North Korea’s foreign relations: Diplomacy of promotive adaptation

Dramatic changes in East Europe and the Soviet Union resulted in North Korea’s doubling its effort to shield and defend itself from disturbances emanating from the outside. Yet, President Kim Il Sung of North Korea has also opted for new diplomatic moves of realignment in existing ties with China and the Soviet Union and is also seeking new rleations with Japan and the United States. North Korea’s diplomatic adaptation in 1990–91, such as its balancing diplomatic acts vis-à-vis the major allies and adversaries, is examined, and so is the North Korean dilemma of reconciling national interests and ideology. While Pyongyang’s nonaligned nations diplomacy is temporarily stalled, its Un diplomacy is likely to be activated as a result of the simultaneous entry into the United Nations with South Korea in 1991.     

Militarizing Japan’s Southwest Islands: Subnational Involvement and Insecurities in the Maritime Frontier Zone

Abstract

This paper sheds light on a relatively underexplored aspect of Japan’s recent security changes by examining the subnational level where the impact has been far-reaching. It focuses on Japan’s maritime frontier zone: the Yaeyama Islands located at the southwestern end of the Japanese archipelago and administered as part of Okinawa Prefecture. It argues that while Yaeyama militarization has been primarily a national response to China’s portrayed assertiveness in the East China Sea, it has also been facilitated by the strategic actions of local political elites, in cooperation with sympathetic extra-local forces. Political elites from two islands, Yonaguni and Ishigaki, have been motivated primarily by diverging material and ideational factors. Yonaguni elites have viewed militarization largely through the prism of “compensation politics.” Their counterparts in Ishigaki have been driven by more ideological objectives, seeking militarization for deterrence purposes and otherwise transforming the island into a rightist breeding ground in defence of Japanese territory. Yaeyama militarization has not only diminished enthusiasm for seeking autonomy and enhancing economic security through microregional cooperation, but has also enhanced local-level insecurities while creating and exacerbating divisions.     

Anxiety and Diminished Hope: The Potential Impact of Trump’s Presidency on Security in the Pacific Islands Region

Abstract

The election of Donald Trump as the next president of the US has caused much international consternation and anxiety. Reactions have been based on distrust and rejection of Trump’s political ideology, behavioural disposition and unpredictable policy positions. His campaign speeches were filled with provocative utterances which were racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-environment and self-centred. This article examines some possible impacts of Trump’s presidency on the Pacific island countries (PICs). The first issue refers to how Trump’s proposed isolationist and militarisation policies may affect regional geopolitics. The two policies tend to contradict each other because while isolationism means pulling back on US economic and strategic presence in the Pacific, a reversal of the pivot to Asia-Pacific policy, militarisation implies greater strategic reach, regionally and globally. What does this seemingly contradictory approach mean for the PICs? Second, the article looks at the impact of Trump’s climate change denial stance and the responses by PICs, given the fact that climate change is the single most significant foreign policy and development initiative of the PICs since their independence. The third issue deals with the potential impact of Trump’s restrictive migration policies on remittance flow to the PICs and how these affect the small island economies and well-being.     

Japan’s Political Economy and Koizumi’s Structural Reform: A Rise and Fall of Neoclassical Economic Reform in Japan

For five years of his premiership, Jun’ichiro Koizumi bravely fought against politicians, bureaucrats, and interest groups to promote his structural economic reform. Fortunately, by the time he retired, Japanese economy got out of the depression. But the tide changed. In the July 2007 Upper House elections, the public was opposed to structural reform that Koizumi and Abe had advocated. Now it is not clear where Japanese political economy is likely to go. This paper will take a long-term view on the evolution of Japan’s political economy, and try to understand Jun’ichiro Koizumi’s structural reform in that long-term context.

Rhetoric and Praxis: Nigeria’s Africa Diplomacy and the Shaping of the African Union

Although Nigeria has always promoted multilateral diplomacy in the African context, the civilian administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo made it a cardinal objective of its Africa policy. Through his foreign policy speeches, President Obasanjo emphasised the readiness of his administration to play a leading role in African continental organisation – the African Union (AU). Using data collected through the secondary and interview methods, and thematic analysis, this study analyses Obasanjo’s diplomatic outing in the AU. While there were some encumbrances (such as the failure on occasion to make wider consultations within the AU framework and the absence of a well coordinated inter-ministerial approach to project Nigeria’s leadership in the AU), the paper contends that the administration’s diplomacy in the AU was successful. This showed in the role the administration played in shaping the structures that currently define the existence of the organisation. The transmutation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) to AU, the recalibration of its peace and security architecture, and the funding of the organisation benefited immensely from Nigeria’s diplomacy under President Obasanjo.     

FOIP 2.0: The Evolution of Japan’s Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy

The “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” (FOIP) is the most important feature of Japan’s foreign policy under the Abe Administration. One of the most important questions is whether this vision aims to contain a rapidly rising China. Along with the amelioration of the relationship between Japan and China, this diplomatic strategy has been evolved from the quadrilateral security cooperation among leading democracies in this region, namely the US, Japan, Australia, and India, to a more comprehensive regional cooperation. This article regards the latter diplomatic strategic as the “FOIP 2.0” and that there emerges a possible harmony between Japan’s FOIP and China’s controversial Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).     

The Malta Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting: The Commonwealth’s New Beginnings?

This article argues that the Commonwealth needs to speak with a distinctive voice on a range of issues confronting the world, failing which it will lose its relevance. This calls for inspirational and strong leadership and a clear focus on the organisation’s charter. Among the concrete proposals suggested by the article for the reinvigoration of the Commonwealth is the establishment of a Commission for Democracy, the Rule of Law and Human Rights inspired by the model of the Council of Europe Venice Commission.     

The Changing Character of Disaster Victimhood: Evidence from Japan’s “Great Earthquakes”

ABSTRACT

Japan is periodically wracked by “Great Earthquakes” (daijishin) – seismic events so destructive that they leave massive amounts of textual and graphic evidence, much of it produced by people who did not experience the events directly. Using this cache of information, it is possible to see how the idea of the “disaster victim” has changed over time and circumstance. My paper traces this role across five Great Earthquakes that spanned roughly 150 years (1855–2011), a period convergent with modern Japan. I will argue that the sense of who and what has been victimized by the shaking of the earth – who has suffered, what weight to attach to their loss, what actions to take and emotions to feel regarding their situation – has changed regularly, and surprisingly, over this rather short period. There is, in other words, no common Japanese experience of victimhood, even in the context of one disaster type over a relatively short historical period. The article is one contribution to an as-yet unexamined history and comparative study of the modern role of disaster victim.     

Vitalizing Democracy at the Grassroots: A Contribution of Post-War Women’s Movements in Japan

The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the socio-political significance of women’s collective activities in Japan. I attempt to demonstrate that the Japanese women’s movements act as a role of democratic agency through their commitment to social reform and to changes in the political status quo. In the first three sections, I give an overview of Japanese women’s movements from the early post-war period to the present day, categorizing them into three types: the elite-initiated, second-wave feminist, and non-feminist participatory. Subsequently, I discuss the confrontation and reconciliation between feminists and non-feminists. In the final section, I examine what role the women’s movements play in socio-political reforms in terms of civil society discourse, and I conclude that the diversity of Japanese women’s movements has contributed to strengthening democracy at the grassroots.

Cataluña and Castilla,Noucentisme and avant-garde: towards a reading of Salvador Dalí’s Autorretrato cubista (1923)

Salvador Dalí’s Autorretrato cubista is his only major painting done predominantly in the style of Analytic Cubism, although it also incorporates various examples of collage, typically associated with Synthetic Cubism. Close analysis of the compositional structure of the self-portrait, together with the identification and interpretation of the various objects and newspaper fragments glued to its surface, suggest the representation of a self divided and pulled simultaneously in different directions. The major lines of tension involve two oppositions: one between Cataluña and Castilla, that is to say, between a sympathetic stance towards Catalan nationalism versus Castilian centralism (tempered by the positive and horizon-expanding experience of student life in Madrid), and the other between the avant-garde and other artistic styles. This second tension manifests itself in the espousal of Analytic Cubism (with some features of Synthetic Cubism) and, at the same time, the inclusion of certain elements deriving from earlier tendencies, notably Noucentisme, a movement that in turn had very close links with Catalanism. In Autorretrato cubista, painted at the very end of 1923, it therefore seems possible to discern a complex and unresolved psychomachia of diverse and sometimes contradictory allegiances and influences played out on the canvas.     

Establishing a Social-Darwinist Mentality in Japan’s Paternalist State: The Potential of Resistance by a Counter-Public

ABSTRACT

From a historical perspective, the welfare net in Japan was established from above without democratic participation and expanded only slowly. This expansion in many cases was aimed at enhancing national cohesion, especially during war time. During the current neoliberal era, Japan’s paternalistic welfare state has been able to put into practice the dismantling of national pension and health-care systems without the need for any theoretical re-orientation. In response, counter-publics have engaged in protest and resistance. By doing so, the victims of modernization and those who are socially weak and disadvantaged in multiple ways are able to regain their self-esteem and personal integrity.     

Japan’s Policy Toward China Under Strong Anti-Chinese Sentiment: A Case of Terminating Yen Loans to China

2004 was the year when the Japanese public's affinity with China dropped dramatically, to 37.6?%, due to anti-Japan riots in China. Now more than 70?% of the Japanese public does not feel an affinity with China. How could such a strong anti-Chinese sentiment influence Japan's policy toward China? This paper considers this question by examining Japan's decision-making process on terminating the much-criticized yen loans to China. Yen loans are a type of Official Development Assistance (ODA) provided by the Japanese government to countries lacking sufficient funds for economic development. China is one of the top yen loan borrowers, and the loans have contributed to China's economic growth and increasing openness. However, in March 2005, Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura told Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing that Japan intended to phase out the yen loans before the 2008 Beijing Olympics and reached an agreement on the matter. Two-and-a-half years later, Japan terminated its yen loans to China, as the foreign ministers had agreed. Through mainly firsthand documents and interviews with government officials, this paper will clarify the following two points: (1) While it is true that the Japanese government significantly reduced its yen loan package to China from 2001 onward due to domestic criticism of China, as pointed out by previous studies, it was not planning to terminate the yen loans as of summer 2004. Instead, the Japanese government was contemplating how to keep providing yen loans to China; (2) Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura, who was appointed in September 2004, had pushed for the termination of yen loans to China only after anti-Chinese sentiment rose dramatically in summer 2004, because he felt that continuing the much-criticized yen loans would not benefit stable Japan-China relations. This paper sheds light on the background of the termination of yen loans to China, a major milestone in postwar Japan-China relations that had been unclear until now. Having said this, the more important point of this paper may be that it also shows the influence of strong anti-Chinese sentiment on Japan's policies toward China.     

In Search of Native Dissidence: RT Kawa’s Mfecane Historiography in Ibali lamaMfengu (1929)

Abstract

This article situates RT Kawa’s Ibali lamaMfengu (1929) as a canonical text of South African historiography, and mfecane historiography in particular. In Ibali lamaMfengu, Kawa attempts to give an account of the origins of amaMfengu clans, who were Mfecane refugees, as well as their political situation, when they were incorporated into the Gcaleka kingdom of King Hintsa in the 1820s and 1830s. Kawa’s work is significant in clarifying key disputes on the origins of amaMfengu although is not comprehensive in detailing their early life amongst amaXhosa. Although a key text, its analysis was not only excluded, but rejected by ‘‘mainstream’’ South African historians in the 1980s and 1990s. This omission resulted in dominant scholarly versions of the Mfecane dismissing the validity of the interpretations and analyses of African writers, in effect, rendering Mfecane historiography a ‘‘white-only’’ debate. I demonstrate in this article that Kawa’s work is in fact, a valid and persuasive history of amaMfengu, and is largely accurate on the basis of their origins, their life under chief Hintsa, and the reasons for their exodus from amaXhosa, that led to their loyalty pledge to the British in 1835.     

Djibouti and Beyond: Japan’s First Post-War Overseas Base and the Recalibration of Risk in Securing Enhanced Military Capabilities

Having passed successive legislation in the past two decades to expand its use of the Japan Self Defense Force (JSDF), Japan has emerged from its post-war ‘pacifist’ shackles to assume a range of security roles that are typically associated with so-called ‘normal nations’. This article addresses how these have been crystallized in the form of an indefinitely-termed overseas base on the Horn of Africa, in Djibouti. Careful examination of pertaining Diet minutes, media discourse and government ministry papers suggests that the risks identified with this facility’s realization and status have been fundamentally recalibrated, allowing its presence and operational diversification to go largely unnoticed and unopposed – both domestically and overseas – despite representing a seemingly radical departure from common sense interpretations of Japan’s antimilitarist constitution.     

The sketch of Brazil’s grand strategy under the Workers’ Party (2003–2016): Domestic and international constraints

After passage of the 1988 Constitution of Brazil, successive democratic governments worked to build bridges between the nation’s foreign policy and its defence strategy, thus fostering a dialogue among administrations and constituencies under the aegis of the rule of law. It was under the Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff administrations that Brazil laid out a grand strategy, implementation of which was interrupted by the controversial impeachment proceedings of 2016. The argument unfolds from a consideration of Brazil’s development model and domestic politics as key structural variables in analysing the challenges faced in the conception and implementation of its grand strategy. The article is organised into two sections: (1) The sketch of a grand strategy: when Brazil’s foreign and defence policies converged; (2) An ambition frustrated? Or, the impact of Brazil’s development model and domestic politics on the conception and implementation of its grand strategy.