Kuroki, Maiko
(2013)
Nationalism in Japan’s contemporary foreign policy: a consideration of the cases of China, North Korea, and India.
PhD thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science.
Abstract
Under the Koizumi and Abe administrations, the deterioration of the Japan-China
relationship and growing tension between Japan and North Korea were often interpreted as
being caused by the rise of nationalism. This thesis aims to explore this question by looking at
Japan’s foreign policy in the region and uncovering how political actors manipulated the
concept of nationalism in foreign policy discourse. The methodology employs discourse
analysis on five case studies. It will be explored how the two administrations both used
nationalism but in the pursuit of contrasting policies: an uncompromising stance to China and
a conciliatory approach toward North Korea under the Koizumi administration, a hard-line
attitude against North Korea and the rapprochement with China by Abe, accompanied by a
friendship-policy toward India. These case studies show how the nationalism is used in the
competition between political leaders by articulating national identity in foreign policy.
Whereas this often appears as a kind of assertiveness from outside China, in the domestic
context leaders use nationalism to reconstruct Japan’s identity as a ‘peaceful nation’ through
foreign policy by highlighting differences from ‘other’s or by achieving historic reconciliation.
Such identity constructions are used to legitimize policy choices that are in themselves used to
marginalize other policy options and political actors. In this way, nationalism is utilized as a
kind of political capital in a domestic power relationship, as can be seen by Abe’s use of
foreign policy to set an agenda of ‘departure from the postwar regime’. In a similar way,
Koizumi’s unyielding stance against China was used to calm discontents among right-wing
traditionalists who were opposed to his reconciliatory approach to Pyongyang. On the other
hand, Abe also utilized a hard-line policy to the DPRK to offset his rapprochement with
China whilst he sought to prevent the improved relationship from becoming a source of
political capital for his rivals. The major insights of this thesis is thus to explain how Japan’s
foreign policy is shaped by the attempts of its political leaders to manipulate nationalism so as
articulating particular forms of national identity that enable them to achieve legitimacy for
their policy agendas, boost domestic credentials and marginalize their political rivals.
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