The Strategic Communications Education and Research Unit (SCERU) and the Graduate School of Public Policy of the University of Tokyo (GraSPP) are pleased to invite you to the seminar as detailed below:

DATE & TIME:
Tuesday 29 July 2025 5:15 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. (JST)
* The venue will open at 5:00 p.m.

VENUE:
Ito International Research Center (Gallery 1/B1F), Hongo campus, the University of Tokyo
*Please note that this event will be held on-site only.

For security reasons, please bring your ID with you to enter the venue.

REGISTRATION:
Please register here.

LANGUAGE:
English

SYNOPSIS:
The recent emergence of Strategic Communications as a distinct form of political and geopolitical influence has caught the attention of academics and practitioners alike. Yet its key distinguishing feature––a grounding in liberal democratic values and the fundamental freedoms of the individual––have exposed a number of vulnerabilities.

From outside it is under attack from authoritarian and totalitarian states who seek the demise of liberal democracy.

At the same time, it finds itself undermined from within by political libertarians, who question the very nature of individual freedoms, acting in a convergence with techno-libertarians for whom the state is no longer the defining agent of power.

Meanwhile, dramatic advances in Artificial Intelligence and digital technologies and their ability to manufacture and falsify truth present a technological, if not existential threat to Strategic Communications and its claim to being built on evidence-based truth-telling.

SPEAKER:
Dr. Neville Bolt, Founder & Director, Sympodium Institute for Strategic Communications
Editor-in-Chief, Defence Strategic Communications, NATO Strategic Communications COE

SPEAKER’S BIO:
Dr Neville Bolt is the Founder and Director of the Sympodium Institute for Strategic Communications, following two decades as Director of the King’s Centre for Strategic Communications (KCSC) and Reader in Strategic Communications at King’s College London. He is Editor-in-Chief of Defence Strategic Communications, NATO’s peer reviewed academic journal, and holds a Visiting Professorship at the University of Tokyo and Visiting Fellowship at St Edmund’s College, Cambridge.
Formerly a BBC and CBC journalist, Dr Bolt produced award-winning documentaries from global conflict zones and led landmark media events such as Amnesty International’s Secret Policeman’s Ball, the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute, and LENNON (co-produced with Yoko Ono).
He later advised international institutions including the United Nations, UEFA, and the Spanish Government, and played a key role in rebranding the UK Labour Party in the early days of New Labour.
He is a graduate of the University of Oxford and holds a PhD from King’s College London where his research focused on insurgent communications and a new theory of the Propaganda of the Deed. His books include the award-winning The Violent Image (Columbia University Press/Oxford University Press), Unmapping the 21st Century (Bristol University Press), with a forthcoming title What is Strategic Communications: Truth, Lies & The Human Condition.

* This session will be chaired by Professor Chiyuki AOI, SCERU, GraSPP at the University of Tokyo.