Japan S Evolving Security Policy

Japan has been expanding its military roles in the post-Cold War period. This book analyses the shift in Japan’s security policy by examining the collective ideas of political parties and the effect of an international norm. Starting with the analysis of the collective ideas held by political parties, this book delves into factors overlooked in existing literature, including the effects of domestic and international norms, as well as how an international norm is localised when a conflicting domestic norm already exists. The argument held throughout is that these factors play a primary role in framing Japan's security policy. Overall, three security areas are studied: Japan’s arms trade ban policy, Japan’s participation in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations, and Japan’s enlarged military roles in international security. Close examination demonstrates that the weakening presence of the left since the mid-1990s and the localisation of an international norm encouraged Japan to broaden its military role. Providing a comprehensive picture of Japan’s evolving security policy, this book asserts that shifts have occurred in ways that do not violate the pacifist domestic norm. Japan's Evolving Security Policy will appeal to students and scholars of International Relations, Asian Politics, Asian Security Studies and Japanese Studies.

'Normalizing Japan' discusses the future direction Japan's military policies are likely to take by considering how policy has evolved since the Second World War, and what factors shaped this evolution.

While the US-Japan alliance has strengthened since the end of the Cold War, Japan has, almost unnoticed, been building security ties with other partners, in the process reducing the centrality of the US in Japan’s security. This book explains why this is happening. Japan pursued security isolationism during the Cold War, but the US was the exception. Japan hosted US bases and held joint military exercises even while shunning contacts with other militaries. Japan also made an exception to its weapons export ban to allow exports to the US. Yet, since the end of the Cold War, Japan’s security has undergone a quiet transformation, moving away from a singular focus on the US as its sole security partner. Tokyo has begun diversifying its security ties. This book traces and explains this diversification. The country has initiated security dialogues with Asian neighbors, assumed a leadership role in promoting regional multilateral security cooperation, and begun building bilateral security ties with a range of partners, from Australia and India to the European Union. Japan has even lifted its ban on weapons exports and co-development with non-US partners. This edited volume explores this trend of decreasing US centrality alongside the continued, and perhaps even growing, security (inter) dependence with the US. New Directions in Japan’s Security is an essential resource for scholars focused on Japan’s national security. It will also interest on a wider basis those wishing to understand why Japan is developing non-American directions in its security strategy.

Japan's National Security offers a detailed examination of Japan's distinctive security policy. It traces in considerable detail the evolution of Japan's approach to the economic, political and military dimensions of national structures of government as well as a particular set of relations between state and society. One of the noteworthy aspects of this book is its detailed attention to the transnational links between the Japanese and the American militaries. The book accords a special place of the interaction between the legal and social norms that have affected Japanese conceptions of national security since 1945. Japan's National Security offers an important, meticulously researched, and up-to-date perspective on the role that Japan is likely to play after the Cold War. Together with Defending the Japanese State, these two monographs analyze the structures and norms that are shaping Japan's policy on internal and national security. The specific focus is on governmental, state-society and transnational structures as well as the social and legal norms that affect the policies of Japan's police and self-defense forces.

This is an in-depth analysis of the U.S.-Japan security alliance and its implications for Japan and the Asia-Pacific region. It moves away from the official line that the alliance is a vital aspect of Japan's security policy and introduces issues and arguments that are often overlooked: American security policy has failed to achieve its goals; Japan's interests are not fully served by the alliance; the alliance itself is a source of instability in the region; and the arrangement has placed constraints on Japan's own political development. The author measures current developments in U.S. foreign policy against Japan's role in the region and Japan's own political development. He assesses the consequences of the alliance for the current regional situation in Northeast Asia, looks at future policy options for Japan, and makes the case for a neutralist security policy.

This is an in-depth analysis of the U.S.-Japan security alliance and its implications for Japan and the Asia-Pacific region. It moves away from the official line that the alliance is a vital aspect of Japan's security policy and introduces issues and arguments that are often overlooked: American security policy has failed to achieve its goals; Japan's interests are not fully served by the alliance; the alliance itself is a source of instability in the region; and the arrangement has placed constraints on Japan's own political development. The author measures current developments in U.S. foreign policy against Japan's role in the region and Japan's own political development. He assesses the consequences of the alliance for the current regional situation in Northeast Asia, looks at future policy options for Japan, and makes the case for a neutralist security policy.

This book offers a comprehensive overview of Japan's national security institutions and policy today, including a detailed discussion of Japan's regional security environment and its alliance with the United States in the context of the Democratic Party of Japan's rise to power in August 2009. 2010 marks the 50th anniversary of the revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, making Japan one of the United States's longest and most important military allies. Over 40,000 US troops are based in Japan, as is the only U.S. aircraft carrier based outside the United States, the USS George Washington. Japan possesses one of the world's largest economies and strongest military forces, and as a result, its national security policies and institutions are highly significant—not just to America, but to the rest of the global community as well. This book provides an overview of Japan's transformation into one of the world's most capable military powers over the past 150 years. Particular attention is paid to developments in the past decade, such as the 2009 change in the controlling political party and Japan's responses to new global security threats.