Waseda University Global COE Program
Global Institute for Asian Regional Integration(GIARI)

2009-E-3

The Origins of ASEAN+6: Japan’s Initiatives andthe Agent-Structure Framework*
Takashi Terada
Professor, Organization for Asian Studies,
Waseda University
August 2009*

A revised version will be published by The Pacific Review.

1. Introduction
The initial impetus behind the development of a 16-nation framework for East Asian
cooperation was provided by Japan’s Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi, who called forthe establishment of a “community” in East Asia in his speech in Singapore, in January
2002. In addition to the three Northeast Asian nations – China, Korea and Japan – andthe ten members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Koizumi
advocated that Australia and New Zealand be included as “core members” in theprocess towards the creation of an East Asian community. The East Asian regional
concept, representing a fusion of Northeast and Southeast Asia, was first formallyelaborated in foreign policy terms in the postwar period by Malaysia’s Prime Minister
Mahathir in his proposal for an East Asia Economic Group (EAEG) in December 1990
(Terada 2003). This was followed by Koizumi’s Singapore speech which indicatedJapan’s intention to proceed with regional cooperation within an “expanded” East Asian
regional concept alongside the existing ASEAN+3 framework established in 1997. The
importance of this “expanded” East Asian (what Koizumi referred to in Japanese as
kakudai higashi ajia in Singapore) regional concept – now an ASEAN+6 frameworkwith the inclusion of India which has strengthened economic ties with ASEAN since theearly 2000s – lies in the fact that the inaugural East Asian Summit (EAS) in Kuala
Lumpur in December 2005 was organised with 16 leaders from ASEAN+6 nations in
attendance. Also, in the second EAS in the Philippines in January 2007, Shinzo Abe,
Koizumi’s successor, garnered support for the establishment of a feasibility study groupof 16-nation regional integration; what Japan called the Comprehensive Economic
Partnership Agreement in East Asia (CEPEA). This move encouraged the 16-nation
framework to expand by encompassing ministerial meetings on foreign affairs, theeconomy and the energy, which was seen as a progress towards a more functionalframework for East Asian cooperation. However, while ASEAN+3 is described as “themain vehicle towards achieving an East Asian community”, EAS is referred to as
playing a “complementary” role; according to the chairperson’s statement at the second
EAS. Consequently, as long as the 16-nation framework continues to coexist with the
13-nation ASEAN+3 framework in East Asia, the argument as to which is the more
effective framework for regional cooperation and why it is necessary lingers.
This article explores the reasons behind Japan’s interest in the promotion of ASEAN+6
as an “expanded” East Asian regional concept despite the existence of ASEAN+3,
which many regional nations, including China, view as a more appropriate regional
institution. The article supports the view that the ASEAN+6 regional concept originated1/25

mainly from the concerns of Japan and the US that China’s rapid economic growth andits huge market was exerting an overwhelming influence on the political and economic
trends in the region. Subsequently, Japan attempted to resist China’s growing influence,
which was seen as detrimental to the US and Japanese interests, by involving Australia
and India who were seen as nations which shared the same basic democratic values andwho were useful counterbalances against China. The article applies an agent-structure
framework to examine the causal factors behind Japan’s advocacy of ASEAN+6, with afocus on the effect of the changes in the US-led structure on Japan. This analysis helps
to trace the impact of the US views which were incorporated into the structure on
Japan’s interest in launching the ASEAN+6 framework. It also seeks to clarify what
Japan wanted to achieve through this new regional concept. The structure follows the
direction of US foreign policy, since Japan, as a key US ally, was obliged to incorporate
the strong US influence at various stages in the policy formulation.
“One cannot understand changes in the “macro” structure of international/regional
politics without taking micro level variables into account” (Kauppi and Viotti 1993:248), and this requires acknowledging the need for domestic level analysis, including
the evolution of policy ideas. The Japanese state as an agent is methodologically divided
into the principal (Prime Ministers) and subordinate actors (the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs (MOFA) and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)). An
understanding of this structure is necessary to elucidate the process by which these two
ministries, which are directly involved in the formation of foreign economic policy,
came to promote a new regional framework in line with the foreign policy views andstances adopted by Prime Ministers Koizumi and Abe as principal actors under the
influence of the changing regional structure. A specific foreign policy can be made andpromoted only when the policy direction, created in line with political leaders’ ideas orworldviews, is compatible with the characteristics of the international structure. The
analytical approach in this article illustrates that the relevant bureaucrats invented
ASEAN+6 as a new regional integration framework under both domestic andinternational structural influences. The article then argues that the development of
ASEAN+6 as a more effective regional framework has faced difficulties which stemfrom the additional changes made to the structure, such as the US proposal for a Free
Trade Area in Asia-Pacific (FTAAP) as its competing regional integration framework,and the growing Chinese influence seen in regional financial cooperation due to theglobal financial crisis. Those structural changes have contributed to APEC and
ASEAN+3 emerging as stronger competing regional institutions on trade and financial
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cooperation, respectively, and this article concludes that Japan has been compelled to be
integral in this transformation, culminating in the growing competition over regional
concepts to promote financial and trade cooperation in East Asia.
2. Agent-structure analysis
There has been a great deal of literature on international relations written from a
constructivist perspective that explores the relationship between individuals and thestate, as well as that between the state and the world. This literature uses anagent-structure framework, an analytical tool that has been mainly developed insociology (Hollis and Smith 1990, Wendt 1999, and Wight 2006). With regard to therelationship between the agents and the structure, whether the agents determine the formof the structure or whether structure determines the direction in which the agents act –or whether both of these patterns even exist – is open to argument (Rittberger et al.:169). Yet, for any new foreign policy approach to be created, the re-evaluation of policy
goals and priorities is necessary, and this largely depends on the values and ideas of theindividuals responsible for the policy and whether they find it desirable or necessary tochange the standard, direction, or purpose of existing policy. Certainly, transformationsin the international structure, such as the end of the Cold War, influence changes in theforeign policies of states and foster increasing economic interdependence among nations.
This can in turn have an impact on, say, the emergence of a new regional institution.
However, it is the policy elites who perceive the changes in the international structure
surrounding their states and who decide how and to what extent the foreign policy of
their states needs to be changed, or whether a new policy needs to be created. It is after
all individuals who “provide the source of value, and they are the main standard bywhich to assess the quality of outcomes in international relations” (Adler et al. 1991:
12).
Individual input into foreign policy making is affected by the positions and roles ofindividuals in institutions or organisations and their influence in wider external
environments. Actor-focus analysis in the agent-structure framework appears useful in
identifying factors which cause states to “react quite differently to similar material
circumstances”. This is because policy is formulated and implemented by individuals
who have “fundamental differences in normative beliefs about policies’ among
themselves” (Goldstein and Keohane 1993: 16). There is another reason to see theanalytical focus on policy-elites or their organisations as appropriate in identifying
casual factors behind the emergence of the ASEAN+6 framework as a rival to the
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existing ASEAN+3 framework; namely, the nature and style of Japanese policy-making.
Calder (1988) claimed that Japan is a reactive state because its inertial implementationof foreign economic policy is only promoted by outside pressures, mainly from the US,
implying that US influence is deeply embedded in Japanese foreign policymaking
system. American’s strong influence on Japan’s Asian regionalism policy, for instance,
can be illustrated by its voluntary abandonment of its participation in the East Asian
Economic Caucus (EAEC) in the early 1990s and the proposal of its own AsianMonetary Fund (AMF) in 1997. This patron-client nature in the US-Japan relationshipcan point to the usefulness of the structural-agent approach in understanding Japan’s
reactive behaviour in formulating Asian policy.
One important change in the analysis of Japan’s Asia policy including regional
integration is that the structural pattern impacting on the direction of Japanese policy
now includes the China factor as an additional influential source. This has meant therise of China as a component of the structure, thereby encroaching on a system hitherto
dominated by US influence. In fact, the uniforming impacts on some or all of theregional states have been so significant that foreign policy orientations among thosecountries, including Japan, have converged on China. The top-down analytical approach
can help to evaluate the logicality or suitability of this observation, although it can only
be intuitionally inferred. The bottom-up approach, in contrast, can more precisely
identify the actual causations by tracing the perceptions, ideas, or roles of individuals ororganisations in domestic politics that appear to have influenced the emergence of theASEAN+6 framework. Accordingly, to show the rise of China as an independent
variable in Japan’s proposal of an ASEAN+6 framework, this article begins to analyse
the Japanese state which can be divided into two types of actors in terms of different
policy-making functions; predominant Prime Ministers and subordinate relevant
ministries. This is done in order to specify how these Japanese actors have invented a
new regional concept by responding to the rise of China. The article then characterises
the transforming regional structure including the rise of China on the basis of theperceptions of these Japanese policy elites.
3. The Japanese state as an agent: Prime Ministers as Principal Actors
Here, the function of the Japanese state as an agent is analysed by shedding light on therole of the principal actors which, in this case, refers to political leaders, especially
Prime Ministers, and to the subordinate agents which include the relevant bureaucracy
such as the MOFA and the METI.
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The US alliance system which originated in the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty has
permeated the foreign policy-making process as the decisive foreign policy norm, andthe relationship with the US has been always of foremost concern among Japaneseleaders in the postwar period. Japan has thus tended to try to prevent major disturbancesin this bilateral relationship, ultimately driving Japan to follow American interests in theinternational arena. This foreign policy predisposition, caused by the US-led bipolarstructure, is not so radically different from the one observed during the post-Cold War
era. It is necessary to discern how the US saw the changing structure in East Asia and to
identify how the US perceptions influenced the development of Japanese interest in
forming the ASEAN+6 framework.
East Asia has emerged as an increasingly significant region in international politics andeconomics, and the global acknowledgement of the significance of East Asia, especiallyin the US, has been mainly attributed to the rise of China (Shirk 2007). Putting it simply,
the rise of China has meant that a traditional political power, which used to lackeconomic prowess, is now emerging as a potential superpower, whose politicalinfluence is backed by continuous high economic growth, impacting both political andeconomic spheres on a global scale. This also means that China’s power projection isbacked by its economic growth, which has become a growing source of US concern.
For instance, the then US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld stated that China’s
improved ballistic missile system would allow Chinese missiles to “reach targets inmany areas of the world . . . Since no nation threatens China, one wonders: Why thisgrowing investment? Why these continuing large and expanding arms purchases?”(Straits Times 5 June 2005). This concern over China's increasing military build-up waswell reflected in the subsequent Quadrennial Defence Review (Department of Defence,
2006: 29) which declared China as “the greatest potential to compete militarily with the
US and field disruptive military technologies that could over time off set traditional U.S.
military advantages absent U.S. counter strategies.”
Excluded from a growing East Asian regional institution such as ASEAN+3, which
China uses “as a shield to avoid other big powers’ pressure by the maintenance of good
relations with other regional members to avoid containment coalitions with foreign big
powers” (Zhang and Tang 2005:54), the US judged China’s potential ascendancy in East
Asia – in conjunction with its political and economic rise – as being undesirable for its
own interests (Christensen 2006). The economic diplomacy that China has been
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executing to frustrate the containment that a US coalition might form has involved theprocess of “knitting together the ‘spokes’ of the US-centred hub-and-spoke
security-alliance system, and connecting them more closely with governments lessfriendly to Washington” (Frost: 2007:98). Consequently, an FTA proposal with ASEAN
by China, which had previously been focused on negotiations concerning its accession
to the WTO and had opposed discriminatory regional integration approach (Straits
Times, 22 November 2000), represented a policy turnaround, and symbolised China’s
serious commitment to regional commercial diplomacy. The US was worried that China
could gain a predominant influence as ASEAN+3 continued to grow, and this wasshared by not only Japan, but also by other nations such as Indonesia and Singapore.
Singapore, for instance, considered it difficult for any nation including Japan to block
China’ predominance within ASEAN+3 and it feared China would be a rule-setter as aresult1. Thus, there emerged a view that a China-centred East Asian community may
eventually emerge (Drysdale 2005:15), despite the fact that the original idea was
advocated by Koizumi in Singapore.
The Koizumi and Abe period (2001-07) constituted the most responsive and reactive
government in history to US regional concerns. During his term in office as Japan’sPrime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi – the first Japanese Prime Minister in almost 20
years to complete the full term as President for the Liberal Democratic Party – expended
his greatest energies on the strengthening of the U.S.-Japan alliance based on his
personal rapport with US President Bush. To provide support for the US in Afghanistan
and Iraq, Koizumi managed to widen the operational scope of the Self Defence Forces(SDFs), which was limited by Constitution Article 9, by enacting special laws to
dispatch SDFs to these areas. In this way, Koizumi found a method of fulfilling Japan’s
obligation as a US ally in the war against terrorism. The US-Japan alliance was thefoundation for shaping his Asian policy, as Koizumi (2006) explained: “The US is the
only nation in the world which says that an attack or aggression against Japan is anaggression or attack against their own country … With Japan-US relations as the basis, I
will advance our cooperative relations with China, the ROK, and other countries in Asiaand the rest of the world”. As a result, the relations between the two nations during the
Koizumi era were seen as having been at their most favourable point in the entire
postwar period, illustrating the preoccupation of Koizumi’s foreign policy withstrengthening the US-Japan alliance. Thus, he tended not to allocate much energy toefforts to improve Japanese relations with China and Korea, which were substantially1

Personal interview with senior official in Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 April 2008, Tokyo.

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strained due mainly to his annual visit to the Yasukuni Shrine.
It was Koizumi who advocated the establishment of an East Asian community by
expressing the desire that Australia and New Zealand should be core members of that
community. Following this, Japan endeavoured to support Australia’s involvement in
the region, with the result that Australia’s participation in the EAS was realized in Kuala
Lumpur in 2005. The inclusion of Australia in East Asia was further promoted by
Koizumi through agreeing to set a feasibility study for an FTA between Japan andAustralia, and the decision by Koizumi was a form of reward for Australia’s decision toincrease its troop numbers in Iraq in order to provide support for Japan’s SDFs. The
increasing awareness of Australia’s strategic importance in Japan’s foreign policy
strategy, as observed in the Japan-Australia Joint Declaration on Security in March 2007,
launched by Abe and Howard, was a factor in Japan’s proposal of an ASEAN+6
framework that included Australia as a part of East Asia.
While, as Prime Minister, Abe stopped visiting the Yasukuni Shrine with a view torepairing relations with these countries, he initially pursued a highly
ideologically-coloured foreign policy, for example, by promoting ties with nations thatshare common values with Japan, such as the rule of law and democracy. Built on thisbelief, Abe (2006) insisted on organising a summit meeting among Japan, Australia, theUS and India, all of which, he believed, share universal values such as democracy andrespect for human rights. The purpose behind this assertion was to discuss the ways ofmaking East Asian countries, including China, accept these values. For instance, in his
speech at the Indian Parliament on 22 August 2007, Abe (2007) introduced a new
regional concept, a “broader Asia” by stating that “the Pacific and the Indian Oceans are
now bringing about a dynamic coupling as seas of freedom and of prosperity. A"broader Asia" that broke away geographical boundaries is now beginning to take on a
distinct form”. Abe’s message to India was to promote regional cooperation together
within this regional framework, further by incorporating the US and Australia. One
purpose behind the proposal was mentioned later in Abe’s speech when he revealed that
“I feel that it is imperative that the democratic nations located at opposite edges of theseseas deepen the friendship among their citizens at every possible level.” Why did Abeneed to introduce the new concept of a “broader Asia”, despite the fact that Australia
and India were already members of the EAS, and that they had thus been acknowledged
as East Asian nations? One nation which the EAS does not include, but Abe considered
to be an essential country in this new regional concept, was the US. In this sense, the
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Abe government was more explicit in expressing its desire to promote an exclusive
group of democratic nations, centring on the US, than the Koizumi government.
4. Subordinate actors: MOFA and METI
Although MOFA and METI are expected to coordinate the formulation of foreign
economic policy in lines with policy or political preferences of their political leaders, itis well known that there has traditionally been a “territorial” conflict between the
MOFA and the METI with regard to the formulation of external economic policy (Fukui
1981:296–7). It has often been the case that a policy promoted by one of theseministries has been presented as “national” policy in the absence of any consultation
with the other ministry and subsequent revision of the policy. MITI, for example,
supported the establishment of APEC in 1989, but MOFA, having previously opposed
the new organization, only involved itself at the stage of the Senior Officials’ Meeting(SOM) held directly before the meeting of APEC members (Terada 1999). There has
also been insufficient consultation and adjustment of policy between the ministries withregard to the proposal of an ASEAN+6 approach. In fact, when METI announced aproposal for this 16-nation regional integration plan in April 2006 it did not consult
MOFA, the ministry responsible for coordinating foreign policy and diplomacy, which
did not conceal its dissatisfaction with the way which its rival ministry treated (Asahi
Shimbun, 28 July 2006).
In general, METI has perceived the 16-nation regional integration framework with theaim of creating a single market in East Asia, while MOFA has viewed it as acomprehensive political framework like the EAS for keeping regional stability, as canbe seen in the text of then-Prime Minister Koizumi’s 2002 Singapore address, thedrafting of which MOFA had a responsibility. MOFA has sought regional integration in
East Asia by means of the ongoing conclusion of numerous bilateral FTAs among
various regional countries. While the orientation of the two ministries differs in this way,
they are in agreement in their conception of the members of a 16-nation framework. In
other words, while their agendas differ, the direction of these rivals in the steering ofJapan’s economic policy overlaps in the promotion of an “expanded East Asia”
framework, and the promotion of this approach can be understood to represent national
policy. This is because this new approach to regional integration has been systematizedby the two ministries based on consideration of the foreign policy orientations of thePrime Ministers Koizumi and Abe, as discussed above.

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METI initially supported the ASEAN+3 approach. In 2002 the Ministry proposed the“East Asia Free Business Zone Initiative,” the intention of which was to create asystematic framework for cooperative relationships that had developed in practice asJapanese companies expanded into East Asia, in order to ensure markets in the region
and to reduce regional trade costs (METI 2003). Therefore, ASEAN’s decision to form a
regional economic community by 2015 was a welcome move to METI as this move tothe regional community, together with the proliferation of bilateral FTAs among themembers, was supposed to promote liberalization and economic reform to increase theattractiveness of the region as a whole to outside investors (Munakata 2001: 21). At thetime, the Ministry saw this zone as comprising 13 nations; India and Australia/New
Zealand were not considered potential members. In 1999, the year of the first joint
declaration by the ASEAN+3 heads of government in Manila, MOFA also regarded theASEAN+3 Leaders’ Summit as a de facto “East Asian Summit”, and worked to promote
the framework. The Ministry believed that ASEAN+3 could play a role inconstructively involving China in East Asia and in the system of global governance(Owada 2000). This intention to promote China’s involvement in the region via
ASEAN+3 indicates that Japan at the time did not perceive China as having an ambition
to predominate in East Asia, indicting the China factor did not influence Japan’s
regional integration policy.
China’s proposal of an FTA with ASEAN at the ASEAN+3 Summit held in Singapore in
October 2000, as an initial causal factor behind the regional structural change, resulted
in a major reversal of this Japanese approach to involvement in East Asia. This proposal
was the motivation for MOFA to include Australia in a framework for East Asian
cooperation, and its impact also prompted METI to begin to pursue a Japan-ASEAN
FTA. China’s FTA with ASEAN, signalling a reversal in the nation’s trade policy, had asignificant impact in the region, even, as discussed above, resulting in the proposal forthe formation of an East Asian regional FTA, which had been a subject of discussion
since the previous year, being positioned as a future goal for ASEAN+3.
According to a MOFA official (personal interview, 9 April 2003,Tokyo), some top
senior officials in MOFA believed that Japan would be isolated within an East Asian
framework, in which most of the members are developing countries, whereas China
could be seen as a representative in this group. MOFA officials believed that Japan
would face difficulty in injecting considerations that reflected the perspectives ofdeveloped countries. For these reasons, these MOFA officials hoped that Australia
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would see the need to join Japan in an attempt to be more committed to creating better
relations with Southeast Asia, with which China has also been engaged in making
cooperative relations. Hitoshi Tanaka, who, as a Vice-Minister at MOFA, had been
responsible for drafting Koizumi’s Singapore speech, and represented this school within
MOFA commented: “In my heart I truly hope Australia will participate in the East Asia
summit . . . We have worked very hard to make it possible. We are doing this not forAustralia’s sake, but for Japan’s sake. We need you . . . I have a very strong feelingabout our co-operation with Australia and I have been advocating it for a long time”(The Australian, 28 May 2005). It is no exaggeration to say that the Tanaka’s strong
interest in Australia as a core partner in his proposed idea of an East Asian community
was driven as a result of his consideration about the changing regional structure spurredby China.
When China’s concessions resulted in the commencement of FTA negotiations between
China and ASEAN in November 2001, Japan experienced a deepening sense offrustration. Toshiya Tsugami, then METI senior official, mentioned that “the prospect ofan ASEAN-China FTA stunned and shocked Japan” and that Japan feared China would
manipulate the FTA to “kick out Japan from the East Asian economic and politicalcircles” (Business Times 2 April 2003). Southeast Asia was a region in which Japandeveloped extensive economic and business relations over the past 30 years ininvestment, aid, trade, human resource development and technology transfer, and Japanwas concerned that this special relationship between itself and Southeast Asia, built up
over decades at both business and governmental levels, might fade away with the tie-up
between China and ASEAN. Singapore and Indonesia, two of the main members of
ASEAN, only established diplomatic relations with China in 1990, and China became a
dialogue partner of ASEAN in 1996, more than 20 years after Japan. However, until
China’s proposal, Japan had not considered the establishment of an FTA with ASEAN
as a single economic unit, focusing rather on a bilateral approach advanced chiefly by
the MOFA. Japan found it inevitable to follow what China had established and proposed
a FTA with ASEAN in 2002, despite the fact that Japan actually did not commence the
FTA negotiation with ASEAN until mid-2005 while hastening to complete bilateral
FTAs with most of ASEAN individual members, based on its stronger economic andbusiness ties through especially ODA (Terada 2009).
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Japan’s increasing strategic interest in Australia, stemming from its awareness ofChina’s influence in the region, can be observed not only in relation to the politicalissue of the EAS, but also in the economic field, in relation to FTAs. ASEAN Senior
Economic Officials Meetings were held for the first time in a 16-nation configuration,
adding India, Australia and New Zealand to ASEAN+3 nations, in August 2006 in
Kuala Lumpur, but Japan, as discussed above, had already proposed the concept of an
East Asian FTA based on these 16 nations in April 2006. Japan had previously regarded
East Asia as made up of 13 nations, and had promoted regional integration on the basisof this regional framework. However, taking into consideration a number of factors,
including India’s high level of growth and its huge market and Australia’s role as a large
natural resource supplier, in addition to the fact that India, Australia and New Zealand
had already commenced FTA negotiations with ASEAN, METI proposed theestablishment of an FTA within an “expanded East Asian” framework. Japan was inparticular highly reliant on Australia as a stable supplier of resources, given that it
supplied 60% of the nation’s coal and iron ore and 25% of its uranium, and theparticipation of Australia in a framework for East Asian integration was therefore an
important consideration for the nation (DFAT 2005).
In promoting this approach, METI stressed the economic benefits that increased
interdependence would bring. For example, the Ministry pointed out the advantages of a“+6” FTA by indicating that the conclusion of an FTA between ASEAN+3 would
increase Japan’s GDP by approximately 4 trillion yen and the combined GDP of thesignatories by approximately 20 trillion yen, while an FTA between ASEAN+6 would
increase Japan’s GDP by approximately 5 trillion yen and the combined GDP of thesignatory nations by approximately 25 trillion yen (METI, 2006). At the same time,
METI also launched the proposal of the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN andEast Asia (ERIA), which aims to serve as an “East Asian OECD,” to formulate policy
proposals and coordinating policy research networks towards regional economic
integration. METI set up a new division for promoting East Asian economic integration
within the International Trade Policy Bureau in October 2006 to efficiently manage
ERIA including the budget planning. The 16-nation approach had begun with the EAS,
an organization with no full-scale secretariat function. METI’s proposal sought toprovide a foundation for the promotion of the approach via the creation of an institution
for the coordination of relevant policy, and it can be seen as a statement of intent on
Japan’s part that it sought to exert leadership within the 16-nation framework.
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Behind this proposal, however, like MOFA’s proposal of the EAS, was the intention todrive a wedge into the 13-nation ASEAN+3 framework advocated by China. Thisintention was generated by Japan’s concern that a China-led approach to regional
integration, in which China acted as a representative of the developing nations, would
make it difficult to achieve progress in areas in which Japan sought cooperation, such as
liberalization of the services sector and protection of intellectual property rights (Nikkei,
15 January 2007). Despite the fact that ASEAN voiced no objections to a 16-nation FTA
and India, Australia and New Zealand actively supported the proposal, Yi Xiao Zhun,
the Vice Minister of China’s Ministry of Commerce, opposed the concept, indicatingthat ASEAN+3 was the main platform for East Asian economic integration and that theeffort to realise regional integration should continue to be promoted within the
13-nation framework (Jiji Press, 24 August 2006). China further attempted to cement
the framework, proposing in September 2004 the establishment of a study group on the
13-nation approach, bringing together scholars in the region, and commencing research
on an FTA based on the ASEAN+3 framework. Primer Wen Jiabao (2004) alsoannounced that US$200,000 would be provided to the ASEAN Secretariat in order tofurther advance the 10+3 framework. However, these initiatives were interpreted by
METI as indicating a strong desire on China’s part to take over leadership of the East
Asian region, and it recognized the 16-nation approach as an effective countermeasure(Nikkei, 28 July 2006). Despite the fact that an FTA between China and Japan will beessential to the success of East Asian integration and China is supposed to be interest in
it, Japan has not as yet made any move at the official level towards the realization of an
FTA with its largest trading partner, partly illustrating a worrisome impact of China’s
FTA move on Japan.
5. Structure level of analysis
The article has so far identified Japan’s interest in forming the ASEAN+6 framework
through the individual and ministerial level of analysis. It then moves to the regional
structural level analysis, focusing on what structural features Japan’s response to the riseof China created in East Asia. First, China’s active East Asian diplomacy mainly
through ASEAN and ASEAN+3 and Japan’s subsequent response to it through theestablishment of ASEAN+6 led to a power struggle between both countries over which
would take the lead in the holding of the EAS. The ASEAN-Japan Commemorative
Summit, held in Tokyo in December 2003, set a precedent in inviting the ASEAN
leaders to a summit meeting outside the Southeast Asian region. Influenced by this,
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China announced its desire to hold the first EAS with the participation of the leaders ofJapan and South Korea in addition to the ASEAN leaders. The rivalry between the twonations manifested itself in a number of ways. Japan distributed a “concept paper”
concerning cooperation in East Asia, including the EAS, to the nations involved; China
countered with a “modality paper” concerning the holding of the summit. In addition,
Japan opposed China’s proposal to host the second summit, and proposed that Japan
should jointly chair the first summit with the host Malaysia. China answered this bystressing that only the host country should act as chair (Terada 2005:4-5). The rivalry
between China and Japan over who should take the initiative in organising the first EAS
added legitimacy to ASEAN’s claim to take the lead in holding it, with a catchphrase“sit in driver’s seat”. ASEAN was able to set three conditions for participation in thefirst EAS: that the participant country should (1) be a member of the Treaty of Amity
and Cooperation (TAC) or be willing to become a member, (2) be a complete ASEAN
Dialogue Partner, and (3) have substantive relations with ASEAN. The contention
between China and Japan therefore actually functioned to the organization’s benefit. In
fact, neither China’s offer to host the second summit nor Japan’s proposal to act as joint
chair of the first summit was realized, as both refrained themselves from pushing their
proposals strongly as a result of considering ASEAN’s concern. The China-Japan rivalry
was one reason why ASEAN, despite its inferiority to those nations in terms of
economic scale and political influence, was able to take the stronger role in the first
EAS process.
This ASEAN-centred approach to East Asian cooperation also appears to be employedin the field of FTAs, as seen in the development of ASEAN+1 framework, in which
ASEAN has acted as a single collective trading partner for its external regional counties.
This is a foundation for METI consider CEPEA by combining five ASEAN+1 FTAs.
Importantly, China’s proposal of FTA with ASEAN in 2000 made a large contribution tothis movement, because, prior to this, ASEAN had never been regarded as a unit in the
East Asian trade structure, and no nations had commenced FTA negotiations with theorganization. China’s proposal accelerated the speed of market integration in ASEAN,
which had previously lacked unity as a regional organization, especially after the Asianfinancial crisis, and inspired other nations specially to seek to conclude FTA with theassociation, and this trend has influenced the present vision of East Asian regional
integration with ASEAN as the hub. Yet, given most of ASEAN members chose Japanas its first and only bilateral FTA partner, underscoring Japan’s distinctive status as themost significant trading and investment partner as well as aid giver in Southeast Asia,
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the FTA diffusion was also attributed to Japan whose initial FTA strategy, based on
those strong economic ties, promoted bilateral rather than ASEAN FTAs, distinguishingits FTA approach from those of China. Most of ASEAN members decided to start FTAs
with Japan as a result of the concern about trade diversion to be caused by pre-existing
FTAs signed by Japan with other regional countries (Terada 2009).
Second, the only institutional difference between ASEAN+3 and ASEAN+6 lies in themembership; the latter includes India, Australia and New Zealand, additionally, andJapan’s interest in ASEAN+6 supported the involvement of these three extra regionalcountries in East Asia. As mentioned in the domestic analytical level, METI especiallyfound it significant that the deepening involvement of three nations in the region
through the conclusion of FTAs with regional countries resulted in an increased regional
economic interdependence that encompasses these nations and established thefoundation for the development of a 16-nation regional framework. In the case ofAustralia, the foreign policy priorities of the Howard government, which came into
office in 1996, clearly differed from those of the Labor governments of Bob Hawke andPaul Keating (1983-1996), with shifts in focus from economic diplomacy to security
issues, from a concentration on relations with East Asia to relations with the US and theUK, and from regionalism to bilateralism.
As a result, in 1999, pressing Indonesia to accept the presence of an international
peacekeeping force during the struggle over the independence of East Timor, Prime
Minister Howard announced the Howard Doctrine, which would see Australia directly
involving itself in regional security as a “deputy sheriff” for the US (Hogue 2000). In
2002, following a bomb attack in Bali, he indicated that he would not rule out
pre-emptive strikes by Australia in Southeast Asia in order to prevent terrorism. Thesestatements aroused indignation in Southeast Asia, and clouded relations between
Australia and the nations of the region. In addition, as the importance of APEC, which
had long been highly valued by Australia under the Labor governments, began to
decline, ASEAN+3, from which Australia was excluded, emerged as an influential new
regional framework, and Australia found itself lacking an effective foundation for
significant involvement in East Asia. The nation’s isolation from the region wasperceived to deepen.
However, following his election to a fourth term in office in October 2004, John
Howard’s foreign policy orientation underwent a transition. The government actively
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engaged in building closer relationships in East Asia, in particular working to improve
relations with Indonesia and Malaysia, which had deteriorated significantly. These
efforts resulted in visits to Canberra by the leaders of both nations in May 2005. This
represented the first visit to Canberra by a Malaysian prime minister in 23 years, and thefact that progress towards the conclusion of bilateral FTAs could also be observed won
praise for the results of Howard’s East Asian diplomacy from influential figures who
had previously been vocal critics, such as former Prime Minister Paul Keating. The
conclusion of bilateral FTAs also proceeded in parallel with the improvement inrelations with Southeast Asia, with Australia concluding FTAs with Singapore in 2003
and Thailand in 20052. Australia’s effort to be engaged in East Asia was a welcome
move to Japan, and Japan tried to convince Australia to sign TAC, a precondition for it
to be invited to EAS. Japan had examined the impact and implications of TAC for its
foreign policy for it to sign in 2004, and the result of the analysis was delivered toAustralia through its Embassy in Tokyo. Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura thensuggested his counterpart, Alexander Downer, in their meeting in March 2005, that
Australia sign the TAC which, Machimura argued, would not cause any serious
problem for Australia’s foreign policy (Terada 2005: 16). Japan’s encouragement
played a useful role for Australia’s participation in EAS.
India has been pursuing a Look East policy since the mid-1990s, and in line with thishas been steadily strengthening its ties with ASEAN. India became a dialogue partner at
the ASEAN Summit in 1995, and has rapidly moved closer to Southeast Asia since 2000,
being involved in the first ASEAN+1 Summit held in Phnom Penh in 2002, andagreeing to FTA negotiations with ASEAN at the ASEAN+1 Summit held the following
year. As was the case of Japan, the impetus for India’s desire to strengthen its economic
relations with ASEAN was provided by China’s proposal for an FTA with theorganization in 2000 (Shiino 2005). India’s deepening interest in the Bay of Bengal
Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC),
participated in by India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand and Sri Lanka, was also
stimulated by its status as a means of responding to China’s increasing influence
through entrenching regional cooperation with the countries involved (Zhao, 2007:
124).
2

Like Australia and India, New Zealand has sought to realize a policy of increased involvement in East Asia via

FTAs. New Zealand concluded bilateral FTAs with Singapore in 2001 and Thailand in 2005, and a quadrilateral FTA
with Singapore, Chile and Brunei in 2006, and became China’s first FTA partner among the developed nations.

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As touched upon, these trends on the part of India, which also strengthened strategic
relationship with the US like the case of Australia, were encouraging for Japan to form a
regional force checking China’s increasing influence together. In fact, it was Japan thatstrongly backed India when the latter offered the strongest objections to China’s
intention to establish an East Asian community based on a ASEAN+3 basis rather than a
16-nation EAS basis during the first EAS in 2005 (Terada 2005). Furthermore, thecommencement for FTA negotiations between Japan and India was agreed upon when
Prime Minister Singh’s visit to Japan in December 2006, a move that initiated by
Koizumi and signed by Abe. Japan’s interest in India as a balancer against China wasalso palpable in strategic arena. For instance, Abe’s support for the quadrilateralapproach sustained by his emphasis on values such as democracy and human rights
came to be strengthened after he met with the US Vice-President Dick Cheney in
February 2007. They discussed the idea of India’s possible participation in Japan,
Australia and the US, to form a quadrilateral grouping among like-minded democraticnations3. This proposal led to an experimental attempt to form the grouping through theorganization of an informal meeting in May 2007, participated by representatives fromthe four nations as a sideline meeting of the ASEAN Regional Forum. China was waryof such a move and issued “formal diplomatic protests to Australia, Japan, and India outof concern that they were forming a security alliance with the US against China”(Chanlett-Avery and Vaughn, 2008:3). Japan’s effort to strengthen the strategic relations
with India continued even after Abe, as it was chosen as its third nation, after the US
and Australia, that launched a joint security declaration in November 2008.
In sum, Japan has at various turns become a follower or a reactive player to China’s
strategic moves that caused the structural changes in East Asia, but Japan’s effort topreclude China’s regional predominance partly through the formation of ASEAN+6
served to sustain regional cooperation since ASEAN was more integrated towards asingle player and Australia’s and India’s regional engagement was encouraged.
6. Further structural changes
Whether ASEAN+6 will develop as an effective regional cooperation/integration
framework depends on the continuation of global and regional structures that prescribed
the conditions which Japanese leaders perceived in formulating this regional integration
scheme. Yet, there have been several critical changes in the US-led structure, a3

http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/n-america/us/vpv0702.html.

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significant determinant of Japanese international behaviour, which have created agloomy prospect for the development of ASEAN+6. Firstly, the US itself has pushed forthe development FTAAP, as a competing regional integration scheme based on APEC.
Secondly, the global financial crisis, which represents both the eroding international
influence of the US and the growing international role of China with the world largest
foreign reserves, has resulted in increasing calls for financial cooperation rather thantrade liberalisation, an area that ASEAN+6 does not entail as a cooperative agenda.
While the US strongly supported the realisation of the EAS involving Australia andIndia, it was disappointed at having been excluded from market integration schemes
such as METI’s CEPEA. Partly motivated by what has been dubbed the “Nikai shock”
by a US official (named after the then METI Minister), the US decided to push for
FTAAP idea utilising APEC (Nikkei, 12 November 2006), meaning that there are now
three economic superpowers in competition in terms of their different approaches to
Asian integration; ASEAN+3, ASEAN+6, and FTAAP. In fact, industry bodies such as
the National Association of Manufacturers and the US Chamber of Commerce andIndustry have voiced their support of the plan, having feared the exclusion of the US asa result of the rising tide of East Asian regionalism (Jiji Press 5 February 2008).. It is
still unlikely, however, that FTAAP negotiations will commence immediately, although
the US announcement to participate in an FTA formed in 2005 among Singapore, Chile,
New Zealand and Brunei, called the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership(TPP), has paved the way towards the eventual formation of FTAAP. If other countries,
as Australia, Peru and Vietnam already did, seek to become involved and if the “TPPplus X” negotiations began; then the critical mass towards the formation of an FTAAP
may be reached. Although the US interest behind the decision to participate in TTP was
not to secure export markets due to the smaller size of markets in the original four
members, the US regarded the TPP as a model for FTAAP because it was a“high-quality” FTA under which tariffs on all products would be eliminated by 2015, as
former Assistant US Trade Representative, Wendy Cutler stated (Nikkei 20 October2008).
The US-led FTAAP may make it difficult for Japan to vigorously promote CEPEA sincesome key members of APEC have developed an interest in FTAAP through their initial
participation in TTP. The number of trade negotiators in most of the Asia Pacificgovernments is not large enough to be engaged in multiple negotiations including bothbilateral and regional FTAs at one time. The prospects for CEPEA would become more
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uncertain if Japan’s rivals like South Korea, which has already signed an FTA with the
US and almost completed one with the EU, decided to join TTP. Although China is yet
to declare its interest in TTP, President Hu said China was ready to examine thepossibility of joining FTAAP (China Daily 25 November 2008). While the expansion of
the TPP appears to be perhaps a more practical way of providing the momentum for theformation of an FTAAP, no such scenario, based on the actual regional FTA situations,
can yet be drawn in CEPEA.
While MOFA considered and supported the involvement of Australia as well as India bytaking into account the US concern about the rise of China and the nature of ASEAN+3,
a process where undemocratic or developing economies dominate and the views ofdeveloped or democratic nations would not be easily reflected, METI’s interest in theframework was based on India’s and Australia’s economic role as the fastest growing
largest economy and stable energy resource supplier, respectively. In addition, METI
was worried that the US had less interest in Asian affairs under President Bush who was
too preoccupied with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As a senior trade official in METI
mentioned, the idea that CEPEA did not include the US was partly to call America’s
serious attention to Asian affairs, especially East Asian integration in which the US
signed a bilateral FTA with Singapore only.4 Noboru Hatakeyama (2007) a former
Vice-Minister of the Ministry, also indicated that participation by the US would be
difficult if an East Asian FTA were to be formed, because the US does notgeographically belong in East Asia. Japan invited US interest in the region, but,ironically, it used TTP as a way of eventually realising that FTAAP which Japan founddifficult to join. The comment made at the 2008 Peru summit by Toshihiro Nikai,
Japan’s Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, to the effect that he had to hold off on
giving direct answers (Jiji Press 21 November 2008) suggests that Japan has also
received overtures regarding participation in TTP, although Japan is not in a position to
support it as potential members in TTP include big agricultural exporters such as
Australia and the US (Nikkei 19 May 2009).
The second structural change that negatively affected the prospects for ASEAN+6 is theglobal financial crisis that has helped enhance China’s international voice and thefinancial cooperation which has been seen as a more urgent area to be tackledinternationally. Financial cooperation, especially the Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI), a
network of bilateral currency swap agreements designed to prevent another Asia
4

Personal interview with a senior official of METI, 7 August 2007, Tokyo.

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financial crisis, has evolved around the ASEAN+3 framework, and it is the policy turf
dominated by the Ministry of Finance (MOF) in Japan that has been hardly involved in
the policy formation of ASEAN+6. It was senior officials of MOF such as Eisuke
Sakakibara and Haruhiko Kuroda during the 1997 Asian financial crisis that proposed
the establishment of an AMF, an Asian version of the IMF, although the scheme was
opposed by the US out of concern over moral hazards, in addition to an insufficient
explanation of the concept which generated suspicion regarding Japan’s true motives in
China and other Asian nation (Amyx 2002). As a result, the proposal was not realized,
and the ASEAN+3 nations have worked to increase their foreign reserves, as well as toexpand their CMI bilateral networks. Yet, CMI‘s links with the IMF through the 20
percent conditionality made it difficult for East Asian countries to use CMI. This was
especially true for Thailand, Indonesia, and Korea; all of whom had traumatic
experiences in securing IMF-led rescue packages during the 1997 Asian crisis. In 2008,
Korea borrowed directly from the US by extending the bilateral swap agreement ($30
billion) and increased the amount of reserves in its arrangements with Japan and China
to avoid relying on the IMF and the CMI. Korn, the Thai Finance Minister, has statedthat there was a widespread perception in East Asia that it was an act of suicide to relyon the IMF in light of domestic politics (Asahi Shimbun 27 February 2009).
Yet, the ASEAN+3 Finance Ministers’ Meeting, held in Indonesia in May 2009, agreed
to expand the total amount of CMI to US$120 billion from $84 billion and agreed on
the contributions by all of the member states including Hong Kong. It was also decided
to establish financial surveillance and monitoring systems, independent from the IMF,
and to multilateralise bilateral swap arrangements, thereby encouraging a move towards
the de facto realisation of the AMF. Through the multilateralisation of CMI, for instance,
the amount of funding could be increased and negotiations could be consolidated;
thereby CMI could serve as a regional lender that would be capable of responding in theevent of a recurrence of financial crisis in the form of multilateral assistance. Also, as
the previous ASEAN+3 Finance Ministers had already indicated in February 2009 bystating that “after the surveillance mechanism becomes fully effective in its function,
the IMF de-linked portion may be increased from 20 percent”, ASEAN+3 isstrengthening its position as a more autonomous regional institution.
Importantly, China has been emerging as a leader in regional financial cooperation, a
position that used to be predominantly occupied by Japan who played a prominent rolein the 1997 Asian financial crisis, and Japanese competition with China over the leading
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role in regional financial cooperation is an additional case to the patterned competition
illustrated in the aforementioned cases of the FTA and EAS. China’s proposal toeventually replace the US dollar as a main reserve currency with the SDR; as explicatedby PBC Governor, Zhou, stimulated MOF which saw China’s proposal as an attempt toincrease the presence of the Reminbi in the payment of trades and investments in East
Asia. MOF responded to China’s challenge by deciding to offer swap arrangements inyen ($60 billion US dollar equivalent), in a form separate from CMI. This first kind of
proposal was intended to increase the utilisation of the yen in Asian trades andinvestments, seeing China’s interest in using its own currency (Nikkei, 3 May 2009).
Competition between China and Japan evolved over which should make the greater
contribution. For instance, when the first official summit between Japan, Korea, andChina was held in December 2008 in Fukuoka, Japan and China decided to increase
their financial commitment to their bilateral swaps with Korea – whose currency was
substantially devaluated at that time. The issue was heavily contested as to which would
provide the larger amount. Both eventually agreed to contribute equally; China
increased from $4 billion to $30 billion, while Japan increased from $13 billion to $30
billion. The battle over “which pays more” was also seen in the abovementioned
multilateralisation of CMI in May 2009; again, both agreed to provide equal
contributions of $38.4 billion for the settlement, although the Chinese contribution
includes one by Hong Kong. As ASEAN+6 is yet to include financial cooperation on its
agenda, the evolution of ASEAN+3 as a regional financial institution, triggered by the
global financial crisis, China’s increasing engagement in the regional financial
cooperation and MOF’s growing sense of competition against China, has obstructedJapan’s ambition to utilise ASEAN+6 as a dominant regional framework.
7. Conclusion
This article has considered how changes in the US-led structure have influenced Japanas the agent in which regional integration within the ASEAN+6 framework was
generated, by focusing on the process by which consideration of a countermeasure to
the rise of China led Japan’s Ministries – such as MOFA and METI – to propose andadvocate the EAS and the CEPEA, respectively. When viewing Japan’s policies inrelation to East Asian regionalism in the light of its own concerns over China’s rise, andalso its consideration of the US desire for a response to that rise, it can be asserted thatJapan has not moved beyond its traditional status as a “reactive state”. Furthermore, inthis case the regional structure in which China’s challenging behaviour was more
directly relevant, can be considered to have exerted a strong influence on the Japanese
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state as an agent, but the process can be seen as its own effort to create a regional
structure to its favour.
This article also demonstrates the existence of the agent-structure relationship indomestic politics; relevant bureaucracies formulate international policies by taking thepolicy stances of Prime Ministers and their worldviews into account. For example, Abe
strongly initiated a strategic dialogue among Japan, the US, India, and Australia in 2007,
and he upgraded the status from bureau chief-level to vice ministerial-level. The Prime
Minister’s influence on regional policy can also be attributed to the decline of thispolicy dialogue: Abe, who stepped down as Prime Minister in September 2007 due tohis bad health, was replaced by Yasuo Fukuda, who displayed little enthusiasm forcontinuing with the four-nation strategic dialogue, the stance of which was natural given
his greater emphasis on the relationship with China in his foreign policy approach.
This article also demonstrates the more recent changes in the structure, highlighted by
the US initiative in the promotion of FTAAP and the re-emergence of ASEAN+3
triggered by the global financial crisis and China’s aggressive initiative. It also analyses
how these events have dimmed the prospects for ASEAN+6, since these changes meant
the transformation of the preconditions behind the birth of ASEAN+6 in Japan. Also, achief agent at the time of the global crisis was the MOF, which was hardly involved in
the ASEAN+6 formation process. Just like MOFA and METI, however, MOF has been
engaged in competition with China over the financial cooperation initiatives around
ASEAN+3. Although the strengthened financial cooperation in ASEAN+3 appears tohave functioned to weaken the ASEAN+6 framework, the continuity of the China-Japanpower struggle in East Asian regionalism, having thus far served as a contributor to theproliferation of bilateral FTAs, the signing of TAC, and the organisation of EAS;
illustrates the rise of China as a dominant part of a regional structure that, together with
the US foreign policy direction, has had a considerable impact on Japan’s regionalism
policy21/25

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GIARI Working Paper Vol. 2009-E-3,
August 1 2009
Published by Waseda University Global COE Program
Global Institute for Asian Regional Integration (GIARI),
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