助成

Institute forInternational Policy Studies
・Tokyo・

IIPS International Conference“A New Horizon for Japan’s Security Policy—Basic Concept and Framework”
Tokyo, November 30 and December 1, 2004

“Redefining Japan’s Security Profile:
International Security, Human Security,
and an East Asian Community”
By
Dr. Yoshihide Soeya
Professor of Political Science
Faculty of Law
Keio University
Japan

Redefining Japan’s Security Profile:
International Security, Human Security, and an East Asian Community
Yoshihide Soeya
Professor of Political Science
Faculty of Law, Keio University, Tokyo
Prepared for Session 3:“How Japan can Contribute to a Peaceful World”
An International Symposium on

A New Horizon for Japan’s Security Policy- Basic Concept and Framework -Sponsored by the Institute for International Policy Studies
November 30 – December 1, 2004
ANA Hotel, Tokyo

Introduction
The demise of the Cold War and domestic changes associated with the collapseof the 1955 regime have released the Japanese from some of the long-standing post-War
taboos, including the debate on the revision of the Article of the postwar Constitution.
In addition, security threats posed by a series of North Korean provocations, such as
intrusion by spy ships, the launch of the Teapodon missile, and the abduction ofJapanese citizens, have steadily aroused Japanese consciousness about its own national
security.
Under these circumstances, many external observers have seen Japan’s
growing eagerness to play an active security role in the post-Cold War era as reflecting
its ambition to become a “normal” great power, including in the military domain.
Along this line of argument, many characterize the nature of Japan’s changes as a movetoward the “right,” and predict an intensifying Sino-Japanese rivalry, both economic
and geopolitical, as a central component of an East Asian order in coming decades.
The net effect of this phenomenon, however, has been mixed at best.

This

paper argues that a most conspicuous change in Japan’s foreign and security policy
since the end of the Cold War has occurred in three forms/domains: deeper engagement
in international security, the rise of human security, and the most recent case ofrenewed interest in regional integration and community building.

Domestic changes

in Japan’s foreign policy parameters, although some of which may indeed be associatedwith the surge of nationalism of a kind, have in effect prompted Japanese deeper

1engagement in these regional and global affairs.
Of particular importance in the Japanese context is the persistent strength of“pacifism” as the most critical reference point informing the content and thepolicy-making process of security policy.

After the end of the Cold War, Japan’s

postwar pacifism has come under challenges from two fronts.

First, the domain of

traditional security has increased prominence, if only relatively, in Japanese security
policy.

Second, even liberals in the Japanese society have begun to question thewisdom of postwar pacifism by criticizing it as “one-country pacifism” and to argue forsomewhat proactive pacifism.
In essence, the combined effect of these two general changes in the post-Cold
War context of Japanese security policy is important in understanding whyinternational and human security have taken firm root in Japanese foreign policy. For
one thing, increased prominence of traditional security does not suggest by any meansthat traditional security concerns have come to dominate Japanese thinking and policy.
It is a new addition, and not a replacement of anything, in Japan’s comprehensive
approach to security, which, for some policy experts, should have been given due
attention long time ago.
True, this new addition of traditional security has placed Japanese postwar
pacifists on the defensive.

This phenomenon, however, did not cause the eradication of

pacifist elements, but rather the evolution of postwar pacifism into a new type ofproactive

pacifism

withaninternationalist bent.

Greater participation ininternational peace keeping operations, the rise of human security, and renewed
attention to regional community building are clear cases of this internationalist
pacifism of post-Cold War Japan.

This is in parallel with, not despite, the somewhat

natural rise of traditional security concerns against the North Korean threat as an
explicit and immediate worry and the rise of China as a rather implicit and long-term
concern.
Awakening to International Security
In the domain of international security, the 1991 Gulf War became a critical
turning point awakening the Japanese government to the new realities after the end of
the Cold War.

The absolute humiliation resulting from the Japanese government’s

incapacity, other than through “checkbook diplomacy,” to contribute to multinational2efforts to defeat Iraq was a central driving force behind the enactment of theInternational Peace Cooperation Law (PKO Law) in June 1992.
The passage of the law enabled the Japanese government to dispatch its
Self-Defense Force (SDF) to the peace-keeping operations under the United Nations
Transitional Authorities in Cambodia (UNTAC), which was followed by a series ofdispatches of the SDF troops to a number of other UN PKOs including those in Zaire,
Mozambique, the Golan Heights, and East Timor1.
As Japan was making this significant engagement in international security forthe first time after the end of the World War II, the monopoly of power by the LDP was
broken in August 1993 with the birth of the Hosokawa government.

When thedesperate LDP came back to power with the Socialist Party head Murayama as Prime
Minister of an LPD-led coalition government in June 1994, Murayama recognized theconstitutionality of SDF and the legitimacy of the U.S.-Japan alliance, thus destroying
his party’s long-standing raison-d’etre.

This led to the catastrophic demise of theSocialist Party, and the collapse of the so-called 1955 regime.
The demise of the leftist-pacifist political forces in domestic politics haschanged the context of political discourse on security matters in a significant way.
Most importantly, it lifted long-standing taboos in the debate about national andinternational security, including the issue of the Article Nine of the Japanese postwar
constitution.

Opinion polls indicate that in the 1990s many Japanese came to support

the revision of the Article Nine because they felt that it prohibits Japan from“international contribution” such as participation in UN PKO.2
The development in the direction of deeper engagement in international
security has been systematic and steady, while responses in the domain of traditional
national security have been sporadic.

After all, the emphasis in the Ichiro Ozawa’s

theory of Japan as a “normal country” was also placed more on Japan’s participation ininternational peace-keeping efforts than anything else.
While encouraging Japanese deeper participation in international security,
new regional and global security challenges after the end of the Cold War also caused
1 L. William Heinrich, Akiho Shibata and Yoshihide Soeya, United National

Peace-keeping Operations: A Guide to Japanese Policies (Tokyo, New York, Paris:
United Nations University Press, 1999).

2 Yoshihide Soeya, “Japan: Normative Constraints Versus Structural Imperatives,”

Muthiah Alagappa, ed., Asian Security Practice: Material and Ideational Influences(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998).

3the re-affirmation of the US-Japan alliance.

The new Defense Program Outline,

revised in November 1995, stressed, among others, a new role of SDF in international
peace-keeping efforts, and an important role of the U.S.-Japan alliance in theseendeavors.3

Along this line of logic, the “US-Japan Joint Declaration on Security,”

signed by Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto and President Bill Clinton in April 1996,
declared that “the Japan-U.S. security relationship …… remains the cornerstone forachieving common security objectives, and for maintaining a stable and prosperous
environment for the Asia-Pacific region as we enter the twenty-first century.”4
And yet, the 9.11 has opened up a new chapter for Japan’s coping withinternational security.

Soon after the 9.11, the support of the international community

for the United States was unmistakable.

China agreed to the UN Security Council

resolution allowing the U.S.-led multinational forces to engage in a war in Afghanistan,which became the first instance where China voted for the use of force by UN members
against a sovereign state.5
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi also supported the United States
unequivocally. This was a natural act from the standpoint of Japanese engagement ininternational security whose momentum has been steadily on the rise in the 1990s.

Infact, the anti-terrorism measures law, enacted speedily to dispatch Japanese SDF tologistical support in the Indian Ocean in the event of a war in Afghanistan, waslegitimized in the name of the United Nations Charter and the relevant UN Security
Council resolutions, and not the U.S.-Japan alliance.6
Here, the lesson from the 1991 Gulf War experiences was clearly at work.

The

nightmare for the Japanese government was to repeat “checkbook diplomacy.”
Politically, the U.S. factor was not insignificant in the mind of central decision-makers,
particularly Prime Minister Koizumi.

In the end, it was fortunate for the Japanese

government that the support for the United States did not contradict contribution to
3 “National Defense Program Outline in and after FY 1996,” (November 28, 1995).

Available at: http://www.jda.go.jp/e/policy/f_work/taikou/index_e.htm

4 “Japan-U.S. Joint Declaration on Security: Alliance for the 21st Century” (April 17,

1996).

Available at: http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/n-america/us/security/security.html

5 David Shambaugh, “Sino-American Relations since September 11: Can the New

Stability Last?” Current History, (September 2002), pp. 243-244.

6 “Special Measures Law Concerning Measures Taken by Japan in Support of the

Activities of Foreign Countries Aiming to Achieve the Purposes of the Charter of theUnited Nations in Response to the Terrorist Attacks Which Took Place on 11 September
2001 in the United States of America as well as Concerning Humanitarian Measures
Based on Relevant Resolutions of the United Nations,” November 2, 2001)

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international security in case of the war in Afghanistan.
This, however, was not necessarily the case regarding the war against Iraq.
While the war in Afghanistan was a clear case of international security, the case of the
Iraq war was complicated at best.
The Japanese government, too, was deeply annoyed by the unilateralism of theBush administration to go to war against Iraq.

It, therefore, hoped that some U.N.

resolution would to be passed justifying the U.S. action. Unlike France or Germany,
however, Japan does not have effective multilateral fora with which to deal with theUnited States.

When time ran out, the Japanese government did not have any othermeans but to go along with the United States.
Beneath the surface, therefore, the implications of the Japanese support for the
war in Afghanistan and the support for the U.S. war against Iraq are significantly
different. The former was a clear case of international security recognized as such by
the majority of the international community, whereas the latter was not.

The case of

the Iraq war has revealed that when and where there is a gap between the policy of theUnited States and the cause of international security, Japan would in the end have tofollow the United States.
The Rise of Human Security
What is peculiarly Japanese in Japan’s context and approach to humansecurity is that the motivation is closely connected with the desire to play a bigger rolein international society under the assumption of proactive pacifism. It was in thiscontext that Japanese efforts toward deeper engagement in international security
through taking part in international peace-keeping operations can be regarded as aprelude to Japanese approach to human security.
Keizo Takemi, a scholar and a politician of the Upper House, who played a keyrole through his close tie with the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi in the initialprocess of the rise of human security, explains as follows7:

7 KeizoTakemi, ”Evolution of the Human Security Concept,” Presented at “Session I:
Evolution of the Human Security Concept as an Operational Tool for Policy Formulation
and Implementation” of the Fourth Intellectual Dialogue on Building Asia’s Future,
March 16-17, 2002, Kisarazu, Japan, pp. 46-47.

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Pacifism in Japan evolved into a highly ideologicalone-country pacifism that repudiated military force, based on deepreflection and contrition for the country’s militaristic aggression
toward its neighbors. However, with the collapse of the East-West cold
war structure, one-country pacifism has been seen to gradually lose its
relevance in the face of new realities, and its significance is receding in
the minds of the younger generation of Japanese who themselves have
had no direct experience of war.
What is now required of Japan is the formulation andprojection of a new future-oriented pacifism that enhances andpromotes Japan’s standing as a responsible member of theinternational community. In the interconnected and people-oriented
21st century, the nebulous concept of one-country pacifism must be
developed into peace diplomacy, where Japan focuses more on
individual values. This is a task that the people of Japan themselves
can engage in as they enlarge their role at the forefront of theinternational community based on the pillar of human security.
Takemi also sates that “Events surrounding the currency and financial crises
in Asia were the driving force behind Japan’s move to highlight the negative aspects ofglobalization and the need to curb their effect.” 8

Takemi was an administrative

vice-minister of Foreign affairs at the time of the Asian financial crisis as was aninspiration for then-Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi as his close aide.
In December 1998, Obuchi, now as Prime Minister, spoke to the “Intellectual
Dialogue on Building Asia’s Tomorrow,” sponsored by the Japan Center forInternational Exchange, where Obuchi elaborated the concept of human security as
follows9:
An unavoidable fact is that Asia's remarkable economic development inrecent years also created social strains. The current economic crisis has
aggravated those strains, threatening the daily lives of many people.
Taking this fact fully into consideration, I believe that we must deal
with these difficulties with due consideration for the socially vulnerable
segments of population, in the light of "Human Security," and that wemust seek new strategies for economic development which attach
importance to human security with a view to enhancing the long term
development of our region.
Obuchi then defined human security as follows:
8 Ibid, p. 43.

9 Keizo Obuchi, “Opening Remarks by Prime Minister Obuchi at An Intellectual

Dialogue on Building Asia's Tomorrow,” December 2, 1998,(http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/culture/intellectual/asia9812.html).

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It is my deepest belief that human beings should be able to lead lives ofcreativity, without having their survival threatened nor their dignity
impaired. While the phrase "human security" is a relatively new one, I
understand that it is the key which comprehensively covers all themenaces that threaten the survival, daily life, and dignity of humanbeings and strengthens the efforts to confront those threats.
Then, two weeks later on December 16 in Hanoi taking the opportunity ofattending the ASEAN+3 Summit, Obuchi further advanced his concept of humansecurity by saying that “At the same time, even in times of economic crisis, we should
not forget cooperation on medium- and long-term problems such as environmental
degradation, narcotics and international organized crime which need to be addressed if
we wish to protect human survival, life and dignity.”

For this purpose, Obuchi

committed to contribute 500 million yen (US$ 4.2 million) for the establishment of the"Human Security Fund" under the United Nations (later renamed as the Trust Fund for
Human Security) to promote human security projects by UN agencies around theworld10.
Despite Obuchi’s sudden death in May 2000, the momentum on humansecurity was kept by successive administrations.

In his speech at the Millennium

Summit of the United Nations in September 200011, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, a
successor to Obuchi, stressed that “With ‘human security’ as one of the pillars of its
diplomacy, Japan will spare no effort to make the twenty-first century ahuman-centered century.”Mori expressed the intention of the Japanese government tocontribute additional 10 billion yen (roughly US$100 million) to the "Human SecurityFund" established at the United Nations in March 1999, on top of the already dispersed
total amount of 9 billion yen (over US$80 million) since the Obuchi proposal.

Mori also

proposed the creation of “an international committee on human security,” which wasrealized as the Commission on Human Security as announced in January 2001 by UN
Secretary General Kofi Annan and former UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako
Ogata in Tokyo.

Sadako Ogata and Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate and Master of

Trinity College, Cambridge, served as co-chairs.
10 Keizo Obuchi, ‘Toward the Creation of a Bright Future for Asia,” December 16, 1998,(http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/asean/pmv9812/policyspeech.html).

11 Yoshiro Mori, 2000. “Statement by H.E. Mr. Yoshiro Mori Prime Minister of Japan at

the Millennium Summit of the United Nations,” September 7, 2000,(http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/un/summit2000/pmstate.html).

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Ogata, who served as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees for one decadefrom 1990 to 2000, has served as a critical and effective linchpin connecting Japaneseinitiatives to the development at the level of international society.

The effective

linkage between the role of Ogata and the initiatives by the Japanese government wasestablished at the occasion of the “International Symposium on Human Security: From
the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit to UN Millennium Summit,” hosted by the Ministry ofForeign Affairs of Japan on July 28, 2000.

As suggested by the subtitle, thesymposium was held using the opportunity of the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit, held in
Okinawa on July 21-13, and anticipating the UN Millennium Summit scheduled in
September.
The event was crucial in advancing the Obuchi initiatives on human security
into global agenda, particularly at the United Nations.

The two keynote speakers were

UNHCR Sadako Ogata and Professor Amartya Sen, who later assumed the co-chairs of
the Commission on Human Security proposed by Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori at the
UN Millennium Summit.

Ogata thus played a critical role as a catalyst in globalizing

Obuchi’s initiatives onto the world stage.
Toward an East Asian Community
Just as the Asian financial crisis triggered the rise of human security as animportant pillar of Japanese foreign policy, the crisis ushered in a new momentum
toward deeper regional integration in which Japan has been a key player. One of theoutcomes was the establishment of ASEAN+3 at the end of 1997, which has become anew basis of regional integration.
The initial move toward regional integration has been sustained by a series of
FTA initiatives by the ASEAN+3 members.

Singapore took an important initiative toofficially propose a free trade agreement (FAT) with Japan in December 1999 when
Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong visited Japan.

Japanese economic ministries, mostnotably the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), which had alreadystarted to study such arrangements with South Korea and Mexico since 1998,
responded positively and the negotiations gained momentum.
In the meantime, observing the momentum of a series of bilateral FTA
initiatives and having achieved the goal of joining the WTO, China also came up with
its own FTA initiative, as most symbolically indicated by the Chinese proposal of a free8

trade agreement with ASEAN at the occasion of the ASEAN+3 summit meeting inNovember 2000.

In the following year, Chinese and SEAN leaders reached a basic

agreement that they would achieve a free trade area within the coming 10 years.

This

was quickly followed-up in November 2002, when the leaders signed a comprehensive
framework agreement to carry out the plan.
These China-ASEAN initiatives have in turn prompted the Koizumi
administration to develop its won regional strategy built upon the ongoing process of
FTA negotiations.

In Prime Minister Koizumi’s policy speech delivered in Singapore in

January 2002, Koizumi proposed an “Initiative for Japan-ASEAN Comprehensive
Economic Partnership,” built upon the “Japan-Singapore Economic Agreement for a
New Age Partnership,” the so-called Japan-Singapore FTA, which Koizumi signed prior
to the speech12.
More importantly, the Koizumi proposal included an ambitious reference to an
East Asian community.

Koizumi said to the audience in Singapore that “our goal

should be the creation of a community that acts together and advances together.”
Koizumi expressed his expectation that, starting from Japan-ASEAN cooperation, “thecountries of ASEAN, Japan, China, the Republic of Korea, Australia and New Zealand
will be core members of such a community.”
What was quietly implied in this presentation of policy approach is the weightof ASEAN as an equal partner for Japan’s regional strategy.

This Koizumi initiative

led to a bilateral ASEAN-Japan summit meeting held in Tokyo in December 2003.
This was the very first occasion when the ASEAN countries agreed to hold such ameeting outside of Southeast Asia.

Previously, any bilateral summit meeting between

ASEAN and its non-member country used to be held in conjunction with the ASEAN
leaders meetings or the ASEAN+3 meetings, which as a rule take place only in theSoutheast Asian region.
As Japan rapidly moves into a highly aged society rather than reverting to a
traditional great power, there is growing awareness among Japanese promoters of FTA
and regional integration that many of the deep-seated challenges, including reforms of
non-competitive sectors such as agriculture as well as entire economic and social
systems, could not be met without harmonizing domestic reforms with the evolution of
12 Speech by Prime Minister of Japan Junichiro Koizumi, “Japan and ASEAN in East
Asia: A Sincere and Open Partnership,” (January 14, 2002). Available at
http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/pmv0201/speech.html

9East Asian economic integration and community building.

FTA with South Korea isnext in line, and there is no reason to believe that WTO-compatible FTA between Japanand China could not be concluded forever13.
After all, Japanese changing security profiles after the end of the Cold War,
more focused upon international security and human security, correspond to this overall
direction of change.
Conclusion: Redefining Japan’s Security Profile
Skeptics may view Japanese dedication to international security, humansecurity, and regional community building as only cosmetic, while believing that more
important impulse relevant for traditional security should be encouraging Japan to
become a traditional great power.

This may well be dominant conventional wisdomamong many experts on Asian security and Japanese diplomacy in the region.

If

preoccupied with this conventional wisdom, however, one can never understand what isreally going on in Japan after the end of the Cold War, and its real implications forJapanese security policy as well as for a regional order.
The same applies to the debate about the Article Nine of the Japanese postwar
constitution.

Previously, saying that the revision should be debated sounded hawkish,

but today, various opinion-makers and politicians have begun to debate alternative
revisions with respective future images of Japan and its role in the region and theworld.
For many in Japan, to change some of the postwar “abnormal” premises of
security policy is in essence to become a “normal” country. Ichiro Ozawa started theargument soon after the end of the Cold War primarily with respect to UN
peace-keeping operations, whose role became significant in the aftermath of the collapseof the Cold War structure.
13 Any comparison between Japan and China over FTA should pay due attention to thefact that China, as a developing country, is guarded by the enabling clause of the WTO
treaty, which exempts her from complying with the no-exception rule in signing a free
trade agreement. No-exception is understood to mean covering 90% of the trading
goods in any bilateral free trade agreement, which is not usually met in case of Japan
without including agricultural products. China, on its part, it not bound by the rule,and therefore could engage in somewhat discriminatory measures such as early
harvests vis-à-vis ASEAN countries. In essence, the roles of Japan and China inregional FTA arrangements are complimentary rather than competitive.

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In these shifting debates on Japanese security policy, somewhat rightist
elements have found breathing space where they have begun to voice their beliefs andideologies loudly.

The phenomenon has proceeded side by side with the decline ofleftist political forces, which used to be the political backbone of Japanese postwar
pacifism.
In this process, postwar pacifism has not simply died away, but some elementsof pacifism have found new forms of articulating their values and beliefs.

They areusually proactive, seeking a global role, as most clearly represented by Yoichi
Funabashi’s thesis of Japan as a global civilian power.

In his theorization of Japan’s

new security profile, participation in international peace keeping operations is an
important defining factor.

Human security is another case stimulated by the same

impulse of proactive pacifism, as indicated by the words of Keizo Takemi introduced
above.
Indeed, Obuch took the initiative in picking up and promoting the concept ofhuman security along this line of thinking.

This was also demonstrated by anotherimportant initiative of Obuchi’s in establishing Prime Minister’s Commission on Japan’s
Goals in the 21st Century in 1999.

Tadashi Yamamoto of JCIE worked very closelywith Obuchi in organizing the Commission, and the Commission report, published in
January 2000 and titled The Frontier Within: Individual Empowerment and Better

Governance in the New Millennium, picked up Funabashi’s concept of Japan as a global
civilian power.
It is no secret that independence-oriented nationalists do not necessarily feelmuch sympathy with the liberal internationalism in Japan’s new security orientation.
There is no evidence to suggest, however, that they have made any serious efforts, otherthan in mass media with a view to influencing the public opinion, to grab resources in
the process of governmental policy-making away from these new security agenda totheir own priority areas such as traditional defense build-up.
In sum, the Japanese government has picked up these new security and foreign
policy agenda rather naturally, because it has suited its life-size profile as a
non-unilateralist, not-threatening security actor.

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