In Memoriam: Professor Nakano Ari

IN LIEU OF AN OBITUARY

Professor Nakano Ari (中野亜里) of the Department of Political Science at Daito Bunka University passed away at 14:40 on January 9, 2021, after nearly three months battling a serious illness. Her sudden passing has come as a shock and a deep sadness to her family, friends, colleagues, students, and the research community — and especially to members of the Vietnamese Association in Japan, who had been guided and supported by her over many years. Before becoming a professor, she was already a renowned scholar of Vietnam, with research spanning the country’s political, economic, and social conditions. She was one of the rare Japanese scholars who openly analyzed the darker, hidden corners of Vietnamese society in public — driven by a wish to improve conditions in a one-party authoritarian state she had been concerned about since her student days. By a fortunate connection, the Association’s monthly newsletter had the honor of writing a review (image attached) of her landmark human-rights study, ベトナムの人権 — 多元的民主化の可能性 (Human Rights in Vietnam and the Possibility of Pluralist Democratization), published in April 2009. The book pulls together data and information she gathered herself over many years — sometimes facing direct threats to her personal safety from the Communist authorities during fieldwork. “It is the Vietnamese people themselves who must decide their political system. Vietnam’s leaders need to re-examine history, acknowledge mistakes in past policies, and learn to reconcile with those once treated as enemies. For that reason, there can be no avoiding an honest look at the human-rights situation.” — That is how this 430-page work concludes. Over a decade has passed since the book was published. Human rights remain a long-deferred yearning for every Vietnamese, and the wish for democratization has yet to be realized — and now the author herself has departed for that eternal place. With deep sorrow and gratitude, we pray for her soul to rest in peace.

Every tunnel must, at some point, meet the light.

When every Vietnamese citizen can decide their own political system for themselves, that will be the moment our entire people will once again give thanks for the heartfelt words of this scholar’s life work.

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