Some of them even wonder whether the new government’s call for a ‘close and equal’ alliance with the United States is but a Japanese version of the ‘equal partnership’ with the United States that Roh Moon-hyun, the former South Korean president, had sought, with South Korea as a ‘balancer’ between the United States-Japan and China-Russia relationships. And yet some others ask whether the Japanese government should prioritize the Japan-U.S. alliance over East Asian community-building, or vice versa.
Such criticisms are wide of the mark. Neither the DPJ’s manifesto nor the agreement the DPJ concluded with two other parties to form the coalition government calls for a strategic change in Japan’s foreign policy, such as reviewing the Japan-U.S. alliance and forming a Japan-China axis. In fact it is obvious from the party platform and the coalition agreement that the new government fully intends to keep its ‘mutually beneficial strategic relationship’—which is just another name for ‘friendship and cooperation’—with China while maintaining the Japan-U.S. alliance.
Hatoyama himself stated, in his meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama, that the Japan-U.S. alliance is the basis of Japan’s foreign policy on which Japan should strengthen its relationship of mutual trust with Asian countries and promote regional cooperation. In the trilateral meeting with leaders of China and South Korea in early October, Hatoyama once again stressed the importance of the Japan-U.S. relationship while pursuing his Asia policy.
Why has Hatoyama come under such criticism then? To put it bluntly, it is because of the poverty of language. When we talk about international politics, we tend to treat countries as individuals, saying, for instance, ‘The United States thinks…,’ ‘China will react…’ and ‘Japan should map out …’ This language is anchored in the realist thinking of international politics in which achieving a ‘balance of power’ in an anarchical world is a paramount concern that shapes the behavior of states. When this language is used, Japan’s move to come closer to China automatically signifies a recalibration of its relationship with the United States. A typical example of this type of realist language is the call for an ‘equilateral’ relationship among Japan, China and the United States.
But relying solely on this realist language is not sufficient to capture the reality in East Asia and map out Japan’s foreign policy. Let’s take a look at the security and the economic system in East Asia. The regional security system is built on a ‘hub and spokes’ system in which the United States has concluded bilateral security treaties and base agreements with Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and other countries. This security system has remained basically unchanged in East Asia since the mid-1970s.
By contrast, the regional economic system in East Asia has changed significantly since the Cold War years. After World War II, the regional economy of ‘Free Asia’ took the form of a triangular trade system among Japan, the United States and Southeast Asia, along with South Korea and Taiwan. This system underwent significant changes for two reasons. First, in the wake of the Plaza Accord of 1985, regional economic development driven by Japan’s and other East Asian countries’ enormous foreign direct investments has promoted de facto economic integration as Japanese and other East Asian multinational firms established their business operations across the borders and expanded and deepened their regional transnational business networks. This de facto economic integration has created the ‘East Asia’ as we know it today; that is, the region stretching from Japan and South Korea to the coastal areas of China, Taiwan and Hong Kong to Southeast Asia. Second, during the same period, China (and then Vietnam) was integrated into the East Asian regional economy while successfully transforming its economic system from socialist to socialist market economy led by the communist party state.
These developments have resulted in structural tensions between the U.S.-centered hub-and-spokes security system and an East Asian economic system in which the United States is no longer the driving force. China and Vietnam are now part of the regional economic system and deeply involved in institution building with ASEAN as the hub. But these socialist market economy states are not part of the U.S.-led hub-and-spokes regional security system of East Asia. The resulting tension between the two systems will not vanish any time soon. In fact, the tension may increase as China’s presence is felt in East Asian political and economic relations. The challenge for Japan, then, is how to manage this tension to ensure Japan’s security and prosperity while promoting East Asian stability and economic growth.
Two things are crucial. First, all East Asian countries have formulated their security policies with the Japan-U.S. alliance as a given. If the future of the Japan-U.S. alliance were to come under question, security in East Asia would become unstable. In the worst-case scenario, the United States would withdraw its military forces to the Guam-Hawaii line and shift its strategy from the current forward defense to an offshore balancing act. Japan will then be forced to allocate far greater resources for its defense than it does now. If Japan chooses to strengthen its defense capabilities, China likely would further accelerate its military growth, with South Korea and Vietnam following suit. When East Asian countries have no choice but to prioritize defense expenditure over economic growth, the common political will to build an East Asian community will be lost. Keeping the current system in place heightens the predictability that security will be maintained. The government should bear this in mind as it decides on the kind of assistance it will extend to Afghanistan and Pakistan in their nation-building efforts, and on the issues of cooperation with Washington on its military realignment plan and relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps’ Futenma Air Station in Okinawa Prefecture.
Second, it is also important to promote regional cooperation and economic partnership in the name of East Asian community-building. Most of the governments in East Asia have staked their legitimacy on the politics of productivity, in which achieving a national consensus on economic growth, job creation, poverty reduction and higher standards of living is seen as the primary purpose of politics. Regional economic development is also crucial to Japan’s growth strategy. Promoting economic partnership and increasing economic interdependence in the name of East Asian community-building are the way to go.
What matters is not the form the proposed East Asian community might eventually take, but the process of promoting regional economic interdependence. To do this, it is important to establish common norms and rules in such fields as currency and finance, investment and trade, and professional qualifications to facilitate flows of people, goods, money and information in the region. When all parties concerned are involved in creating common rules, each of them will find it difficult to infringe on those rules, even when it is convenient to do so. As East Asia’s economic interdependence deepens, China and all other countries in the region will naturally have greater stakes in ensuring regional stability and prosperity. What should not be done? The answer is don’t try to create a ‘closed’ regional bloc of ‘Asia for Asians’ — this concept is no longer tenable in the world we now live in. The Japan-U.S. alliance is the basis for maintaining stability in East Asia. But for Japan’s and other East Asian countries’ economic growth (and the increasing importance China has in the regional economy), it is also important to create common norms and rules and promote regional economic interdependence. This can be pursued in the name of building an East Asian community. To keep the regional economic system open to the rest of the world, it is worth concluding a Japan-U.S. free trade agreement as a harbinger of a collective APEC FTA for all the member economies of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. These are initiatives that Japan and the United States can take when they serve as chairs of APEC talks in 2010 and 2011, respectively.
East Asia is now the world’s growth center. For this reason, both the stability and the economic growth of the region are critical not only for Japan and other East Asian countries but also for the rest of the world. To understand the regional order in East Asia and to map out Japan’s foreign policy, we need both the realist language of balance of power and the liberalist language of rule-making and interdependence.
Takashi Shiraishi is a visiting professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo and president of the Institute of Developing Economies of the Japan External Trade Organization.
This article first appeared in the Yomiuri Shimbun.