JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION

OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS： A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

TAKAHIKO TANAKA

Reprinted from
HITOTSUBASHI JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS
Special Issue June 1994

The Hitotsubashi Academy

Hitotsubashi University
Kunitachi, Tokyo
Japan
Hitotsubashi Journal of Law and Politics Special Issue (1994), pp. 61-9 〇. © The Hitotsubashi Academy

JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION

OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS: A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

TAKAHIKO TANAKA

Introduction

At the end of the 1980s, world politics experienced a dramatic change. There seems to be
consensus among students of international studies that the cold war was finally over. Faced with
this international political change, however, a divergence as to how to interpret the end of the cold
war have emerged recently.
Some argue that the end of the cold war only indicated a shift of the balance of power after the
collapse of the bipolar system. With rather unrealistically nostalgic feelings, many American
political scientists and historians look back upon the cold war as 'the Long Peace? 1 The post-cold
war world is, according to them, precarious because a multipolar system is less stable than a bipolar
one.2
One can find a different contention, with the same kind of basic tone as the abovementioned,
in discussions within the so-called neo-realist school. They suggest that not only the collapse of the
cold war, but also the decline of the United States has destabilized international politics. According
to their contentions, the stability of the world depends, upon the existence of a hegomon, and the
decline of the hegemon will lead to a violent restructuring of the existing order. 3 4
The neo-realists hold the same views as the 'cold-war-nostalgists' in the sense that they insist
that the nature of international politics has never been fundamentally transformed during the cold
war era and that the cold war was a favourable period of power politics.
On the other hand, the end of the cold war is regarded by some other scholars as an indication
of an on-going fundamental transformation developing at a deeper level of the international
political structure. The main elements of their discussion can be summarized according to the ideal
type of 'complex interdependence5 devised by Robert 〇, Keohane

1 For example, John Louis Gaddis, THE LONG PEACE: Inquiries into the Hixtoiy of lhe Cold War (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 198?).
2 See Gaddis, op. cit., Kenneth Waltz, THEOR Y OF INTERNA TIONA L POLITICS (New York: McGraV(-
Hill Inc., 1979). John Measheimer, *Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War/ in THE COLD WAR
AND AFTER： Prospects for Peace, edited bv Sean M. Lynn-Jones (Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1991), pp. J42-193.
'
3 For example, Robert Gilpin, WAR AND CHANGE IN WORLD POLITICS (Cambridge: Cambridge
4University Press, )981).
62 HITOTSUBASHI JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June-
5
and Joseph 8. Nye Jr.
Keohane and Nye suggest that at least three characteristics can be perceived. First, multiple
channels connecting nation-states and societies, in addition to formal interstates ties, have emerged
as significant variables in present world politics. These included both transgovernmental and
transnational channels. In other words, the nation-state has gradually ceased to be a coherent and
closed system, and state sovereignty has been definitely eroded. Second, the hierarchy among issues
of interstate relations has become steadily ambiguous, and military security does not consistently
dominate the agenda of interstate relations. Under these circumstances, what used to be called
'national interest* has been dissolved into only a collection of sub-national interests. It has become
very difficult to define national interest. Finally, related to the abovementioned elements, the
significance and effectiveness of military power to solve international conflicts, in particular, those
on economic issues, have been questioned.
Keohane and Nye assume that growth of interdependence which was recognized at the latest in
the late 1960s is one of the most important background factors behind the transformation. Based
upon the increasing transactional flows between nations-states and societies, interdependence has
developed. Then, the costs imposed on the nations which sever the interdependent ties has become
intolerable for themselves. Another background factor is the slackening of the cold war tension and
sense of threat, generated by detente and the prevailing perception of nuclear stalemeat. Military
power has now become less relevant as a measure to solve international conflicts.
Observing the development of rule of the games in present international political situations, it
seems plausible to say that the world is still in transition from an old structure to a new one. As
Stanley Hoffmann suggests, at least two different games co-exist: the strategic-diplomatic
chessboard and the game of economic interdependence. 6 7 This being the case, the future form of
world politics may depend upon which rule is to become prevailing and how to construct more
stable and peaceful rules based upon the management of interlocking and conflicting rules.
This essay intends to present descriptive hypotheses with regard to historical patterns of
Japan's reaction to the transformation of the international system since her re-entry into
international politics at the time of the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Here, the evolution of Japanese
external behaviour since then is regarded as a series of her reactions to rule of the games perceived
by Japan's political and diplomatic leaders as prevailing in the international environment. How did
they define Japan's international surrounding? Is there any clear pattern of Japan's reactions or
adaptation to its international system and its change? Does one find any historical factors
influencing Japan's external behaviour? The main purpose of this essay is to attempt to find some
tentative answers to these ques-

5 Keohane and Nye picked out the main elements of "Realist assumptions"* in their book and placed the complex
interdependence as the opposite pole of the realist assumption. The present world is, according to them, located
somewhere between the two models. Although the summarization by Keohane of the realist framework of analysis was
criticized from various quarters, their hypothesis regarding the character
6ization of the present world politics seems relevant still.
7 For detailed discussion, see Stanley Hofmann, PRIMACY OR WORLD ORDER: American Foreign Policy since the
Cold War, (New York: McGiaw・Hill Book Company, 1978), esp, pp. 122-31.
 J 994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 63

lions.
This essay is based on at least the following two basic assumptions. The first is that post-
WWII world politics has been transformed as Nye and Keohane suggest. During this period, this
essay presumes, Japan has been trying, successfully or not, to escape from some structural shackle
imposed by the cold war system and her historical experiences, and to adapt herself to the world
political process which seems to be transformed into the world of complex interdependence. Then,
it will be argued that the international frictions and criticisms which Japan now faces is a reflection
of the delay and slowness of her adjustment to the new reality of the world.
The second basic assumption is related to an assumption about the historical development of
power politics. This historical process may be characterized as a series of struggles between the
dynamism of power politics and efforts to tame it. Broadly speaking, the game of power politics
seems to have been altering its form since the starting point of international politics, that is, the
Peace of Westphalia. This essay assumes that the form of power political game has transformed by
passing through the following five phases. The first phase was approximately from the Thirty Years
War to the Westphalian Peace in 1648. In this phase, power politics took the most primitive form in
that power struggles were closely, connected with the ideological structure of 'feind und freund?
The distinction of enemy and friend was based upon the distinction between the two branches of
Christianity. But in the middle of the Thirty Years War, power struggles had been gradually
detached from the rigid ideological cleavage.
The second phase of power politics was from the middle of the 17th century to the beginning
of the 19th century when the Vienna System was established. During this period, the major
European states conducted power politics by following the principal behavioural creed of 'balance
of power., The distinction between friend and foe was based on the perception and quasi-calculation
of national power. Moreover, there were no institutionalized constraints on an instable balance of
power.
After rhe Congress of Vienna, the European powers tried to manage, though loosely, the
balance of power through a series of congress diplomacy. The relative stability called 'the Concert
of Europe' appeared in this period. This was the third phase of power politics, namely, managed
balance of power.
European leaders, however, mismanaged the balance of power and finally the first world war
broke out. At the beginning of the 20th century and during the war, the behavioural pattern of
power politics born in Europe extended to non-European powers: the United States and Japan.
After the first world war, which was the very first total war in real terms, the political process
of power politics in Europe started to change its basic form and entered into the fourth phase of
power politics. In this phase, European leaders began to perceive the futility of power politics and
attempted to adopt new diplomatic principles. The League of Nations was an example of
embodiment of this perception, even though its original idea was not fully embodied, The League
was designed to restrain power struggles among nation-states through its covenant and by
establishing permanent institutions. It had, however, a crucial defect: it provided no effective
security institution such as a collective security system incorporating all member powers. As a
result, European powers conducted a game of power politics by making alliances for their own
security and to contain the resurgence of
64 HITOTSUBASHI JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June-

the German menace. French efforts to build up an anti-German coalition with

the Little Entente states was one of the examples. The fourth phase can be,
therefore, called 'power politics under imperfect constraints.*
The lack of the effective constraints on power politics led to the outbreak of the second world
war in 1939. After the first world war, the antipathy against war and power politics started to
penetrate the societies of the major victorious European powers particularly, France and Great
Britain. The appeasement policy adopted by them in the 1930s indicated, these sentiments. But
again, the inherent instability of the balance of power mechanism 8* overwhelmed the perception of
the futility of power politics. The devastation of European countries as a results of the second world
war inevitably intensified the sense of futility of power political game among the western European
powers.
After the second world war, the western European states attempted to go beyond power
politics and to establish the so-called 'no-war community 9,9 through regional integration. The
European Coal and Steel Community (hereafter, cited as ECSC) was a landmark of this attempt.
One of the original motivations embraced by the founders of ECSC was to end the historical
Franco-German rivalry. Of importance is the fact that for that purpose, they selected ways to detach
themselves from the game of power politics itself. This is the fifth and, probably, the last phase of
the European power politics: 'renunciation of power politics/
Whereas the western European political scene showed such a dramatic transformation of rule
of the games, the overall global political process took an atavistic course of power politics: the cold
war. The main protagonists of the cold war were, needless to say, the Soviet Union and the United
States, both of whom were amateurs in the game of power politics.
The tragedy for the people of the post-WWII period was that these superpowers played the
power political game which could be categorized as being in the first phase of the evolution of
power politics. As Raymond Aron and Hans J. Morgenthau pointed out, these superpowers were
inexperienced players in the game of power politics. 10 The cold war power politics between the two
superpowers lacked the flexibility represented by the recurring alteration of feind-und-freund
coalitions or the preservation of di pl omatic contacts and negotiations with foes, which had been
seen in the 19th century European power politics. The superpowers based almost their entire
foreign policy upon the ideological distinction of enemy and friends. On this basis, they threatened
each other by intensively building up their nuclear arsenals.
The European powers learned lessons from successve wars fought by themselves and finally
moved to depart from the power politics game at least among western European countries. Indeed,
they were the essential components of the Western bloc of the cold war.

8 For inescapable instability of the balance of power mechanism, see Hans J. Morgenthau, POLITICS AMONG
NATION: the Struggle for Power and Peace, (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1978, the fifth revised edition) chapter 10, esp.
p. 217.
9 For the deEnition of no-war community, Karl W. Deutsch, POLITICAL COMMUNITY AT THE
INTERNATIONAL LEVEL: Problems of Definition and Measurement, (New York: Doubleday & Com- panu, Inc., 1954),
p. 41.
10「 Motgenthau, op. cit., p. 539. Raymond Aron, PEACE AND WAR: A Theory of Inlet-national Relations, translated
from the French by Richrad Howard and Annette Baker Fox, (New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1966), p. 3.
 J 994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 65

but they were also secondary players of cold war power politics. Even so, their
conducts during the cold war era were quite different from the superpowers'
immature confrontation. During the cold war period, the western European states
were willing to improve their trade ties and even political relations with the Soviet
Union and other communist countries including Communist China. In the 1950s,
most of the significant initiatives in promoting East- West detente were taken by
the western European states, It is not too much to say that their long and niature
experience of power politics and their present inner-European political mechanism
of 'no-war community, may have reflected on their flexible attitudes toward their
archenemy in the cold war era.
Ironically, the superpowers were deprived of the most eflective opportunity to learn the
lessons which European powers had learnt from their experiences of the successive wars. Because
of the emergence of nuclear weapons, and, because of the improbability of major wars involving
both of the superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States could not learn the same lessons as
the Europeans did from the devastation of war, Then, was there no opportunity for them to learn the
futility of power politics?
Perhaps, the termination of the cold war may provide us an answer. Arguably, the Soviet
Union took the initiative in ending the cold war during the Gorbachev period. It is argued that the
Russian initiative reflected Gorbachev's recognition of the collapse of the domestic economy which
had been under a heavy burden due to the arms race with the United States. In other words, if the
end of the cold war was really induced by that recognition, it can be said that the Russians finally
perceived the futility of continuing the power political game with the Americans. The western
European states had learnt the unmanageability of power politics from the devastation and costs
caused by recurring wars, the Russians from the domestic economic collapse caused by the cold
war.
Turning to beliavioural patterns of Japan in international politics since the middle of the 19th
century, her peculiarity of historical experience with power politics seems to have a certain
explanatory power. Needless to say, Japan was a latecomer to the power politics. Did this fact affect
her international behaviour? Moreover, during the cold war period, whereas no lhot war' took place
in the European theater of the cold war, the Korean war and the Vietnam war were waged in Asia.
Did this dilTerence not affect Japan's behaviour? This perspective will be set in the later discussion.
I must confess that it must be rather too ambitious to overview, in a short essay like this, the
historical development of Japan's international behaviour of more than one hundred years. It is,
however, now necessary to try to comprehend the behavioural pattern of Japan from such a macro
perspective. For Japan's past and contemporary external behaviour can be assumed to have been
affected by her historical experience in world politics. Moreover, it is significant, I believe, to
clarify some patterns of Japanese behaviour in order to prescribe how Japan should conduct itself in
the present transitional period of the world, and how other countries should treat her. This essay is
intended to oiler a series of historical and descriptive hypotheses for the abovementioned purposes.
 66 HITOTSLfaASHl JOURNAL Of LAW AND POLITICS [June

Modernization of Japan and Power Politics in East Asia

in the 19th Century

Shortly before the Meiji Restoration in 1868, Japan departed from her 200-year-isola- tion and
re-entered international society. At the moment of her re-entry, Japanese^politicaL and diplomatic
leaders were immediately faced with the far eastern international political system in which
European powers were struggling for imperialist interests over the Manchii dynasty. The most
crucial task for Japan as a latecomer was to modernize herself in order to protect herself from the
threat of the Western powers, and to catch up with them. For this purpose, the Meiji government
adopted the policy of rapid industrialization: the so- called 'shokusan kogyo seisaku* (policy for
growth of production and industrialization). At the same time, the government sought to amend her
unequal treaty relations concluded, with European powers by the Edo government shortly before
the Restoration. For this purpose, the Japanese government vigorously strived to restructure the
domestic political system by adopting a western European model, that is, the establishment of a
constitutional government,
Thus, Meiji Japan was eager to be recognized by the Western powers as a legitimate actor in
the existing international society with sufficient power and an adequate domestic political system.
In fact, Japan under the Tokugawa Shogunate was not a nation-state in European terms. The
Tokugawa Japan was a loose confederation of many small states of warlords with accepting the
ShogunaZe's political, economic, and military control, with a considerable degree of autonomy. The
modernization of Japan was also aimed at the unification of Japan to establish a nation-state based
on the European model.
Japanese leaders had, however, to answer the question as to which European state was the
most suitable model for Japan, The answer was Germany under Otto von Bismarck. The Japanese
leaders such as Iwakura Tomoni observed that Bismarckian Germany, also as a latecomer as a
nation-state, was in a position similar to Japan and was a successful example in international
politics. It is well known that the Meiji government made the Japanese Imperial constitution
modelled after the Prussian constitution.
Another important task for Japanese leaders was to grasp the nature of the rules of the game
played in the international political system in which Japan had just entered and to adjust their
external behaviour to the perceived rules of the game. It can be argued that the rules of the game or
the behavioural pattern prevailing in international politics of that period was in the third phase of
the evolution of power politics as mentioned above. But this power political game was perceived
differently by the newly emerging weak Asian country of Japan. Indeed, the European powers were
enjoying the relative stability of 'the Concert of Europe/ though faced with a shift in the balance of
power caused by the rise of Germany. For them, the imperial struggles in Asia were merely a part
of the game of managed balance of power. From the Japanese viewpoint, however, European power
struggles meant the total threat against their tiny country. As Raymond Aron suggested, regarding
the dissymmetry existing in colonial wars, nationalists fighting for independence- tend to perceive a
war of liberation as a total one, whereas the colonial powers tend to understand the war against the
nationalists as a limited war.9 A similar pattern of dissymmetry
 J 994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 67

could be seen in the condition where Japan was placed.

In 1871, the Meiji government sent the so-called Iwakura Mission' of more than 100 delegates
to Europe and the United States. The delegates headed by Iwakura Tomomi saw Otto von Bismarck
in 1873. Bismarck is recorded to have said that international law was of no use for a small state
such as Prussia and that there was no way to protect its independence and equality other than
augmenting its military power. Iwakura and other prominent Japanese politicians in the delegation
were strongly affected by Bismarck's statement.11 12 Thus, to the Japanese leaders, the principal
element of the rules seemed to be that the stronger in military terms would always win over the
weaker. This principle was a typical one of unfettered 'gunboat diplomacy?
With this perception, their concept of power was essentially that of power politics and the core
of the concept was military power. Economic aspects of power were only regarded as important as
long as they could be converted into military one. This was explicitly expressed in the slogan of the
Japanese government, 'fukoku kyohei/ Indeed, the Meiji government tried to participate in the
Treaty system by revising the unequal treaty relations with European states. But these attempts
should be interpreted not only as the expression of their intention to respect international
agreements in order to be recognized as a legitimate participants of the international system led by
the Western powers, but also as their effort to abolish the conditions which had been a stumbling
block against the growth of Japan's economic power which could be converted into a military one. 13
At the level of power relationships, however, Japan was only a secondary power which had
just taken the first step towards modernization. As for her economic power, the national income of
Japan in 1880 was only 0.4 billion dollars. This was only 10% of Britain's and 6% of the United
States. A decade later, Japanese national income increased up to 0.7 billion dollars, but the
percentage share compared to Britain and the United States remained same. Regarding military
power, Japan was a military pygmy. To look at the share of Japan's military expenditure among the
six great powers (Britain, the United States. France, Italy, Germany and Russia) and Japan,
Japanese share was 1 % in 1880, 3% in 1890 and only 5% in 190 〇, On the other hand, the share of
each of the following four powers, Britain, Russia, France and Germany, was almost 20% in each
year.14 Nevertheless, the Japanese share showed a steady increase from 1 % to 5%. It indicates that
Japan was striving to catch up with the European states in terms of military strength.
With the steady growth of her military power, Japan started to participate in the imperial
struggles for power in Asia as an Asian candidate for a regional hegemon. The Sino-Japanese war
in 1894 was in a sense a test of Japan's capability as a modernized military power and as a player in
the power political game in the far east. Japan's victory over the Manchu dynasty convinved the
Japanese leaders that their course had been right since the Meiji Restoration. At the same time, the
Japanese leaders were compelled to

11 Raymond Aron, op. cit., p. 34.

12 Shibahara Takuji, SEKA1SHI NO NAKA NO MEIJI ISHIN (The Meiji Restoration in World History), Tokyo:
Iwanami Shoten, 1977. p. 15J.
13n Iriye Akira, NIHON NO GAIKO: MEIJI ISHIN KARA GENDAIMADE (Diplomacy of Japan: from the Meiji
Restoration to the Present), Tokyo: Chuo Koronsha, 1966, p. 18.
14 Calculated by the author from the statistical data provided by Quincy Wright. See Wright, THE STUDY OF
WARt Volume 1, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, )947, pp, 670-671.
 68 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

admit, however, that Japan was still a minor power compared with the European
great powers. During the Sino-Japanese peace settlement, France, Russia and
Germany, who felt that their far eastern imperial interests were under threat from
Japan, jointly intervened and put pressure upon Japan to be satisfied with
considerably small dividends from the war. This was the three-power intervention.
Japan was finally compelled to accept the demands of the three powers. The efleets
of this three-power intervention on Japan's course in international behaviour should
not be underestimated. As a result, the nationalism of Japan was i nspired by the
diplomatic defeat against the three powers, and the Japanese derive for a military
great power was enormously encouraged,15 In summary, her victory in the Sino-
Japanese war and her diplomatic defeat as a result of the three-power intervention
must have been recognized by the Japanese as the righteousness of their perception
of the rules of the power political game.
Another effect of the Sino-Japanese war was European recognition of Japan as a player of their
power political game. In the 1890s, Russian thrust into the far east became a major menace for
Britain. One of the main reasons for the British effort to conclude the Anglo- Japanese alliance in
1902 was to obstruct the Russian drive in that region. When the Russian far eastern thrust caused
the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese war in 1904, Britain contributed to Japan's devastating victory
in the Battle of the Japan Sea by interrupting in various ways the long navigation of the Russian
Baltic Fleet from the Baltic Sea to the Japan Sea.16
In addition, the American leaders such as Theodore Roosevelt, who had perceived their
economic interests in the vast Chinese market, also regarded Japan as a balancing factor to restrain
the Russian thrust in far eastern region. The existence of this kind of power politics consideration
was proved by the fact that the major portion of war finance for Japan was supplied by private loans
from Britain and the United States.
Thus, Japan entered the power politics game led by European powers as a regional great power
in Asia, Japan herself also became more convinced in her seccess as a player of the power political
game by her victory over Russia in 1905. But Japan was not yet one of the major players of the
game in global terms. She was recognized as a significant piece of the regional diplomatic-strategic
chessboard.17 But she was not in the position where she could experience the restraining mechanism
of the power political game such as shown in *the Concert of Europe.'
Because of Japan's successive victories in these regional wars, Japanese leaders more
convincingly intensified their efforts to construct their country as a military great power. But this
effort distorted the domestic structure of Japan. Nothing would indicate this distortion more dearly
than her excessive degree of militarization. Taking the share of military expenditures in comparison
with national income as an indicator of the degree of the nation-state's militarization, Japan showed
a steady increase from 1880 to 190 〇. It was

15 Jan H. Nish, THE ORIGINS OF THE RUSSOSAPNESE WAR, London, Longman, 1985, pp, 26- 28.
16 Jan H. Hish, THE ANGLO-JAPANESE ALLIANCE: The Diplomacy of Two Island Empires 1894- )907 1
London: The Athlone Press, J966, p. 289.
17For the concept of the strategic-diplomatic chessboard, see Stanley Hoffmann, op. cit., pp. 1)9-122. This concept
seems to be based on Raymond Aron's argument regarding the main facloi of international relations. See Aron, op. cit.,
chapter 1.
 J 994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 69

2% in 1880, 3% in 1890, and as large as 7% in 190 〇 . Compared with the British

share in 1900, which was 3%, Japan's ratio was remarkably high. In other words,
her efforts to catch up with the European powers constructed the basic structure of
Japan as an overmilitarized state.18

Road to the Pacific War

1. The Transformation of the International Political Game after the First World War

After the first world war which broke out in 1914 and ended in 1919, a crucial transformation
took place in some aspects of the basic international political structure. The first is the decline of the
European powers. The European decline had at least the following two chief effects on the far
eastern international political game: the emergence of an opportunity favourable to Japan's bid for
the regional hegemon, and the increase in importance of Japanese-American relations in the far
east. Under these circumstances, Japan, who had already annexed Korea in 1910, strengthened her
imperial drive towards the power vacuum in China as the European powers concentrated on war in
Europe. The Japanese administration headed by Count Okuma Shigenobu issued "twenty one
demands** towards China in 1915 in order to consolidate Japan's political control over China.
Responding to this Japanese drive in the far east, the United States, now the only power with the
capability of restraining Japan, began to assert its interests in the region more vigorously.
The second aspect of the international political transformation was seen on the level of rules of
the power political game. This was a shift from the third phase to the fourth phase of the power
politics. On the one hand, the legitimacy of military power as a measure for promoting national
interests and solving international conflicts became increasingly faded during this period. Various
attempts at disarmament made after the first world war, and the conclusion of the Kellogg-Briand
Pact in 1928, whose official title was 'General Treaty for Renunciation of War as an Instrument of
National Policy1 reflected this transformation. On the other hand, multilateral institutions with
permanent organizations began to replace the traditional diplomacy on a bilateral basis as the major
method for international cooperation and stabilization of international politics. In other words, this
was the emergence of the 'new diplomacy/19 The League of Nations can be counted as an example.
It was the United States that played the most active role in this new trend of diplomacy.
President Woodrow Wilson's 'Fourteen Pionts, based on the ideal of liberal internationalism became
a foundation of the League of Nations and other efforts to institutionalize international anarchy in
other areas. Although the United States herself

18IS Calculated from Quincy Wright, op. cit.

19 Iriye Akira, AFTER IMPERIALISM: The Search for a Order in the Far East, 1921-1931, Massachusetts, Harvard
University Press, 1965, pp. 1-22.
 70 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

failed to participate in the League because of her strong isolationist public

sentiments, she took the initiative in spreading and planting the idea 6 of *new
diplomacy' in the far eastern region.
2. The Washington System and Japanese External Behaviour in the 1920s

From 1921 to 1922, an international conference was held in Washington in order to search a
stable multilateral regime in the far east. As a result of this conference, a set of rules for mutual
restraint and stability in the pacific area was established: the so-called Washington Treaty System?
The system was based on the treaties aimed at restricting the on-going naval arms race, to regulate
the imperialist competition over China through mutual respect for imperial interests of the
concerned great powers and for the territorial and administrative integrity of China. The birth of the
Washington Treaty System seemed to be the death of the Anglo-Japanese alliance, in other words,
the end of 'old diplomacy' and to be the birth of a new international order based on multilateral
cooperation..20 21 22
The Washington System had, however, several crucial defects. It was merely a mixture of the
old diplomacy and the new diplomacy. In fact, Japan participated in this system reluctantly and
only because Japanese leaders recognized that it was unrealistic to wage an American-Japanese war
which would likely result from Japan's refusal to join the System. 23 In addition, the system was
much less institutionalized than the League of Nations. This lacked any mechanism imposing
sanctions on the countries attempting to violate the basic principles of this system. The Washington
System was a weak institution which could be maintained effectively only when the participants
were willing to obey principles of the new diplomacy.
More importantly, the Washington System was interpreted from contradictory viewpoints. For
the Americans, the system was an essential international regime for inducing a new rule of game in
the anarchical imperial competition in the far east. For the Japanese nationalists, however, who
were still haunted with the rules of the previous phase of the power political game, it was an
insistent shackle reducing the opportunity for Japan to expand her influence and prosperity in Asia.
In Japan, there were those who shared the sentiments that Japan was forced to be content with a
secondary status under the Anglo- Americans table system. Prince Konoe Fumimaro wrote his
famous article in 1919, “EIBEI HONI NO HEIWA 〇 HAISU" (To Abolish the Anglo-American
Peace), insisting that Japan, as a 'have not country/ should resist against the international system
constructed in accordance with the interests of the western 'have' countries. Those who shared this
kind of sentiment came to regard the Washington System as 'a white-sponsored system for

20 Hosoya Chihiro, "Washington Tai sei no Tokushitsu to Henyou" in WASHINGTON TAI SEI TO NICHIBEJ
KANKEI:, Hosoya Chihiro and Saito Makoto (eds.), Tokyo: Tokyo University Press, 1978, p.
213, Iriye Akira, ACROSS THE PACIFIC: An Inner History oj Amer icon-East Asian Relations, New York:
22Harcourl, Brace & World, Inc., 1967, pp. 143-145.
23 Iriye Akira, ACROSS THE PACIFIC, p. 144. Iriye argues that the establishment of the Washington System was
partly a product of combination between Japanese realism and American challenge to the old diplomacy. Moreover, the
late Guy Wint and John Prichard characterized the Washington system as *a remarkable blend of real polilik, self-
sacrifice, and compromise/ Sec, Peter Valvocorssi, Guy Wint and John Pritchard, TOTAL WAR: The Causes and
Courses of the Second Woild War, Volume II: The Greater East Asia and Pacific Conflict, London: Penguin, 1089,
second edition, p. 50).
 J 994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 71

the perpetuation of Western domination of the worlfd/ 24 These nationalistic

sentiments and inferiority complex survived the new diplomacy's era of fragile
international cooperation.
Faced with the start of the era of new diplomacy, Japan showed a downward zigzag process in
her efforts to adjust herself to the rule of the new diplomacy. This process can be characterized as
the power struggles between the two factions with different ideas concerning desirable Japanese
external behaviour: namely the anachronistic vanguards of old diplomacy, such as Tanaka Giichi,
and the protagonists of international cooperation, such as Shidehara Kijuro.
The history of Japanese external behaviours in the 1920s can be roughly divided into three
phases. The first was the phase of Japanese efforts for adjustment, continuing from 1919 to April
1927. The second was the phase of an atavistic resurgence of unrestrained power politics from 1927
to 1929. The third was from 1929 to 1931. During this period, the last effort was made by the
protagonists of international cooperation to return Japanese diplomacy to the rule of the new
diplomacy.
In the first phase, Japan participated in the Washington System and took the course of
cooperative non-military expansion into China within its framework. The most eminent example
was the so-called 'Shidehara diplomacy' which was foreign policy adopted by Foreign Minister
Shidehara Kijuro from 1924 to April 1927.
In the mid 1920s, international politics at the global level enjoyed relative stability based upon
the intensified economic Interdependence. The United States and many major European powers
returned to the Gold Standard. The quantity of international trade increased steadily. Shidehara was
adequately convinced that Japan should live and expand her power by following the new rules of
the game that had emerged after the first world war. Moreover, he recognized the growing
significance of economic issues. According to him, the national interest of Japan was considered in
the context of economic welfare and could be enhanced only by promoting international economic
cooperations. In this sense, his diplomatic idea was based on an understanding of economic
interdependence.25 26
Nevertheless, the success of Shidehara diplomacy did not mean the total victory of
protagonists of international cooperation and interdependence. Their basis of influence considerably
depended on the effectiveness of international economic cooperation and on the fulfillment of
domestic economic expectations. Unfortunately, it took a long time for Japanese economic
structure, which was not internationally competitive, to fit the present international economic
system sufficiently in order to obtain the expected economic benefits. Moreover, the great Kanto
earthquake which attacked Tokyo in 1923 inflicted devastating damages to the Japanese economy.
This devastation led to a financial depression in 1927.22
The economic fragility of Japan strengthened the influence of the vanguards of old diplomacy.
The Japanese sought a seemingly more effective method at hand to improve theit economic
situations: that was military power. In these situations, Tanaka Giichi. a

24•° Iriye. ACROSS THE PACIFIC, p. 153.

25 Banba Nobuya, MANSHU JIHEN ENO MICHI: SHIDEHARA GAIKO TO TANAKA GAIKO (The Road to the
Manchurian Crisis: Shidehara Diplomacy and Tanaka Diplomacy), Tokyo: Chuokoronsha, 1972, p. 79, p. 90, pp. 133-4.
26Nakamura Takafu 淄,'Sekaikeizai no Naka no Nichibei Kankei' in Hosoya and Saito (eds.l, op cit., pp. 467-487, esp.
475.
 72 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

traditional military nationalist, took the premiership in Apiil 1927 and started
his aggressive foreign policy towards China. Tanaka was a protagonist of the
naked power political game. He assumed that the essence of international politics
was an unrestrained power struggle?3 Under the Tanaka administration, Japan
seemed to have returned to the pre- WWI behavioural pattern. Three expeditions to
Shangtun in 1927-8 and the Tsinan incident in 1928 were exact incorporations of
his foreign policy idea. Then, the murder of Chang Tso-lin, a Chinese warlord
ruling the Manchurian area, by the Japanese Kwangtung Army took place at the
last period of his office in 1929. It was the prelude to the Manchurian crisis.
The protagonists of the new dipolniacy, such as Shidehara and Hamaguchi Osaji, returned to
office in July 1929 and tried to revive Japan's *new diplomacy/ The international political and
economic conditions at that time were, however, unfavourable to them. The Great Depression
which had started in October 1929 in the United States began to sever the network of
interdependence in the world economy and to encourage economic nationalism to establish
exclusive economic spheres.

3. Japanese Atavism in the 1930s: Road to the Pacific War

Nevertheless, it is wrong to conclude that no attempt was made to salvage the sinking
international cooperation system in the 1930s. In the diplomatic and strategic fields, the London
Naval Conference in 1930 was an example of successful attempts for naval disarmament. The
World Economic Conference in 1933 also enjoyed relative success in the reconstruction of
economic cooperation. These efforts were meant to bring the world back to the stable rules that had
emerged immediately after the first world war.
Under the Hamaguchi administration, Shidehara as the foreign minister led these efforts. Japan
signed the London Naval Treaty and recognized Nationalist China in 193 〇. But their efforts turned
out to be abortive. In 1931, the Kwangtung Army started the Manchurian crisis. After this, Japan's
behavioural pattern became steadily oriented towards her pre-WWI type. A series of ultranationalist
terrorism in the 1930s consolidated the dominance of the old diplomacy vanguards.
After the first world war, Japan tried under the Shidehara diplomacy to adjust herself to the
new rules of the games which had emerged after the first world war, But it was unfortunate for
Japan that she could not sufficiently adjust her state structure to the new rules. While the major
European powers sought a way out from the sufferings of the great depression by establishing their
own exclusive economic spheres with their economic power, Japan, as a weak economic power,
could not reply on her own economic strength.
One of the chief sources of this economic weakness can be found in the distorted economic
development due to the over-militarization since the Meiji period. It is suggested that the military
expenditures hindered the Japanese economy.24 In this sense, Japanese

23
Banba Nobuya, op. cit., p. 32.
& Okita Saburo, JAPAN'S CH ALLENGIUNG YEARS: Reflections on My Lifetime^ Can ben a, Australia-Japan
Research Centre, Australian National University, 1983, quoted by Marius Jansen in 'Nijuseiki ni okeru Taiheiyosenso no I
mi' (The Mea nings of the Pacific War in the Twentieth Century), in Hosoya Chi- hiro, Hom ma Nagayo, Iriye Akira, and
Hat ano Sumio (eds.), TAIHEIYO SENSO (The Pacific War) Tokyo: Tokyo University Press, 1993, pp. 59.1-616, esp. p.
605.
1994] JAPAN IN SI KUCTUKAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 73
aggression into Manchuria was one of the efforts to overcome this economic weakness by using
military power to establish the so-called 'Yen Block,' and 1 ater the Greater East Asian Co-
prosperity Sphere. In other words, excessive efforts to adjust herself to the power political game
which Japan had faced in the mid 19th century definitely reduced the options which she could take
within the framework of the rules of the new diplomacy to cope with the international economic
crisis in the 1930s.
While the Anglo-American powers still tried in the late 1930s to tame the power political
game through the framework of a multilateral cooperation system, Japan ruled by militaristic
nationalists became more diplomatically isolated. Japan seceded from the League of Nations in
1933 and concluded the Anti-Comintern Pact with Germany in 1936. The Sino-Japanese War broke
out in 1937. Japan finally left the Washington System. Responding to these Japanese actions, the
United States came out of its isolationist foreign policy and put a stringent economic pressure on
Japan by means of the embargo of scrap iron and petroleum, and the abolition of commercial
treaties with Japan. The Americans tried to pull the Japanese back into the framework of the new
diplomacy by manoeuvering asymmetrical economic interdependence with Japan. Japan, which was
in a position inferior to the United States in terms of the asymmetrical interdependence, could not
counter the American economic pressure by relying on her economic power. Instead, she strived to
escape from international isolation by manipulating the balance of power in military terms and
concluded the Tripartite Treaty with Germany and Italy in 194 〇, The tension between Japan and the
Anglo-American powers reached the point of no-return, and the Pacific War broke out in 1941.
Japan's decision to wage the Pacific War demonstrated not only the divergence from the rules
of new diplomacy but also from the reality of the Japanese position in terms of her economic and
military power. In military terms, Paul Kennedy suggests that the relative war potential of the major
powers in 1937 shows a clear dominance of the Anglo- American powers over the Axis powers. 25
As for her strength of economic power, Japan's GNP in 1941 was less than 10% of the US 5s and
approximately 30% of Britain's. The intensified militarization of Japan was high enough to
convince one that Japanese economy could not endure the heavy cost of military actions or total
war with the Anglo-American powers.
As mentioned above, Japan was in an asymmetrical structure of economic interdependence
with the United States. The degree of dependence of Japan's economy on her trade with the United
States, calculated as the share of total value of Japan's trade with the United States compared to
Japan's GNP, drifted from 7% to 10% in 1930s, whereas the American dependence on Japan was
approximately a tenth of Japanese dependence. The economic pressure imposed by the Franklin
Roosevelt administration was an indication of its political use of power generated by this
asymmetrical structure of interdependence. Moreover, the degree of dependence of Japanese
economy on her external trade (total value of Japan's external trade/Japan^ GNP) ranged roughly
from 25% to 30%.” These 27 28

275 Paul Kennedy, THE RISE AND FALL OF THE GREAT POWERS: Economic Change and Militaty Conflict J'roin
1500 to 200 〇, London: Unwin & Hyman, 1988, p. 332.
28 Calculated by author From B.R. Mitchell, EUROPEAN HISTORICAL STATISTICS, 7750-/975, 2nd rev.
edn„ London: Macmillan, 1980; INTERNATIONAL HISTORICAL STATISTICS AFRICA ANl> ASIA, New York: New York
University Press, 1982.
74 HITOTSUBASHi JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June-

indices show that Japan should not have cut the network of interdependence by
using military power against the Unied States. In other words, for the political and
economic stability of Japan, it was essential for her not to disturb economic
interdependence and international political stability. Thus, the behavioural pattern
of Japan in the 1930s was not at all adequate to her international political and
economic relations.

Japanese Behavioural Pattern in Post-WWII Period

1. International Political Structure and Rules of the Game during the Cold War

Shortly after the second world wa r, the world entered the cold war era. The international
political structure was now drastically changed. Firstly, at the level of power relationships, there
were two ideologically and militarily confronting and hierarchical blocs, with the Soviet Union and
the United States at the top of each. The bloc members were guaranteed their military security and
economic welfare by their dominant bloc leader in return for their acquiescence to political control
by the superpowers. Secondly, there was a rigid ideological distinction of *feind und fieund ,
between the two superpowers, which constituted the structure of mutual distrust and threat. Thirdly,
at the level of economic relations, the world economy was divided into two exclusive zones of the
liberal capitalist economy and the planned communist economy. In the western bloc, particularly, a
liberal international economic regime, the Bretton Woods system, was established. The western
bloc members enjoyed rapid economic reconstruction, and economic prosperity.
More specifically speaking, the following three rules of the game can be pointed out as being
played in the inner-western-bloc politics of the cold war era. Firstly, the bloc members had to avoid
causing significant shifts in the balance of power between the two blocs. Secondly, the bloc
members whose military security was guaranteed by the American nuclear umbrella made the best
of a relatively light burden of military expenditures and favourable trade conditions provided by the
open market of the United States. Under these circumstances, the western allies could enhance their
economic transactions, and economic interdependence was intensified. Through this economic
process, the game of economic interdependence gradually and steaduly became influential in inner-
bloc politics among the bloc members including the United States. Finally, the bloc members tried
to expand the room for their external actions free from the political control imposed by the United
States as long as their actions did not erode the solidarity of their bloc. Such were the rules of the
game which Japan had to play when she managed to re-enter internaiotnal society at the time of
effectuation of the San Francisco Peace Treaty in 1952,

2. Japan's Adaptation to the Cold War Rules of the Game

Here, the central question is how Japan tried to adjust herself to the new international political
structure and game of the cold war. During the early occupation period, the shape of the newly
emerging world order was not clear. From the termination of the
 1994] JAVAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSfORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 75

Pacific War to at latest 1947, American foreign policy was still in a transitional phase between the
co-operation and confrontation with the Russians. The demilitarization of Japan by General
Douglas MacArthur and Article IX of the new Japanese Constitution, prohibiting Japan from
resorting to armed forces to solve international conflicts, reflected the pre-cold war optimism.
Article IX embodied, to a great degree, the desire of the Japanese people to reform their country
into a peaceful one, but also reflected the post-war and precold war wishful thinking of the coming
world order: that is a peaceful world managed by a concert of the victorious great powers.
This being the case, it can be argued that Japan was reformed during the occupation so as to fit
the fifth phase of the development of power politics: the denouncement of power politics and the
establishment of a "no-war community." But the intensification of the U.S.-Soviet confrontation
since 1947 and the outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 brought the world and the far east
back to the previous or more primitive pattern of cold war power politics. Thus Article IX of the
Constitution and the intensification of war came to throw Japan into a dilemma. The constitution
compelled Japan to live in a sort of optimistic image of a world free from power politics, but she
has to cope with the reality of the cold war. From a different perspective, however, one can argue
tha tJapan was offered an opportunity, perhaps the very first opportunity, to go far ahead of the
evolution of power politics. If I may use a concept devised by Funabashi |Yoichi or Hans W ・
Maull, Japan was, during the early occupation period, destined to become a global civilian power. 29
30 31

For the post-war Japanese conservative leaders, the most urgent national goal was to
reconstruct Japan's power. With the demilitarization and Article IX of the new constitution,
however, they chose the path towards not a military great power but an economic one. The cold war
confrontation being intensive, they also chose the way to reconstruct their country by belonging to
the western bloc, instead of participating in the eastern bloc or taking a neutral course. The San
Francisco Peace Treaty, without Soviet participation, and the conclusion of the U.S.-Japanese
Security Pact under the premiership of Yoshida Shigeru, irrevocablly incorporated Japan into the
network of western military alliance and, on the basis of these, Japan entrusted her defence to the
United States. Despite increasing American pressure for rearmament of Japan since the Korean
War, Yoshida, who realized that the economic strength of his country was too weak to remilitarize
his country decided the economic growth without increasing military power.528
Japan could achieve a considerably successful economic recovery from the wartime
devastation with U.S. economic assistance. The United States leaders clearly favoured an
economically strong Japan as their important far eastern ally. It should be noted that American
economic assistance was offered to Japan in the context of the cold war power political game, but
not from the logic of internatilonal economic cooperation or interde

29 Funabashi Yoichi, 'Gurobaru Shibiiian Pawaa Shiron: Nihon kara Reisengo no Rinen of Tsukuru Tameni (A
Tentative Argument for Global Civilian Power: For Japan Creating an Ideal for the Post-Cold
30War World Order), SEKAI, Tokyo: Iwanamishoten, January 1993, pp. 198-2]7, esp., p. 205. Funabashi borrowed the
concept of 'gloea! biviltan power* from Hans W. Maull. See Mau 】】,'Germany and Japan* FOREIGN AFFAIRS, Vol. 69,
No. 5, Winter 1990.
312A Hosoya Chihiro, SANFRANSISUKO KOWA ENO MICHI (The Road to the San Francisco Peace), Tokyo:
Chuokoronsha, 1984.
 76 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

pendence. In 1955, Japan managed to obtain membership to the Genera)

Agreement on Tariffs and Trade after lengthy negotiations. At that time, Britain
was strongly against Japan's membership, because some of British industrial
sectors were suffering from Japan's 'unfair' trade activities. The United States
government asserted, however, that the western countries should admit Japan to the
GATT in order to keep her firmly in the western free world. In consequence, the
British conceded and Japan was admitted to the GATT. 29 It is clearly shown, here,
that Japan's unfair commercial activities were tolerated because of the
overwhelming influence of the policy consideration in the context of diplomatic-
strategic viewpoint of the cold war.
After the effectuation of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, nationalistic sentiments resurged as a
result of Japan's achievement of independence and the termination of the occupation period.
International political situations in the mid 1950s also enhanced these nationalist sentiments. The
slackening of East-West tensions represented by the successful outcomes of the Five Power Foreign
Ministers9 Conference for terminating the Indochina War in Geneva in 1954 spurred the domestic
desire for a more independent foreign policy. The rise of Afro-Asian nationalism and the non-
alignment powers in 1955 must also have operated in the same direction.
As a result of the revealed corruption of the Yoshida administration and the emergence of
strong nationalist feelings, Hatoyama Ichiro came into office at the end of 1954. Hatoyama was one
of the strong advocates of rearming Japan. At the same time, he tried to absorb the nationalist desire
for 'jishu gaiko' (independent diplomacy) by proposing to normalize Soviet-Japanese relations.
Hatoyama's endeavour for the Soviet-Japanese normalization was, partly aimed at appeasing anti-
Americanism growing in the mid 1950s in Japan by slightly distancing his diplomacy from the
United States. But his government never tried to get out of the orbit of the western bloc. Rather, he
advocated rearmament as a device to complement the U.S.-Japanese alliance. Hatoyama's wooing
of the Soviet Union was, in this sense, in accordance with the second rule of the inner-bloc political
games of the cold war.32
In the Japanese domestic political scene, the conservatives consolidated their power basis
through the conservative merger and the establishment of the Liberal Democratic Party in
November 1955. The LDP was to continue its reign for 38 years until 1993. This conservative
merger was welcomed by the American leaders and the Japanese business circle. 33 The fact that the
Japanese economy was excessively dependent on the American economy firmly incorporated the
business circle of Japan into the cold war system. The continuation of the cold war and the good
relationship with the United States was one of the most

322u The account shown above is based on my research undertaken in the Public Record Office in Kew, London, in
1991.
"J five Akira. NIHON NO GA(KOUt Tokyo: Chuokoron, .1966, p. 159. And see, Tanaka Takahiko, The Soviet-
Japanese Normalization and Foreign Policy Ideas of the Hatoyama Group/ in Peter Lowe & Herman Moeshart (eds.)
WESTERN INTERACTION WITH JAPAN: Expansion, the Armed Forces & Readjustment 1959-1956, Kent: Japan
Library Ltd., 1990, pp. 105-114. See also, Tanaka, NISSO KOKKO- KAIFUKU NO SHITEKIKENKYU ： Seiigo Nisso
Kankei no Kiten 1945-1956 (Soviet-Japanese Normalization: A Starting Point of Post-war Soviet-Japanese Relations),
forthcoming.
33 Aruga Tadashi, 叮 he Security Treaty Revision of I960' in Iriye Akira and Warren I. Cohen (eds.), THE UNITED
STATES AND JAPAN LN THE POSTWAR WORLD, Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 198°, pp. 61-80, esp.,
p. 64.
1994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION 〇!- INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 77

crucial sources of their benefits and prosperity. The business circle now
became able to enjoy the domestic political stability based on the strength of the
conservatives and the stability of pro-American foreign policy.
The East-West thaw in the mid-1950s was short-lived, especially in the far east. In 1955, under
European initiatives, the main cold war adversaries came to agreements to stabilize the East-West
confrontation in Central Europe. But this was not to dissolve the fundamental cold war structure of
mutual distrust and threat. The nuclear arms race between the superpowers was rather intensified.
The establishment of the rule of detente between the United States and the Soviet Union had to wait
the after effect of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. In the far east, Sino-American tension was
more sharpened after 1954 over the Taiwan Strait.
Faced with the intensification of Sino-American cold war confrontation, Japanese leaders
resumed their foreign policy oriented towards the confrontatilon with the communist countries. The
new Japanese administration set up by Kishi Nobusuke in 1957 attempted to improve the U.S.-
Japanese relations which had grown worse during the two previous premierships. If the foreign
policy of the Hatoyama administration can be called 'detente oriented cold war policy/ Kishi's was
'confrontation oriented cold war policy' In 1960, under Kishi's premiership, the Japanese
government revised the U.S.-Japanese Security Pact signed in 1951. The treaty revision was aimed
at increasing Japan's commitment to the American military strategy against Japan's communist
neighbours. This provoked a sense of threat in the Soviet Union and led Nikita Khrushchev to
assume a more hostile attitude towards Japan.
Japan's relations with Communist China also deteriorated during the Kishi administration. His
predecessor, Ishibashi Tanzan, had attempted to restore diplomatic relations with Communist China
in 1956-7. This movement reflected a desire held by part of the business circle to expand their
market into the mainland China. But Kishi tried to redirect this desire by reorienting the Japanese
economic drive into the Southeast Asian market. He also strengthened ties with Nationalist China.
This transformation of Japan's Asian policy finally resulted in the severance of trade relations with
Communist China in 1958, though the amount of Si no-Japanese trade had been steadily increasing
since 1952. This development of events meant the firmer incorporation of Japan into the U.S. cold
war strategy against Communist China. Whereas Kishi succeeded in revising the U.S.-Japanese
Security Pact, strong national movements against the treaty revision ousted him from office. Kishi's
endeavour to absorb Japanese nationalism by promoting the political prestige of Japan in the
political field failed to obtain the outright consent from the Japanese people. The conservatives
were now faced with the necessity of changing the direction of their policy.
The Ikeda government from 1960 after the collapse of the Kishi administration placed more
weight on the acceleration of economic growth. In other words, Japan took further steps to re-adjust
herself more to the economic aspects of the rules of the inner-bloc political game. The main pillar
of Ikeda's policy was the so-called *shotoku baizou keikaku* (a plan for doubling national income).
With this new orientation, the GNP of Japan showed a rapid increase. Japan's GNP of 1970 marked
six times as much as of 196 〇 , In 1964, Japan was admitted to the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD), which meant that she had obtained the status of an
advanced industrial state.
 78 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

The behavioural pattern of Japan from the end of the Pacific war to the end of the 1960s
revealed her excessive adaptation to the rule of the cold war political game. Turning our eyes
towards European international political developments, the Western European powers were steadily
establishing a no-war community among themselves and sometimes took the initiative to stabilize
the cold war confrontation from the 1950s to the 19608 by restraining the United States from
overreacting militarily to such regional conflicts as the Indochina war, or by taking an independent
course like France did in the 1960s. Indeed, even those western powers had to act within the power
political framework of the cold war. But the sharpest contrast to the European attitudes to the cold
war could be seen in the negative attitudes of Japan towards contributing to the dissolution of the
cold war structure. Whereas Japan had started her new life in international society with the new
form of nation-state which was far ahead of international history, she did not make very much effort
to transform the external conditions into a more peaceful international political structure.
As in the political realm, Japan showed the over-adaptation to the rules of the cold war game
in the economic realm. Because of the American favourable attitude towards strengthening the
Japanese economy, Japan could concentrate on her economic development by maintaining her
relatively closed domestic economic structure. The Japanese business circle took advantage of this
situation, It cannot be denied that there were incentives in Japan to contribute to the continuation of
cold war structure on behalf of her own economic development. Being defended by the perceived
nuclear umbrella of the United States, Japan did not have to require large military expenditures,
which seemed to facilitate economic growth considerably. Since the late 1960s, however, the
relevancy of such a pattern of Japan's external behaviour was called into question, as the cold war
structure started to change at its surface and also deeper level.

3. Transformation of the Cold War Structure

The cold war structure which had been dominant in the 1950s and the early 19608 was shaken
in various dimensions from the late 19608 onward, At the level of power distribution, the relative
decline of the United States started to be salient. On the other hand, the rise of economic power of
her western allies became remarkable. In the eastern bloc, the Sino-Soviet rifts became intensified
and its monolithic structure was increasingly eroded. The cold war based on a bipolar structure
became gradually eroded.
Secondly, perceiving these changes, the Nixon administration of the United States started to
implement the 'detente' policy under the initiative of Henry Kissinger. The first Strategic Arms
Limitation Talks were convened between the two superpowers and the reapproachment between
Communist China and the United States took place in 197 〇 . Kissinger's 'detente' policy also
indicated the departure of the United States government' from the rigid ideological distinction of
*feind und freund?
In the field of world economy, the decline of American economic power caused the collapse of
the Bretton Woods system and the re-structuring of the international monetary and trade regimes.
The oil crisis of 1973 triggered worldwide stagflation. Economic frictions among the advanced
western industrial countries rose in significance as a political issue.
Remarkable transformation was also going on at the deeper level of the international
1994] JAVAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSfORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 79

system. Given the progress in institutionalization of rules of nuclear deterrence through such efforts
as the conclusion of SALT I and the growth of economic interdependence, the rules of the power
political game, whereby the stronger military power wins the game, gradually lost their significance
and the effectiveness of military power as a means to solve international conflicts came into
question.34
Thirdly during the peak period of the cold war, the game on the strategic-diplomatic
chessboard between the superpowers seemed dominant over the games of economic
interdependence. The logic of alliance seemed to absorb economic differences and frictions among
the western allies. But the game of economic interdependence seemed to start to dominating the
other games. The intensification of economic interdependence certainly increased not only the
incentives for cooperation but aslo the probability of conflicts. 35 In the 1970s, the advanced western
industrial powers including Japan tended to formulate a conflict resolution mechanism for solving
international economic frictions. Examples of this include the series of economic Summits which
started in 1975 and the process of economic integration in the European Community.
Fourthly, the nature of the modern nation-state system seemed to be faced with a fundamental
transformation. State sovereignty was eroded by activities of transnational actors such as
multinational corporations.36 The growth of human and material transaction between sociaties made
the closed system of nation-states more irrelevant. The erosion of issue hierarchy with the military
security issue at the top made national interests more difficult to define and national interests started
to divided into various subnational interests. The coherency of the nation-state was reduced by this
development.
Finally, the difficulty in defining national interests and the erosion of the issue hierarchy made
it more difficult to calculate national power. Neither an actor with stronger military power nor one
with stronger economic power can always win the international political game. Rather, the result of
the game became more dependent on the particular power distribution related to the issues in
question, Policentricity rather than multipolarity became more salient in the international political
game. In these situations, the balance of power strategy considerably lost its relevancy, 37 which one
could not say had been a very effective measure for international conflict resolution or stability. 38

4. Japan in the Transforming Cold War Structure

If the abovementioned hypotheses of transformation of the cold war structure and international
political system were correct, how well did Japan try to adjust herself to this changing international
circumstances? Unfortunately, it should be said that the score was not very high.
Firstly, Japan, which had achieved the dramatic economic growth in the 1960s, and which had
managed to recover from the stagflation caused by the oil crisis in 1973, obtained

34 Robert 〇• Keohane and Joseph S. Nye Jr., op. cit., pp. 27-29.
3523 Stanley Hoffmann, op. cit., pp. 122-3.
36 For example, Raymond Vernon, SOVEREIGNTY AT BAY - The Multinationaf Spread of US Enterprises,
MiddJesex: Penguin Books, Ltd., 1973.
37as Stanley Hoffmann, op, cit., p. 176.
38ar, See footnote 6.
80 HITOTSUBASHi JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June-

the status of a global economic power in the late 1970s. One of the clearest
indications was the fact that Japan was invited to the first economic Summit held
in Rambouillet, France in 1975 and that Japan became one of the main member
states of the Group Five and later the Group Seven. This showed not only the
rising status of Japan, but also that she became gradually incorporated into a
system of international economic co-coperation to institutionalize the conflict
resolution of economic interdependence. In other words, she was placed in a
position where she had to take serious account of not only her own economic
interests but also milieu goals of the international community she belonged to, It
became necessary for Japan to consider not only impacts of other countries'
economic activities, on herself but also the impacts of her activities on other
countries.
But Japan had been enjoying the economic growth due to the other powers' tolerance of her
closed market. The tolerance was a product of cold war considerations. When the cold war
confrontation seemed to lose its intensity in the 1970s, this tolerance could not be expected as much
as before. Criticisms against the expanding trade surplus of Japan and the demand from western
Europe and the United States for internationalization of the Japanese market and domestic
economic structure were uttered more loudly. The 1970s was, in this sense, the period when Japan
was faced with the necessity of readjusting ： her external economic behaviour and domestic
structure to the transforming international system and to her own status as a global economic
power.
It was, however, extremely difficult for Japan to do so. It can be argued that her domestic
economic structure and external economic behaviour had been excessively adapted to the cold war
rules. Daniel Yergin discussed that the United States had restructured in the beginning of the cold
war her state structure in order to cope with the reality of the confrontation with the Soviet Union
and established a 'national security state/39 It can be said that Japan had also modified her state
structure to adapt to the on-going rules of the game of the cold war in economic terms. Her national
structure was adjusted too much to the favourable conditions generated by the cold war of the 1950s
for it to depart from these conditions easily. Even so, she started to make efforts to open her market
and to alter the pattern of economic activities in the 1970s. But the effect of these efforts was to
appear only slowly.
At the level of the diplomatic-strategic game, Japan was also faced with the necessity for
readjustment. The dramatic change of the cold war policy of the United States took place under the
Nixon-Kissinger initiative in 1969 and 1971' respectively the Nixon Doctrine and the Sino-
American reapproachment. Japan had generally been following the anti-Chinese policy of the
United States si nee the late 1950s. She was now compelled to depart from the previous foreign
policy to Communist China. Tanaka Kakuei, the then prime minister, visited China and normalized
Sino-Japanese relations in 1972. He also visited the Soviet Union in 1973 to respond to the detante
policy of the United States. The following administration headed by Fukuda Takeo proclaimed the
foreign policy principle of the so-called 'zenhoui gaikou* (all directions diplomacy) and attempted
to improve her relations with the Southeast Asian countries, which had deteriorated during the
Tanaka period. This new foreign policy orientation was meant to play a role in stabilizing South-

39 Daniel Yergin, SHATTERED PEACE: The Origins of the Cold War and the National Security State p New York:
Penguin Books, 1980, esp., p. 5.
 1994] JAPAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION 〇!- INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 81
■east Asia in economic terms after the American retreat from military burdens in that region. 40
During the era of detente and stability in the 1970s, Japan showed a considerable growth of
military expenditures, which was not in accordance with other countries' trends. The share of her
niilitary expenditures compared with the world total indicated a steady increase i'rom 1971 to 1980:
1.16% to 1.65%. On the other hand, the other major powers' showed quite different tendencies. The
United States decreased her share from 27.39 % in 1971 to 21.92% in 1980 and so did Britain from
3.63% to 3.49%. Only the Soviet Union showed the same kind of upward trend as Japan.41
In fact, Japan saw growing assertion for rearmament among her policital and business •elites
in the late 1960s and the 1970s. The Japan Federation of Employers Association's study group
issued a report in the summer of 1969 which proposed a rapid military build-up and even proposed
developing nuclear weapons.42 Moreover, in the fiscal year of 1972, Nakasone Yasuhiro, the then
director of the self defence agency, put forth a new defence plan, the so-called 'yonjibou (the Fourth
Defence Plan), which proposed a more vigorous military build-up.
Behind these movements, there were several significant background factors. Firstly,
nationalist sentiments, which had been tamed and restrained within the framework of the cold war,
found room for expressing themselves in the era of detente. Secondly, the nationalism of those
seeking the status of a great power had been gradually intensified by the dramatic economic growth
of Japan, which was quite often called an "economic miracle.' Thirdly, the Nixon Doctrine
encouraged those nationalist sentiments to complement the American strategy in Asia by niilitary
build-up. Indeed, there was a power shift represented by the American withdrawal of her military
presence in Asia based on the Nixon Doctrine. But it seems that this power shift was only used as
an opportunity to fulfill the existing nationalistic demand in Japan. 43 In other words, Japan's military
build-up planned during this period was of domestic origins. The assertion for military build-up was
still not based on adequate understanding of international changes going on in the late 1960s and
the 1970s. In fact, the attempt for the rearmament of Japan became a target of sharp criticism i'rom
various neighbouring countries in Asia.
Another important factor behind this trend was the nationalist desire to make Japan a "normal
country.' Otake Hideo suggested that Nakasone had an idea that Japan should raove from the
distorted form of nation-state, that is, 'peace country, established during the occupation period, to
the normal form of nation-state represented by the European countries. 44 This desire for making
Japan 'normal' must be found in the whole historical process of Japan's development since the Meiji
Restoration, During the pre-war period,

40 Hosoya Chihiro, *Sengo Kokusaiseiji Sisutemu no Henyou to Nichjbeikankei no Rekishiieki Tenkai: NSC68
kara Nikuson Dokutorin Made' (Post-war Transformatroii of International System and Historical Evolution of U.S.-
Japanese Relations: From NSC68 to rhe Nixon Doctrine), in Hosoya (ed.) A M ER IK A CAJKOU: Nichibeikankei no
Bunmyaku no Nakade (American Diplomacy: In the Context of U.S.-Japanese Relations) Tokyo: Nihon Kokusaimondai
Kenkyusho, 1986, pp. 1-19, esp. pp. 15-J 7.
41 Calculated from United States Arms Control atid Disarmament Agency, WORLD MILITARY EXPENDITURES
AND AR.\4S TRANSFERS, 1981, Washington: GPO, 1982.
10
42 Otake Hideo, NIHON NO BO UEl TO KOK USA iS El JI (Japan's Defence and Domestic Politics), Tokyo. Sanichi
Shobou, 1983, p. 32.
43 Otake Hideo, op. cir., p. 20.
44 Ibid., p. 39.
 82 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

Japan had been trying to catch up with the existing great powers. Doing so,
Japan had been over-militarized and failed to obtain a 'normal' economic strength.
In the post-war era, she tried to be a 'normal' economic power by restraining her
military build-up. In other words, from the viewpoint of the conservative
nationalists, Japan successfully corrected her error made in the pre-war era and
should now try to become a 'normal' nationstate by military build-up in proportion
to her economic power. This being the case, it should be argued that Japan's course
was a remarkably reverse one against the trend of the international system: that is,
the decline of the signihcance of military power and the trandformation of nation-
state system.
This anarchronistic development of Japan in the 1970s was, in a sense, a product of her inward
looking behavioural pattern generated by her over-adaptation to the cold war rules of the game. The
Japanese leaders had been concentrating their attention on how to make their country prosperous
economically without seriously examining the on-going international system transformation. Their
concentration on economic growth exclusively on Japan's own behalf caused, in part, her difficulty
in adjusting herself both to the rules of economic interdependence and to the transformation of the
international system at deeper level.
Nevertheless, the trend towards the military build-up in the 1970s was quite effectively
constrained by the economic bureaucrats in the Ministry of Finance. They were able to exert a
considerable influence in the process of budget making and they were able to resist the nationalist
demands for militarization. It is interesting that such a bureaucratic sector centrally dealing with the
issues closely connected with the on-going economic interdependence was sensitive to the
meaninglessness of the efforts for military build-up. Indeed, it is too much to say that the Ministry
of Finance held the idea identical with that shared by the so-called 'moderns/ because even the
Ministry was haunted by the fading conception of national interests. But il cannot be denied that the
orientation of those economic bureaucrats was towards the thought of 'moderns.' It must be
remembered that, even in pre-war Japan, there had been struggles between the military and the
economically oriented leaders, such as Shidehara Kijuro. The same kind of struggles also took place
within Japan after the second world war. If one of the main streams of ideological contest in
international politics can be characterized as that between the 'moderns' and the 'classicals/ 42 45 the
similar sort of ideological contest can be assumed to be going on within Japan.
At any rate, Japan in the 1970s was faced with the serious necessity to readjust herself to the
changing international rules of the game. Japan surely readjusted herself quite effectively to the
shift in balance of power resulting from the change in U.S. for eignpolicy. But it cannot be said that
she adapted as successfully to the transformation at the deeper level of international system as to
that at its surface.

45仆 Stanley Hoffmann, op. cit., pp. 106-19, and pp. J64-6. It must be noted here that HofTmann primarily defines the
'classicals' and the "moderns* as the distinction in terms their analytical attitudes. But the distinction can also be
assumed, I believe, to reflect the ideological distinction held by those who assert the relevancy of lheir analyucal model.
1994] JAVAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSfORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 83

5. The Collapse of the Cold War Structure and Japan

During the last phase of the Brezhnev regime in the Soviet Union, the world saw the
resurgence of the East-West tensions in the form of the so-called 'new cold war.' With the Soviet
intervention in Afghanistan in 1979 and the advent of the Reagan administration in the United
States in 1980, the world seemed to return to the serious cold war power struggles. It gradually
became clear, however that the economic situations of each superpower, especially the Soviet
Union, could not continue to endure the heavy burdens of the nuclear arms race. Needless to say,
both of the superpowers did not intend to withdraw from a set of strategic-diplomatic rules which
they had been establishing to avoids mutual nuclear annihilation. Rather, it can be assumed that the
intensification of the tension in the new cold war had an ironical or paradoxical effect to convince
the superpowers that they could not endure the power political confrontation based on the structure
of mutual distrust and threat. In this sense, though sounding rather rlietorical, the new cold war was
a prelude to the collapse of the cold war structure.
The advent of the Russian reformer government headed by Michael Gorbachev in 1985 and a
series of the superpowers' summit meetings paved the way to the termination of the long-lived
structure of mistrust and mutual threat. Under the Bush administration, the process of the collapse
of the cold war structure took steady progress through a series of disarmament agreements between
the superpowers. The end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s saw many symbolic events
of the irreversible termination of the cold war: the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the former
Soviet bloc in the eastern Europe, the re-uniHcation of Germany, and, finally, the collapse of the
Soviet Union herself in 199 〇,
The economic problems having emerged in the 1970s were not fully solved even in the 1980s.
But the growing economic interdependence among the developed countries made it more difficult
for them to take unilateral economic foreign policy steps based on exclusive conceptions of national
interest in order to solve those problems. The summit diplomacy and multilateral economic
meetings such as the G5 and the G7 among the most advanced industrial countries seemed to be
recognized as effective measures for economic coordination and conflict resolution, or at least a
conflict restraining mechanism to cope with the politicized economic issues.
Moreover, the multilateral cooperation in economic realm expanded their significance into
political realm, which can be called the politicization of the economic summit. The European
Community left its stalemate of integration from the 1970s to the mid 1980s, and entered a new
phase of the European Political Cooperation to deal with even security issues which had not been
dealt with before within the framework of the E.C. 46 It seems that a no-war community, though not
sufficiently institutionalized, has gradually appeared, at least in the relations among the advanced
industrial and, in particular, the Western European countries.
Given the deepening of economic interdependence and the termination of the cold

46 Kamo Takehiko, 'ECTougou to Anzenhosho* (The EC Integration and International Security)inKOKU-

S メ【SEIJI, No. 94, Tokyo- Japan Association for International Relations, May 199 〇,
 84 H1T0TSUBASHI JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

war, military action has considerably lost its relevancy for solving international
conflicts among the major powers. It seems that in the 1970s the main
characteristic of the international political system was the parallel existence of the
two different games: diplomatic- strategic chessboard and economic
interdependence.47 With the collapse of the cold war structure, the game of
economic interdependence seemed to become a dominant one. This hypothesis
appears, however, plausible with regard to the relations among the advanced
industrial countries. To be sure, one has to discuss the meaning of the Gulf War
and ethnic violence in the eastern Europe, but this will be discussed later.
Now the question to be asked is how Japan reacted to the process of this international change.
As mentioned above, the voice demanding for rearmament of Japan had become louder in the
1970s. The Soviet intervention in Afghanistan enhanced this trend in the 1980s. Indeed, the Ohira
Masayoshi administration, from November 1979 to July 1980, tried to restrain the movement
towards the significant rearmament of Japan and put forth the programme for *sougou anzenhosho'
(comprehensive security), by including the consideration about how to cope with Japan's economic
vulnerability as part of overall security considerations. But after the Ohira administration, the
Japanese government tended to follow the American pressure for significant military build-up to
bear the burden for the security of the free world in Asia.
The Suzuki Zenkou administration made it clear that Japan would make efforts for the defence
of 1,000 miles sea lane in 1981. In the 1980s, it is pointed out that many Japanese leaders clearly
recognized the decline of the United States. 48 In this sense, they intended to respond to the
situations generated by the new cold war by sharing the security burden from which the United
States had gradually retreated.
It is also suggested that, from the end of the 1970s onward, the Japanese government was
inclined to assert that Japan was a member of the Western Alliance and should play a more positive
political role.49 One can see here a reflexion of the same sort of concept as had prevailed in the
1960s and even in pre-WWII Japan: the desire to be equal to the leading powers in international
politics. More importantly, one can find in this sort of idea an anachronistic and oversimplified
perception about the relationship between political influence and military power. Those leaders
were still haunted with the nationalistic desire for making Japan as 'normal' a country as an western
powers. The new cold war and Japan's achievement of the status as the economic great power
provided their assertion with a useful justifying power.
This kind of inclination was more clearly demonstrated by the Nakasone administration in the
mid-1980s. The Japanese government emphasized more strongly the significance of Japan's
military contribution to the western alliance. Prime Minister Nakasone clearly mentioned this
stance at the summit held in Williamsburgs in 1983. His efforts to establish a seemingly equal
partnership with the United States by promoting a personal friendship with President Reagan, the
so-called 'Ron-Yasu' relationship. It is needless to reiterate the existence of Nakanose's nationalism
behind these developments.

47 Stanley Hoffmann, op. cit., Chapter 3.

48"For example, see Akaha Tsuneo, 'Japan's Security Policy After US Hegemony' in Kathleen Newland led.) THE
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS OF JAPAN, London. Macmillan, 1990, p, 153.
49 Otake Hideo, op. cis., pp. 315-7.
1994] JAVAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSfORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 85

This orientation towards the military build-up of Japan continued even after the advent of
Michael Gotbachev. The growth of Japan's military expenditures was remarkable in the 1980s. In
1981, her share of total world military expenditure was 2.08%, It reached 2.23 % in 1985 and
steadily increased to 2.74% in 1989. On the contrary, Soviet share did not at all show such a steady
increase. It was 32.22% in 1981 and then decreased to 30.07% in 1986. Although it increased to
31.29% in 1988, it went down again to 30.05% in 1989. Communist China showed more consistent
downward inclination. Her share was 2.58 % in 1981 and steadily decreased to 2.07% in 1987. It is
interesting that the U.S. share showed growth from 21.92% in 1980 to 29.38% in 1989.48 This
statistical analysis demonstrates that Japanese military growth was going parallel with the Reagan
administration's military build-up. Given the fact that Britain and France, two of the most important
western allies, did not show such an increase during the 1980s, Japan's military build-up in the
1980s seems rather odd.
Although it should be pointed out that this Japanese military build-up was a product of the
nationalist sentiments shared especially among the conservative nationalists, it is necessary to
discuss structural differences between Europe and the far east. The cold war in the far east had
developed differently from that in Europe since its start. In Asia, 'hot wars' took place in Korea in
1950 and in Vietnam from the 1960s to the beginning of the 1970s. The Nixon-Kissinger's detenet
with Communist China was the mere result of power political considerations: balance of power
calculation and the reapproachnient for convenience. No serious efforts were made to establish a far
esatern framework for disarmament or confidence building, On the other hand, in Europe the CSCE
played a significant role as a multilateral forum for confidence building between Western and
Eastern Europe. It can be assumed that perceptions of international politics held by the Japanese
leaders could be more power politics oriented, given such development of the far eastern cold war.
Again, the characteristics of the far eastern international sub-system seem to have strongly affected
Japan's external behaviour.
As for Japan's behaviour in the realm of the world economy, she was also troubled by the
inertia of the cold war type of behavioural pattern. Her economic power continued to grow in the
1980s. Japan's share of ON? compared with world total had increased from almost 9% in 1980 to
13% in 1989,49 An enormous trade surplus was accumulated. Japan came to be placed under more
intensified criticism against her unfair trade activities, and, more importantly, against her
insufficient adjustment of domestic social and economic structure to the development of economic
interdependence. The Japanese society and economy which had been structurized by vigorous
efforts for adaptation to the cold war rules could not depart from this cold war inertia as smoothly
and easily as the European and Americans envisaged.
At the same time, unfortunately, it seems difficult for the Japanese, who have recognized the
vested interests in their beneficial economic and social structure created in the cold war era, to
discover domestic incentives for changing the structure. Moreover, Japan's political mechanism,
that is, the so-called *1955 system/ was closely connected with the
48
Calculated from United States Arms Control and Disarmameni Agency, WORLD MILITARY EXPENDITURES AND
ARMS TRANSFER, 1987, Washington: GPO, 1988.
40
Calculated 「 • om United States Aims Control and Disarmament Agency, WORLD MILITARY EXPENDITURES
AND ARMS TRANSFER, 1990, Washington: GPO, 199).
 86 HJTOTSUBASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

abovementioned social and economic structure. Under these circumstances, only external pressures,
or 'gaiatsu' (foreign pressure), proved to be effective for changing the Japanese system. Even so,
Japanese leaders have started, though belatedly, to readjust the domestic structure to the external
realities. The so-called 'Maekawa Rrpoet' proposing in 1985 to modify Japan's economic structure
and the 17.8.-Japanese Structural Impediment Initiative Talks starting in 1989 are the examples of
such attempts.

Some Tentative Conclusions: Japan in the World

after the End of the Cold War

1. Inertia of Japanese External Behaviour and the International System

The historical overview of Japan's external behaviour attempted as above demonstrates its
characteristic pattern. Japan always participated in the existing international system as a latecomer.
This latecomer was a remarkably ambitious one. She tried vigorously to adjust herself to the
international system and rules of the game which her leaders believed were dominant and
prevailing. For that purpose, they modified the political and economic structure of Japan. As a
result of these endeavousr, Japan was able to succeed in promoting her power.
Ironically, Japan had always, however, to be troubled by the divergence between reality and
her perception of international rules of the game. Surely it cannot be denied that this divergence
may be partially explained by the uniqueness of Japanese culture and civilization. Nevertheless, one
of the many significance reasons for this divergence was the discrepancy of international rules of
the game between the dominant international system and its subsystem. During the pre-WWII
period, Japan over-adjusted herslef to the rule of games prevailing over the far eastern subsytem,
which was already obsolete and more violent compared to the dominant rule of games. The Pacific
War was a result of the violent convergence between the Japanese obsolete perception of rules of
the game and the western atavistic response.
During the post-WWII period. Japan concentrated on her economic growth under the cold war
structure. Again she achieved a miraculous economic development. But as the cold war system was
gradually transforming its features, the maladjustment of Japan to the new rules has become salient.
The tragedy of Japan was that she successfully became a great power with global influence,
though her perception of international rules was still haunted with the obsolete one. Moreover, the
domestic political, military and economic strudture of Japan that rigidly structurized into the
perceived international rules constituted a insistent obstacle to readjustment to the changing central
game. As long as the dominant rules are stable, Japan could enjoy her status of a rising latecomer.
Once the stability began to be eroded, however, Japan's inflexibility easily became a target of the
criticism from the other great powers.
It must be, however, stressed that the narrow minded understanding of the Japanese leaders
regarding the reality of the international system was another main reason for Japan's
 1994] JAPAN kN STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 87

maladjustment to the international system transformation. It cannot be denied

that they could have more adequately comprehended the transformation of the
international political system. They could have selected a path which they
unfortunately did not follow.

2. Nationalism of Japan

As a latecomer into the international political system which has been led by the western
powers, Japanese political leaders, especially the conservatives, continuously desired to mould their
country as a 'normal' nation-state. This desire was formed through the process of Japan's attempt to
catch up with the western powers at the very start of the Meiji Restoration. During the pre-WWII
period, the Japanese leaders perceived the economic weakness of their country. They wanted to
escape from the economic dependence on the great powers in Europe and the United States. For
that purpose, they used the power resources at their hands: that is, armed forces.
After the second world war, these kinds of nationalist sentiments survived, though in a
different form, within the cold war political game. As a result of the occupation, Japan lost her
military power resources which she had had in the pre-WWII period, and chose dependence on U.S.
military dominance. During some recurring periods of slackening of the East-West tension,
however, this dependence and the lack of her own military forces were strongly conceived as a
symbol demonstrating the anomaly of Japan as a nation-state. As mentioned above, this perception
became a driving force for the Japanese military buiId- up in the 1970s and the 1980s.
After the cold war, this kind of perception can be seen in some quarters of the conservative
leaders. An influential leader of *Shinsei Tou* (the Japanese Renewal Party) is now asserting that
Japan should be 'normal', and, for that purpose, contribute militarily to the United Nations Peace
Keeping Operations. It must be noted that his argument is not that Japan should be 'normal' because
military contribution is the only way Japan can resort to now. It is still not impossible that the gap
between the Japanese behavioural pattern and the reality of the international structural
transformation will be widened in the future. These existing nationalist sentiments might lead Japan
into the direction contradictory with the on-going trends of the transformation of international
political system; the erosion of nation-state system and the decreasing effectiveness of military
power.

3. Tasks Imposed on Japan in the Post-Cold War World

The descriptive hypotheses developed in this essay are based on the assumption that the world
has become closer to the one described as 'complex interdependence? But the fact should not be
overlooked that the world after the end of the cold war seems to lead us not only to optimism but
also pessimism about the future of world politics. Indeed, the termination of superpower
confrontation has decreased the probability of nuclear ani- nihilation, though it is too early to say
that there is no possibility. The declining significance of the power political game between the
United States and her former arch enemy appears to raise the relevancy of the rules of the game of
economic interdependence instead of that played on the diplomatic-strategic chessboard. But this is
a story adaptable to only a particular part of the world. As many scholars correctly suggest, the
present world clearly demon
 88 H1T0TSUBASHI JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS [June

strates regional unevenness of the degree of departure from power political game. 50 In other words,
this unevenness has become more clear partially because the dominance of the power political game
has been steadily eclipsed.
The Gulf War was a product of this new trend after the cold war. During the cold war era, Iraq
had to follow, to a large extent, the rule of inner-alliance game and. therefore, to sretrain herself.
Faced with the end of the cold war constraints, however, she started to assert her national interests
by playing her own game which had very different rule from that observed by the advanced
industrial countries. The rule of the games perceived by the Iraqis may still remain at the violent
and rather primitive phase of the evoluiton of power politics: that is, the first or the second phase of
unfettered power political games. A historical hypothesis can be put forward here. History seems to
show that, in the conflicts between the actors who were playing different games, the actor with the
tendencies to play a less violent game was compelled to play the more violent game that other
actors tended to play. The first and the second world wars may be counted as examples proving this
hypothesis, not to mention the Pacific War.
In the realm of international economic activities, it is possible to make a similar discussion.
Japan is still playing an inward looking political economic game. It is still suggested that she
protects her own domestic economy by non-tariff barriers and does not make sufficient efforts to
correct her excessive trade surplus. Intensification of economic interdependence has at least the
following two elements in terms of its rules of the game. The first is economic 'power political'
games using power generated from asymmetrical interdependence. 51 The other is the existence of
incentives to establish the rule for international cooperation to resolve and contain the conflicts
resulting from economic power political games. Perhaps, it seems as if Japan was still playing the
first game of economic interdependence, from the western European and American viewpoint. The
growing American desire for imposing economic pressure on Japan may reflect their endeabour to
lead Japan to become more sensitive to the more cooperative aspects of the game of economic
interdependence. It seems that the structural mechanism of economic interdependence requires
cooperative resolution to economic problems. But the divergence of the perception with regard to
the prevailing rule of economic political game might lead to an instable convergence of the
different rules of the game. If the analysis developed above is correct, one of the most urgent tasks
for making a stable and peacef ul world order is to search for the way to achieve non-violent
convergence of different rules of the games.
Based, on the understanding shown above, the following suggestions can be made as to what
Japan should do in the present transitional period from the cold war structure to a new world order.
Firstly, Japan should make more intensive efforts to re-structure her domestic economic and
political system in order to get out of the cold war inertia. In particular, she should

50 For example, Robert Jervis, The Future of World Politics: Will It Resemble the Past?* in Sean M. Lynn- Jones and
Steven E. Miller (eds.) AMERICA'S STRATEGY IN A CHANGING WORLD, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1992, pp. 3-
37. Also see, Stanley Hoffmann, 'A New World and Its Troubles' FOREIGN AFFAIRS, Vol. 69, No. 4, Fall 1990, pp. 115-
122.
5161 For the interrelation between ihe asymmetrical interdependence and power, see Robert 〇, Keohane and Joseph
S. Nye Jr., op. cit., pp. 11-18. z
1994] JAVAN IN STRUCTURAL TRANSfORMATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 89

not reduce the other countries to the economic power political game. The mere
intensification of economic interdependence is not at all sufficient to contain
international conflicts. Economic interdependence can become a source of the
conflicts. Japan should contribute to establishing international cooperative rules for
solving such conflicts, by re-structuring herself.
Secondly, Japan should restrain the nationalistic sentiments driving for military buildup or
leading to economic nationalism, which have become more and more anachronistic in the present
trend of the world. Thirdly, closely related to the second suggestion, it is necessary for the Japanese
people and political leaders to search for a new model of Japan as an interntaional actor which is
suitable for the changing international system. The gap between the world assumed by Article IX of
the Japanese constitution and the real world has become narrower after the end of the cold war. The
path Japan should follow is that reaching not an obsolete form of nation-state, but a new type of
nation state.
The fourth point is related to the Asian-Pacific security. Unlike Europe, there is no multilateral
security institution such as CSCE to tame power political game in this region. Although economic
interdependence in this region has been dramatically intensified, the mere existence of the structure
of interdependence would not fully deter violent conflicts. Moreover, the nuclearization of North
Korea is evoking a strong sense of threat. This may also cause anxiety about the nuclearization of
Japan and about the possible deterioration of Sino-Japanese relations. 52 The possibility of Japan's
militarization is still felt and worried, though her participation in the UNTAC seemed to be
accepted by the Asian countries with mixed feelings. The U.S.-Japanese security system and the
American military presence in Asia have been given a new emphasis as an effective instrument to
prevent an arms race in the far east. 53 The effects of the collapse of the former Soviet Union can
also be regarded as a source of instability in this region. The arms transfer from the Russian
Federation for economic purpose may destabilize the region by provoking an arms race under these
circumstances, Japan should try to search for her role in reducing the possibility of violent
international conflicts without taking an anachronistic course which she had been taking in the past
changing world structure in the 1930s. The most urgent task for Japan is to discover the way for
peaceful convergence of different rules and to contribute to establish international circumstances for
achieving such convergence in the Asia-Pacific area. More specifically, Japan should try to plant
the more peaceful rule of games of the fifth phase of the evolution of power politics to the region
where there seem to be many factors which may cause more violent power political game. For this
purpose, Japan should make much more efforts to adjust herself to the on-going international
system transformation which seems to enter the era of an institutionalization of interdependence.
More immediate task for Japan is, in addition, to set up some institution or solid mechanism fbr
confidence building in the Asia-Pacific region.
Japan seems now to be in the middle of uncertain domestic transformation. The *1955
System5 collapsed this year. But it is not at all clear whether the inertia of Japanese external
behaviour can vanish as a result of this domestic change. Whether Japan can contribute

5262 Ki shore Mahbuban;, 'Japan Adrift, FOREIGN POf.ICY, No. 88, Fall J 992. pp. 126-44, esp., p. 132.
53"Kishore Mabbubani, ibid., pp. 135-6. Joseph S. Nye Jr., *Coping with Japan* FOREIGN POLICY No. 89, Winter J
992-93, pp. 96-J J 5, esp. p. 101.
90 HITOTSUMASHl JOURNAL OF LAW AND POLITICS

to a new peaceful world order depends on where the Japanese will direct these
domestic changes and how profoundly they wll understand the trends in
international transformation after the cold war.
HrroTsuuASHi UNIVERSITY