Reconstructing Japan's Security

Abstract

Japan’s post-Cold War security policy displays significant changes compared to the Cold War period. One critical change has been the incorporation of the Japanese military, known as the Self-Defence Force (SDF), as a legitimate and important tool of Japanese post-Cold War security policy practice. It has developed new roles both outside and within the US-Japan alliance to contribute to regional/international security. The question is how the Japanese security policymaking elite has been able to bring about this critical change to the security policy practice in light of the domestic social and legal constraints that have traditionally prevented the expansion of Japan’s security role, in military terms, in regional and international affairs. This research introduces external military crises as an important factor for change in Japanese security policy. It argues that the Japanese security policymaking elite achieved security policy expansion by utilizing external military crises as policy windows, inflating and deflating threat elements to circumvent the constraints and justify the implementation of security policy initiatives. This utility of external military crises to widen the role of the Self-Defence Force (SDF) in shaping Japan’s security priorities, as well as its proactive contribution to regional/ international security are outlined in four key case studies - international peacekeeping in 1992, regional defence in 1997-99, global missions in 2003-05, and collective self-defence in 2014-15.