Japan as a Non‑Military Global and Regional Power

Abstract

For the Japanese Foreign Ministry and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, the most significant foreign policy achievement of 1992 was the passage in June of the controversial PKO (peacekeeping operations) bill allowing Self-Defense Forces (SDF) personnel to contribute to non-military aspects of United Nations peacekeeping efforts. As a swift follow-up, in September and October Japan sent 600 SDF personnel to Cambodia, marking the first major deployment of Japanese soldiers outside Japan since the end of World War II. For the Japanese, the PKO authorization and Japan's peacekeeping role in Cambodia, following upon the sending of three minesweeping ships for clean-up operations in the Persian Gulf in 1991, well after the conclusion of the Gulf war, mark historical steps toward Japan's resumption of a normal role in the international community. However, Japan's role remains tightly circumscribed by continued public suspicion of foreign engagements and the opposition of many of Japan's neighbours to any further major expansion of Japan's international security role as well as by the highly restricted grant of legal authority given to the Japanese Government to participate in U.N. peacekeeping. It is inevitable that Japan will continue to become an increasingly important and more independent actor in international and regional affairs, given its status as an economic superpower, the global scope of its interests, and the lessened role of the United States. Inevitably, there will also be many domestic and regional tensions associated with Japan's rise to a position of greater regional and global influence and responsibility. In many respects, Japan is poorly prepared domestically to assume such a position and the external environment remains hostile to a broader and more comprehensive Japanese role. This chapter examines some of the factors and tensions associated with Japan's role, and points to Southeast Asia as a key arena within which this role will be tested.