1858 in Edo. It was granted university status in 1920, becomi ...

and

Tohoku University is a public research university in Sendai, Miyagi, Japan. It is colloquially referred to as or . Established in 1907 as the third of the Imperial Universities, after the University of Tokyo and Kyoto University, it initially focused on sc ...

) and political TV commentator. Charismatic and good speaker he was encouraged to run for

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

governor in the 2007 Tokyo gubernatorial election. He faced

Shintaro Ishihara was a Japanese politician and writer, who served as the Governor of Tokyo Metropolis, Governor of Tokyo from 1999 to 2012. Being the former leader of the Far-right politics, radical right Sunrise Party, later merged with Toru Hashimoto's Japan ...

, who run for his third four-year term, and several minor candidates. With barely a couple of months to prepare Asano ended up second on that election.

References

http://www.asanoshiro.org/profile/index.htm (Asano Shiro official profile, in Japanese)

External links

Official Website
* https://www.flickr.com/photos/hasekura/sets/72157600013119936/ (Flickr set on Asano Campaign)
Asano Shiro / TV RANKING
{{DEFAULTSORT:Asano, Shiro 1948 births Governors of Miyagi Prefecture Academic staff of Keio University Living people Politicians from Miyagi Prefecture Tokyo gubernatorial candidates University of Tokyo alumni Academic staff of Tohoku University