Japanese Foreign Policy at the Crossroads

Japanese Foreign Policy at the Crossroads
Author: Yutaka Kawashima
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 176
Release: 2003-10-16
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0815796153

The post–World War II paradigm that ensured security and prosperity for the Japanese people has lost much of its effectiveness. The current generation has become increasingly resentful of the prolonged economic stagnation and feels a sense of drift and uncertainty about the future of Japan's foreign policy. In J apanese Foreign Policy at the Crossroads, Yutaka Kawashima clarifies some of the defining parameters of Japan's past foreign policy and examines the challenges it currently faces, including the quagmire on the Korean Peninsula, the future of the U.S.-Japan alliance, the management of Japan-China relations, and Japan's relation with Southeast Asia. Kawashima—who, as vice minister of foreign affairs, was Japan's highest-ranking foreign service official—cautions Japan against attempts to ensure its own security and well-being outside of an international framework. He believes it is crucial that Japan work with as many like-minded countries as possible to construct a regional and international order based on shared interests and shared values. In an era of globalization, he cautions, such efforts will be crucial to maintaining global world order and ensuring civilized interaction among all states.

Japan’s Security Renaissance

Japan’s Security Renaissance
Author: Andrew L. Oros
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2017-03-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 0231542593

For decades after World War II, Japan chose to focus on soft power and economic diplomacy alongside a close alliance with the United States, eschewing a potential leadership role in regional and global security. Since the end of the Cold War, and especially since the rise of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japan's military capabilities have resurged. In this analysis of Japan's changing military policy, Andrew L. Oros shows how a gradual awakening to new security challenges has culminated in the multifaceted "security renaissance" of the past decade. Despite openness to new approaches, however, three historical legacies—contested memories of the Pacific War and Imperial Japan, postwar anti-militarist convictions, and an unequal relationship with the United States—play an outsized role. In Japan's Security Renaissance Oros argues that Japan's future security policies will continue to be shaped by these legacies, which Japanese leaders have struggled to address. He argues that claims of rising nationalism in Japan are overstated, but there has been a discernable shift favoring the conservative Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party. Bringing together Japanese domestic politics with the broader geopolitical landscape of East Asia and the world, Japan's Security Renaissance provides guidance on this century's emerging international dynamics.

Japan's Foreign and Security Policy in the Twenty First Century

Japan's Foreign and Security Policy in the Twenty First Century
Author: William Fujii
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
Total Pages: 89
Release: 2009-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3640347382

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2008 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Other States, grade: 72% - First Class Honours, University of Greenwich, language: English, abstract: This paper argues that because of the new reality of the twenty-first century where the United States is beginning to decline, China is rising and North Korea has acquired nuclear capabilities, Japan may need to rethink its foreign and security policy which are deeply anchored on its alliance with Washington. In the light of these new challenges, this paper considers potential problems and constrains in Tokyo's current strategy and suggests it may not be in Japan's best interest to continue pursuing them. Finally, alternatives to Japan's security policy are considered and this paper concludes that no single alternative could replace the U.S.-Japan alliance as an effective security policy in the foreseeable future. Rather, all the alternatives pursued together would potentially lead to an efficacious option, consequently providing Japan's foreign policy with greater independence from the United States.

The Japan-U.S. Alliance

The Japan-U.S. Alliance
Author: Nishihara Masashi
Publisher:
Total Pages: 200
Release: 2000
Genre: Political Science
ISBN:

For the foreseeable future, the alliance with the United States will remain the cornerstone of Japan's security. The Japan-U.S. alliance is also arguably the most important factor in the stability of East Asia. While this alliance is thought to rest on a firm foundation, it is in reality constantly affected by a number of elements, small and large. Domestic public opinion and politics, international events and their repercussions, tensions between other countries, and cultural outlook--all these things and more influence the health of the alliance. In this collection of essays, six Japanese political scientists examine how the differences as well as the similarities in policies between the two alliance partners toward various issues and countries may affect the solidarity of the alliance and, hence, influence the stability of the Asia Pacific region at large. Themes covered by these young scholars--all of whom were born after World War II--include the two countries' strategies toward armed non-state actors, the security of Southeast Asia as a common agenda in the alliance, the Taiwan issue in Sino-Japanese relations, the impact of a reunified Korea on the security agreements between Japan and the United States and between South Korea and the United States, economic sanctions against Myanmar, and the overall framework of the Japan-U.S. alliance. As the first such collection of analysis and opinion on this topic in English by Japan's intellectual leaders of tomorrow, this volume makes accessible to readers current thinking in Japan on the alliance that is so important to both countries.

Japan's Aging Peace

Japan's Aging Peace
Author: Tom Phuong Le
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 388
Release: 2021-06-22
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231553285

Since the end of World War II, Japan has not sought to remilitarize, and its postwar constitution commits to renouncing aggressive warfare. Yet many inside and outside Japan have asked whether the country should or will return to commanding armed forces amid an increasingly challenging regional and global context and as domestic politics have shifted in favor of demonstrations of national strength. Tom Phuong Le offers a novel explanation of Japan’s reluctance to remilitarize that foregrounds the relationship between demographics and security. Japan’s Aging Peace demonstrates how changing perceptions of security across generations have culminated in a culture of antimilitarism that constrains the government’s efforts to pursue a more martial foreign policy. Le challenges a simple opposition between militarism and pacifism, arguing that Japanese security discourse should be understood in terms of “multiple militarisms,” which can legitimate choices such as the mobilization of the Japan Self-Defense Forces for peacekeeping operations and humanitarian relief missions. Le highlights how factors that are not typically linked to security policy, such as aging and declining populations and gender inequality, have played crucial roles. He contends that the case of Japan challenges the presumption in international relations scholarship that states must pursue the use of force or be punished, showing how widespread normative beliefs have restrained Japanese policy makers. Drawing on interviews with policy makers, military personnel, atomic bomb survivors, museum coordinators, grassroots activists, and other stakeholders, as well as analysis of peace museums and social movements, Japan’s Aging Peace provides new insights for scholars of Asian politics, international relations, and Japanese foreign policy.

Japan’s Reluctant Realism

Japan’s Reluctant Realism
Author: M. Green
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 356
Release: 2001-05-17
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 031229980X

In Japan's Reluctant Realism , Michael J. Green examines the adjustments of Japanese foreign policy in the decade since the end of the Cold War. Green presents case studies of China, the Korean peninsula, Russia and Central Asia, Southeast Asia, the international financial institutions, and multilateral forums (the United Nations, APEC, and the ARF). In each of these studies, Green considers Japanese objectives; the effectiveness of Japanese diplomacy in achieving those objectives; the domestic and exogenous pressures on policy-making; the degree of convergence or divergence with the United States in both strategy and implementation; and lessons for more effective US - Japan diplomatic cooperation in the future. As Green notes, its bilateral relationship with the United States is at the heart of Japan's foreign policy initiatives, and Japan therefore conducts foreign policy with one eye carefully on Washington. However, Green argues, it is time to recognize Japan as an independent actor in Northeast Asia, and to assess Japanese foreign policy in its own terms.

Japan's Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century

Japan's Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century
Author: Lam Peng Er
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2020-03-09
Genre: History
ISBN: 1498587968

This edited collection analyzes the innovative changes in Japan’s foreign policy. Pursuing new relationships with South Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe, Japanese initiatives include regional peace-building and human security activities, Asian multilateralism, and the Indo-Pacific concept. This collection focuses on these evolving international relationships through Japan’s unique approach to political change and continuity.

Japan's International Relations

Japan's International Relations
Author: Glenn D. Hook
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 680
Release: 2013-01-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1134328052

The new edition of this comprehensive and user-friendly textbook provides a single volume resource for all those studying Japan's international relations.

American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the 21st Century

American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the 21st Century
Author: David C. Kang
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 229
Release: 2017-10-26
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 110716723X

David C. Kang tells an often overlooked story about East Asia's 'comprehensive security', arguing that American policy towards Asia should be based on economic and diplomatic initiatives rather than military strength.

Choose and Focus

Choose and Focus
Author: Ulrike Schaede
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2011-01-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0801460557

Between 2002 and 2008, Japan's economy saw constant expansion, a record among the world's advanced economies and Japan's longest period of economic growth since World War II. This remarkable achievement came about because of a transformation of Japanese business practices. This transformation was guided by strategies that enabled Japan's leading corporations, previously diversified to an exceptionally high degree, to become leaner, more nimble, and more competitive at home and in the global economy. In Choose and Focus, the first in-depth account of this strategic inflection point in Japanese business, Ulrike Schaede argues that the emerging practices and attitudes have created a New Japan. Drawing on profiles of several corporations, including Panasonic, Takeda and Astellas, Softbank, kakaku.com, and SBI E*Trade, Schaede explains how the fundamental principles of Japan's economy have been overturned. "Choose and focus" strategies, whereby corporations concentrate on core areas and spin off unrelated businesses, have completely altered the strategic logic of Japan's previous industrial architecture. These surprisingly aggressive moves, Schaede finds, have created new market opportunities for start-up enterprises and foreign investors, as well as a wave of mergers, acquisitions, and hostile takeovers that have shaken Japanese companies out of complacency. Unlike the advances made by Japanese firms in the 1970s and 1980s, the current transformation is taking root in component and materials industries rather than in consumer products. Because of the relative obscurity of the changes and the overshadowing story of China's ascent, the Japanese corporate revolution has gone largely unnoticed among Western observers. Choose and Focus is required reading for anyone doing business in Japan or trying to understand how contemporary Japanese business works and how Japanese corporations have reinvented themselves to face the challenges—and realize the opportunities—of the 21st century.