Richard C. Kagan

Richard. C. Kagan (born June 24, 1938, in North Hollywood, California, of Jewish immigrant parents from the Ukraine and Poland) is an American professor of East Asian history and a political activist. His undergraduate and master's degrees were awarded from the University of California Berkeley. He received his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1969. For over three decades (1973-2005) he taught East Asian history at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, and currently holds the rank of Professor Emeritus. Kagan was also a founding member of the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars (CCAS) and sat on the editorial board of its peer-reviewed quarterly journal, the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars (BCAS), with Noam Chomsky, Herbert Bix, Mark Selden, John W. Dower, and other noted scholars. A provocative study of the origin of the CCAS appears in a study by Fabio Lanza (2016) entitled America’s Asia? Revolution, Scholarship, and Asian Studies. In 2001, the BCAS changed its name to Critical Asian Studies.

Taiwan independence

Kagan's unpublished PhD dissertation on Chen Duxiu 陳獨秀 and Chinese Trotskyism provides an iconoclastic view of culture, revolution and polity in early 20th century China. The work was among the first to reference Antonio Gramsci's theoretical contributions to comprehending the political economy of revolutionary China. Kagan lived in and studied Chinese language in the Republic of China (Taiwan) from 1965 to 1967, and this initial experience served as the springboard for a lifelong commitment to furthering civil and political rights in Taiwan. Among Kagan's published materials on Taiwan are an introduction to Ross Y. Koen's book The China Lobby in American Politics (1974), and two seminal biographies of Taiwanese leaders Lee Deng-hui and Chen Shui-bian. Kagan's first trip to the People's Republic of China was in January 1975, and since then he has traveled frequently to both mainland China and Taiwan. Kagan testified before the House Sub-Committee on Foreign Affairs in 1980 regarding human rights in Taiwan.

Selected works

• Chan, F. Gilbert (1976), with contribution by Kagan, Richard. C. China in the 1920s: Nationalism and Revolution (A History of Modern China).
• Kagan, Richard C. (1972). Ch'en Tu-Hsiu's Unfinished Autobiography. The China Quarterly, Vol. 50, April 1972, pp. 295-314.
• Kagan, Richard C. (2000). Chen Shui-bian: Building a Community and a Nation. Paperback 296 pages. Published by Asia-Pacific Academic Exchange Program.
• Kagan, Richard C. (2007). Taiwan's Statesman: Lee Teng-hui and Democracy in Asia. Hardcover 240 pages. Naval Institute Press.
• Kagan, Richard C. (1980). Presentation to the House Sub-Committee of Foreign Affairs
• Kagan, Richard C. (1969). PhD Dissertation, Univ. of Pennsylvania. The Chinese Trotskyist Movement and Ch’en Tu-Hsiu: Culture, Revolution and Polity, with an appended translation of Ch’en Tu-hsiu’s Autobiography. 243 pages.
• Kin-ming Liu, editor (2012). My First Trip to China: Scholars, Diplomats and Journalists Reflect on their First Encounters with China. A collection of stories by seminal scholars about their first encounters with China. Kagan’s contribution is entitled “Multiple Chinas, Multiple Americas.”
• Koen, Ross Y., with Introduction by Richard C. Kagan (1974). The China Lobby in American Politics.
• If the United States intends to focus more on Asia, Taiwan's a good place to start, Minnesota Public Radio News. Mprnews.org. Retrieved 2016-03-03.

References