Edited by Ashley J. Tellis and Michael Wills Country Studies Japan s Long Transition: The Politics of Recalibrating Grand Strategy Mike M. Mochizuki please note: For permission to reprint this chapter, please contact <publications@nbr.org>. To purchase the print volume Strategic Asia 2007 08: Domestic Political Change and Grand Strategy in which this chapter appears please visit <http://www.nbr.org> or contact <orders@nbr.org>. 1215 Fourth Avenue, Suite 1600 Seattle, Washington 98161 USA 206-632-7370
executive summary This chapter examines political developments in Japan and analyzes how domestic politics affects the country s strategic response to the changing international environment. main argument: Japan has moved toward a two-party system, and political leadership and the mobilization of public support matter more for governance than before. The prime minister and the cabinet secretariat together now wield greater executive power, and the bureaucratic state has been reformed to respond more effectively to security as well as economic challenges. Japan has become more willing to contribute to its alliance with the U.S. and various international security activities; anti-militarism norms and domestic politics, however, are likely to restrain Japan from using military force abroad. Japan s grand strategy will evolve incrementally rather than change dramatically. Japan will continue to balance between the security imperative of its alliance with the U.S. and the economic imperative of developing a favorable Asian environment for its long-term commercial interests. policy implications: The recent revival of Japan s economy and Japan s trend toward greater security and diplomatic activism are generally consistent with U.S. interests. The U.S. benefits from a Japan that is more capable, proactive, and influential in Asia. Although the U.S. and Japan converge strategically, there will continue to be tactical differences stemming from different priorities and perspectives. Such tactical differences require U.S. policymakers to remain attentive and not complacent about the alliance. Sensitivity to the risks of inflated expectations and entrapment as Japan recalibrates its grand strategy will prove useful to the U.S.
Japan Japan s Long Transition: The Politics of Recalibrating Grand Strategy Mike M. Mochizuki The changing international environment presents Japan with strategic challenges and opportunities in both the traditional security and economic realms. On the one hand various security uncertainties (e.g., North Korea s nuclear and missile programs, the rise of China, and international terrorism) are testing Japanese defense policies; on the other hand the end of the Cold War has also given Japan an opportunity to help create a more stable regional security order. Economic globalization provides Japan an opportunity to extend and deepen its overseas commercial reach but also challenges Japan to maintain its industrial and technological competitiveness. Although shaping Japan s calculations, these developments do not by themselves ordain the country s strategic response. As with any other major power, Japan s grand strategy is not determined entirely by its external environment, geographic position, and natural resource endowments. Domestic forces do play a pivotal role in the selection of a grand strategy. 1 Mike M. Mochizuki holds the Japan-U.S. Relations Chair in Memory of Gaston Sigur at the Elliott School of International Affairs in George Washington University. He can be reached at <mochizuk@ gwu.edu>. The author would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions on an earlier version of this chapter and Stephanie Renzi for her preparation of figures 1 and 2. He is also grateful to Ellis Krauss for sharing his knowledge of Japanese politics and for helping clarify the author s own thinking. 1 Richard Rosecrance and Arthur A. Stein, Beyond Realism: The Study of Grand Strategy, in The Domestic Bases of Grand Strategy, ed. Richard Rosecrance and Arthur A. Stein (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993), 5. In line with Rosecrance and Stein, this chapter considers grand strategy in terms of a state s adaptation of non-military as well as military resources to achieve security but also treats security in a broad sense to include both military and economic security. This broad conception of security, which has strong historical roots in Japan, is exemplified by the notion of comprehensive security.
70 Strategic Asia 2007 08 This chapter examines how domestic political developments after the end of the Cold War have affected Japan s grand strategy, which was institutionalized after World War II. The chapter argues that, despite significant changes in the external environment, domestic factors are steering Japan to incrementally recalibrate rather than radically alter its grand strategy. After briefly summarizing the main parameters and evolution of Japan s grand strategy during the Cold War era, the chapter analyzes change in political institutions and processes since the early 1990s by focusing on the following: party system and electoral politics, the bureaucratic state and executive power, and interest intermediation and civil society. The chapter then examines Japan s contemporary strategic discourse and the way this discourse is linked to elite politics and public opinion. The chapter next delineates the incremental policy responses in Japan that are emerging through this filter of domestic politics and discourse. The chapter concludes by drawing implications for U.S. policy toward Japan. Strategic Evolution: Toward a Regime Shift? Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru established the basic parameters of Japanese diplomacy during the U.S.-Japan peace talks after World War II. Yoshida resisted U.S. pressures to rearm Japan, insisting that his country must focus on economic reconstruction. He struck a shrewd strategic bargain with the United States whereby Japan would host U.S. forces and bases on Japanese territory and the United States would provide Japan with security protection and facilitate Japan s reintegration into the world economy. This bargain was later institutionalized into a grand strategy that scholars have called the Yoshida Doctrine. 2 Under this strategy Japan prohibited exercising the right of collective self-defense and restricted the use of force to what was minimally necessary to defend the home islands. While relying on the United States for security and deferring to Washington on major strategic issues, Japan concentrated on economic development by pursuing a neo-mercantilist foreign economic strategy. This strategy optimized access to export markets, natural resource supplies, and frontier technologies; used government-business cooperation to facilitate industrial and technological innovation at home; and minimized the domestic negative social effects of economic and industrial change. This grand strategy enjoyed sturdy domestic political foundations. The political stalemate and later modus vivendi between pacifist political 2 Kenneth B. Pyle, Japan Rising: The Resurgence of Japanese Power and Purpose (New York: Public Affairs, 2007), 210 77; and Richard J. Samuels, Securing Japan: Tokyo s Grand Strategy and the Future of East Asia (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007), 38 59.
Mochizuki Japan 71 forces on the left and realists and nationalists in the center and on the right constrained Japanese defense policy despite U.S. pressures. A tacit consensus between conservatives and progressives in favor of economic growth with social equity provided both the political cover and motivation for Japan s neo-mercantilist economic strategy. 3 The priority on economic development was reflected in the power of the economic ministries (e.g., the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of International Trade and Industry) and their extensive network of ancillary policy organizations. By contrast, the Defense Agency lacked full ministerial status and was colonized by bureaucrats from other ministries. Insofar as the alliance with the United States was the key pillar of defense policy, the Foreign Ministry often had more influence on security-related matters than the Defense Agency. As its position in the global economy rose and the international environment changed, Japan made adjustments to the original version of the Yoshida strategy. In response to U.S. requests for greater defense burden sharing during the Cold War, Japan enhanced bilateral cooperation for homeland defense and contributed more host-nation support for U.S. forces deployed in Japan. After the end of the Cold War, Japan began both to contribute to rear-area support on U.S.-led missions that were not directly related to defense of the home islands (in what was termed situations in areas surrounding Japan ) and to deploy defense forces in UN peacekeeping operations. 4 On the economic front, Japan gradually shifted its neo-mercantilist strategy to a more liberal direction by encouraging FDI, relaxing protectionist practices and policies, and pursuing moderate market-oriented reforms at home. Finally, Japan actively encouraged the development of regional multilateral dialogues and processes in both the economic and security realms in order to manage regional economic integration and to mitigate potential regional security dilemmas. In 1993 Japan experienced a political earthquake. Defections from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), a successful no-confidence motion in parliament, and a subsequent LDP loss of its Diet majority in a general election toppled the venerable conservative party from power for the first time since its formation in 1955. Many factors were behind the stresses that triggered this upheaval: discontent about corruption scandals and uninspirational leadership, security uncertainties after the end of the Cold War, international humiliation because of Japan s underappreciated 3 Terry MacDougall and Ikuo Kabashima, Japan: Democracy with Growth and Equity, in Driven By Growth: Political Change in the Asia-Pacific Region, ed. James W. Morley (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1999), 275 309. 4 Christopher W. Hughes, Japanese Military Modernization: In Search of a Normal Security Role, in Strategic Asia 2005 06: Military Modernization in an Era of Uncertainty, ed. Ashley J. Tellis and Michael Wills (Seattle: The National Bureau of Asian Research, 2005), 112 14.