[EAI Working Paper] A Closer Look at Japan 1. Is Japan Moving Towards Becoming a Military Power? Japan's Constitutional System and Signals of Defense Intent

Editor's Note

Is Japan Militarizing?

A state's perception and misperception of its defense intentions significantly impact national security and international relations. In the first installment of EAI's Working Paper series, "A Closer Look at Japan," Professor Atsushi Ishida of the University of Tokyo focuses on how changes in Japan's declared defense policies affect its neighbors' perceptions of its defense intentions. Since the cabinet decision on July 1, 2014, the Japanese government has interpreted the collective exercise of the right to self-defense as constitutionally permissible, expanding the scope of Self-Defense Forces (SDF) activities from situations of armed attack and existential crisis to situations of significant impact. In this working paper, the author outlines Japan's exclusively defense-oriented policy and examines how its passive and limited SDF activities have maintained consistency with Article 9 of the Constitution. Regarding the perceptions of neighboring countries, the author points to the security dilemma and alliance dilemma arising from Japan's entanglement anxieties due to the U.S.'s asymmetrical hub-and-spoke alliance structure and the divergence in interpretations of the SDF among nations. Finally, Professor Ishida emphasizes that the promise not to resort to the use of force, beyond the context of excluding unilateral changes to the status quo by force, is crucial for securing domestic accountability and the persuasiveness of its external policy declarations.

Introduction

Is Japan militarizing again, or not? The question itself arises because it is difficult for neighboring countries to accurately perceive a nation's defense intentions. And this question is important because misperceptions of intentions can lead to undesirable outcomes—'tragedies' that could have been avoided had they not occurred—among neighboring countries.

When the Japanese government explicitly or implicitly expresses its defense intentions, it utilizes the following means: the enactment of the Constitution, the enactment of laws (such as the Self-Defense Forces Act, the Defense Agency Establishment Law, etc.), the conclusion of treaties (multilateral San Francisco Peace Treaty, bilateral Basic Treaty on Relations between Japan and the Republic of Korea, etc.), the formation of alliances (conclusion and revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty), the exchange of notes (establishment of diplomatic relations through the Yoshida-Acheson Exchange of Notes, Kishi-Hatter Exchange of Notes, etc.), statements by the Prime Minister or Chief Cabinet Secretary (Murayama Statement, Miyazawa Statement, Gotoda Statement, Kono Statement, Abe Statement, etc.), joint statements by Prime Ministers (1960 Kishi-Eisenhower Joint Communiqué, 1969 Sato-Nixon Joint Communiqué, etc.), the conclusion of agreements (Okinawa Reversion Agreement, etc.), cabinet decisions (e.g., the "New Three Conditions for the Exercise of the Right to Self-Defense" in 2014), and replies in the National Diet (e.g., the "Old Three Conditions for the Exercise of the Right to Self-Defense" in 1954, the "Three Principles of Nuclear Unarmament" in 1967), among others. This circuitry all serves as signals influencing the perceptions of not only adversarial nations but also friendly nations regarding the country's defense intentions, and the persuasiveness of the signals sent and received significantly impacts national security.

This paper will first examine Japan's 'exclusively defense-oriented posture' as a declared policy under the Abe Shinzo administration. It will then historically review what the 'exclusively defense-oriented posture' policy has entailed since Japan's rearmament in 1954, focusing on the development of Japan's defense capabilities.

Next, it will consider how the hub-and-spoke alliance structure that the United States has built in the Western Pacific relates to Japan's exclusively defense-oriented posture. It will compare and contrast how the security structure in the Western Pacific differs from that in the North Atlantic.

Furthermore, it will confirm the basic knowledge of international politics that divergent interpretations of the SDF among nations create international dilemmas (security dilemmas and alliance dilemmas), and examine the implications of the 2014 limited exercise of collective self-defense. Finally, it will consider how domestic accountability can lend persuasiveness to a government's declared policies.

※ Please check the attached file above for the full text of this working paper.

■ Author: Atsushi Ishida (石田淳)_Professor, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo. Received B.A. and M.A. in Political Science from The University of Tokyo and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. Previously served as a professor at the Faculty of Law, Tokyo Metropolitan University, and an associate professor at the Institute of Social Science, The University of Tokyo, before assuming his current position as a professor at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo. He lectures on international political economy, game theory, quantitative analysis, text analysis, survey experiments, international institutions, global governance, international relations theory, political economy analysis, and international political economy. His major publications include "Japan's International Relations Theory: Between Imported Theory and Originality" (co-authored, 2016), "International Politics" (co-authored, 2013), and "Lectures on International Politics" (co-authored, 2004).

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Attachment: [Working Paper]A Closer Look at Japan 1_Atsushi Ishida.pdf

Attachment: 日本語_石田淳.pdf