Towards an East Asian Community:
What kind of lessons should we learn from Europe?
December 2, 2009 Tokyo
Hirotsugu Koike
Kwansei Gakuin University
First of all, allow me to discuss Prime Minister Hatoyama's proposal for an “East Asiancommunity”.
Just before the national election, he mentioned in an article for monthly magazine“Voice” that an East Asian community is a national goal and clearly stated that hewould aim for the creation of a common Asian currency.
In an article for the New York Times, he wrote, ”We should aspire to move toward
regional currency integration; We must spare no effort to build the permanent security
frameworks essential to underpinning currency integration”
I am sure that Prime Minister Hatoyama wants to learn lessons from Europe. In thearticle for Voice magazine, he mentioned that his grandfather translated the book
written by Coudenhove-Kalergi, founder of the first popular movement for a unitedEurope.
At the East Asia Summit in Thailand in October, Prime Minister Hatoyama proposed
his idea to build an East Asian community
Please allow me to tell you two things I think about his proposal.
First, the prime minister did not explain how to achieve the goal of an East Asiancommunity. In his party’s manifesto, there is no explanation about it.
Second, he is not the first to propose this idea. In the beginning of the 21st century,
there was a lot of discussion about creating an East Asian community. I remember
China was very positive on this idea at that time.
I would like to remind you that former Prime Minister Nakasone wrote in an article foranother monthly magazine last April that we should cooperate for the establishment of

a common Asian currency. He even proposed the scenario for how it could happen,
mentioning the establishment of an Asian Currency Unit (ACU) in the 2020s and theintroduction of a common currency in the 2030s at the earliest.
What lessons can we learn from Europe about regional integration?
First, I would like to note the importance of political will. The political leaders of Europe
at the early stage of regional integration had a strong desire to unify the people,
economic activity and security to avoid a disastrous world war.
Second, I would like to point out the importance of engagement with the United States.
Although the U.S. is not a member of the European Union, it plays a great roll inmaintaining regional security through NATO.
Third, I believe that mutual understanding of the leaders of France and Germany wasparticularly important for European integration.
What are the implications for Asia, especially Japan?
First, it is important to have strong political will for all Asian countries to achieve thegoal of an East Asian community.
Second, we should engage the U.S. in the process of Asian regional integration. Because
we do not have a NATO-type organization, we should consider having some kind ofmechanism for enabling the U.S. to engage with Asia.
Third, I would like to mention that China and Japan should make every effort toimprove their mutual relations. In some sense, China and Japan are in a similar
position to France and Germany. Both countries fought wars against each other, andthere is still some mutual resentment.
Regarding Japan-China relations, I would like to explain some historical facts, if I may.
Needless to say, healthy relations between Japan and China are crucial for the stability
and prosperity of East Asia. Frankly speaking, however, this relationship is very
difficult to manage. Japan invaded China in the 1930s and fought a disastrous conflictthere for nearly a decade, which eventually led to war with the U.S. There is still
resentment among Chinese people, and that is certainly understandable, at least to me.
There is growing nationalism in China, and it is often targeted at Japan, its former
enemy. The same kind of nationalism can be seen in Japan, especially among theyounger generation, and this causes concern for older people, including myself. There
have been a lot of people on both sides who understand each other fairly well and have astrong desire to solve these problems. Unfortunately, they have been retiring or dying
off, meaning there are fewer people on both sides who are making serious efforts toresolve the problems between the countries and enhance the bilateral relationship.
Chinese leaders and policymakers are now looking toward the U.S., not Japan, meaningthat for the Chinese intelligentsia, relations with the U.S. are primary and those withJapan are secondary. The Chinese government does not have a strong enough incentive
to deal with issues related to Japan.
The fundamental problem between us is that each country has difficulty treating theother normally. For Japan, especially, it has been hard to regard China as an equal
partner. If we look at history, we can see that the Japanese perception of China haschanged dramatically through the centuries.
We learn in school that during the Tang dynasty, from 618 A.D. to 907 A.D., Japan sent
15 delegations to China, the most advanced country in the world at that time, to learn
from it. Now, let us think of modern history. During the imperialist era, the greatWestern powers sought to expand their empires, and they looked to China as a place toestablish colonies. Japan, which in theory advocated the liberation of Asia from colonial
rule, actually took the same path as the other imperialist powers. After World War II,
China became a major socialist country. Because the Japanese intelligentsia had
left-leaning tendencies, China came to be viewed as a great country and once again
became a possible role model. Now, Japanese view China as a potential superpower.
If you look back at history, one thing I can say for certain is that there has never been atime where the relationship between Japan and China has been one of equality. ForJapanese people in particular, China tends to be regarded either as inferior or superior.
At this time in history, it is extremely important for people in both Japan and China tolook at each other as equal partners and try to carefully manage the bilateralrelationship. As a scholar, I greatly respect Dr. Akira Irie, a Harvard professor who once
wrote that diplomatic relations are not only between governments but also between
people at the grass-roots level. We must increase contact between the Japanese andChinese people, especially between the youth of the two countries.
(end)