YAMADA Hiroshi
| YAMADA Hiroshi |
| [Belonging・Position] | Area Studies Center |
| [Research Field] | Cambodian Politics, Comparative Politics |
| [email] |
Hiroshi_Yamada 
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| researchmap | Profile Information (Research history, education, papers & publications) |
| Japanese page |
Previous research
I began working on Cambodian politics in earnest when I entered a master's program in 2000, and I spent two and a half years studying in the country during my graduate studies. Building on recurrent fieldwork sustained over more than two decades, I have examined empirically how the Cambodian People's Party has maintained and consolidated its rule over nearly half a century. Guided by the question of why and how authoritarian regimes endure, I use the methods of comparative politics to analyze a paradox: democratic institutions—political parties, elections, and parliaments—in fact contribute to sustaining and strengthening authoritarian rule. Alongside this research, I have been continuously engaged in practice, including election observation and support for electoral reform. After eleven years as a full-time faculty member at a private university, I joined the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE-JETRO) in October 2026.
Current research projects
My current work centers on the hereditary succession from the Hun Sen government to that of his son, Hun Manet, and on how this transition has reshaped the regime. My main concern is how the generational turnover in the leadership has rearranged the distribution of patronage within the party and the ways in which legitimacy is secured, and how these changes bear on the maintenance and consolidation of the Cambodian People's Party's rule. I have also begun research on transnational repression—the extension of authoritarian control across borders to dissidents living abroad—examining both the methods particular to the Cambodian case and the institutional gaps that make them effective in host countries, including Japan. In addition, I take part in a collaborative project with specialists on other Southeast Asian countries and on China that compares the region's authoritarian turn and the role of Chinese influence. Connecting domestic regime dynamics with their cross-border extensions, I aim to explain how the Cambodian People's Party sustains its rule.
Membership of Academic Societies
Japan Association for Comparative Politics, Japan Society for Southeast Asian Studies, The Japan Association of International Relations, Japanese Political Science Association
Related information
For one year from September 2022, while holding my university post, I was invited to the Institute of Developing Economies as a domestic visiting research fellow. During this period I served as project leader of the IDE-JETRO timely research project "Cambodia's 2023 National Assembly Elections: Collective Power Succession for the Post-Hun Sen Era."
- The Strengthening of Hun Sen's Rule: Cambodia's 2023 National Assembly Elections and the Birth of the Hereditary Regime (ed., March 2024) (in Japanese)