Japan Internationalism And The Un

Japan has enormous economic power and yet is a minor player in international politics. In part this has been due to the partnership with US, but now with the end of cold war there is a fierce debate going on in Japan regarding the international political role for the nation. This book is a response to the issues raised and was originally published in Japanese for a Japanese audience. Ronald Dore provides a full analysis of Japan's post war international position and in particular its role within the UN, the use of armed force and constitution. Japan, Internationalism and the UN provides a unique insight into Japan's foreign policy and its related domestic politics. It is the product of nearly half a century of study and discussion with the Japanese themselves about their place in the world.

First Published in 1993. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The International Minimum tells the history of internationalism in Japan from the 1930s to 1960s, shedding light on the deep connections between modes of diplomacy during times of aggressive imperial expansion and of peaceful cooperation. For most of the twentieth century, a rhetoric of international cooperation for peace and stability persisted as the lingua franca of foreign relations in Japan and around the world, even during the years of rampant nationalisms and global war. The advocacy and practice of multilateral cooperation, though attenuated and often distorted and abused, did not disappear during the years of aggression and war, but instead were channeled into new and unexpected directions. With a broad view of international relations that takes into account but also looks beyond the official sites of multilateral cooperation, this book uncovers a continuous evolution of internationalist thought and activity in Japan that extends across the dark valley of war and the historiographical schism of defeat. Acknowledging this continuity does not mitigate the violence and atrocities of the wartime regime. But recognizing that institutions, activities, and rhetoric that were derived from the Wilsonian internationalism of the 1920s contributed to imperialism and war, as well as to the postwar construction of a peaceful and democratic "new Japan," does help us understand the enthusiastic participation in war and empire in the years before 1945 by many of the same people in all sectors of Japanese society who eagerly embraced postwar structures of cooperation for peace and shared prosperity. This study rethinks the standard narrative of Japan's international cooperation in three ways: by taking seriously those international activities conducted outside of formal state-level relations, by examining cultural forms of international engagement, and by asserting the importance of rhetoric in cultivating what was then referred to as an "international mind." Rather than signaling the demise of multilateral participation, Japan's infamous withdrawal from the League of Nations became, in fact, the occasion for the diversification of internationalist activities. For instance, proponents of a "people's diplomacy" campaigned to bring the 1940 Olympic Games to Tokyo and established the Society for International Cultural Relations, a national organization for international cultural exchange. But as Japanese society was increasingly mobilized for war, even such popular and cultural efforts at international cooperation were made to contribute to the imperialist project. In the decade after the war ended, familiar internationalist rhetoric became a keystone in the construction of a so-called new Japan. This book traces the evolution of the internationalist worldview in Japan by examining both official policy and general discourse surrounding epochal moments such as Japan's withdrawal from the League and admission into the United Nations, the failed and successful attempts to host a Tokyo Olympiad, and wartime and postwar regional conferences in Tokyo and Bandung, Indonesia. Bringing these varied elements together produces a synthetic history of internationalism, imperialism, and the performance of diplomacy in the twentieth century, when new global norms required a minimum level of international engagement. This story is told through the materials of both high diplomacy and mass culture. Unpublished documents in government and private archives reveal one layer of the formation of Japanese internationalism. The public discourse found in popular journals, books, newspapers, advertisements, poems, and songs articulates what would become the common-sense views of international relations that helped delineate the realm of the possible in imperial and postwar Japanese foreign policy.

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the internationalization of Japan in the early 20th century. It examines the factors that led to Japan's increasing engagement with the world, including economic, political, and cultural factors. The book provides a nuanced understanding of the complex processes of globalization and the role of Japan in this process. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of Japan and international relations. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This volume delivers a history of internationalism at the League of Nations and the United Nations (UN), with a focus on the period from the 1920s to the 1970s, when the nation-state ascended to global hegemony as a political formation. Combining global, regional and local scaes of analysis, the essays presented here provide an interpretation of the two institutions — and their complex interrelationship — that is planetary in scale but also pioneeringly multi-local. Our central argument is that although the League and the UN shaped internationalism from the centre, they were themselves moulded just as powerfully by internationalisms that welled up globally, far beyond Geneva and New York City. The contributions are organised into three broad thematic sections, the first focused on the production of norms, the second on the development of expertise and the third on the global re-ordering of empire. By showing how the ruptures and continuities between the two international organisations have shaped the content and format of what we now refer to as ‘global governance’, the collection determinedly sets the Cold War and the emergence of the Third World into a single analytical frame alongside the crisis of empire after World War One and the geopolitics of the Great Depression. Each of these essays reveals how the League of Nations and the United Nations provided a global platform for formalising and proliferating political ideas and how the two institutions generated new spectrums of negotiation and dissidence and re-codified norms. As an ensemble, the book shows how the League of Nations and the United Nations constructed and progressively re-fashioned the basic building blocks of international society right across the twentieth century. Developing the new international history’s view of the League and UN as dynamic, complex forces, the book demonstrates that both organisations should be understood to have played an active role, not just in mediating a world of empires and then one of nation-states, but in forging the many principles and tenets by which international society is structured.

This thesis seeks to demonstrate that Japan can best satisfy its international security interests by assuming a combatant role in current and future multinational military coalitions, The thesis labels this alternative military posture "martial internationalism," An understanding of how Japanese military policy serves its overall international security interests is a central concern of this thesis, Japan's international security interests are defined as: (1) shaping a stable international security environment, (2) supporting the United Nations, and (3) upholding the Japan-United States alliance, Factors considered in this argument include trends in Japan's postwar military policy evolution and recent military activities and developments The nature of Japan's current domestic military policy debate is analyzed in terms of relevant political, social, military, and economic perspectives, Regional and international ramifications of a more militarily assertive Japan are explored, The thesis investigates the potential for martial internationalism to realize Japan's international security interests and to permit a greater Japanese military contribution to the ongoing War on Terrorism Finally, the thesis offers specific recommendations for both Japan and the United States toward implementing this alternative strategic design,