TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Is Japan heading in the wrong direction?
With the Japanese, one might venture to say, the love you take is equal to the love you make
Change Size
W
ith the Japanese, one might venture to say, the love you take is equal to the love you make. For all their incredible achievements as the world's third-largest economy, they are, after all, only human like the rest of us.
So as tensions mount in East Asia over sea rights and island ownerships, we need to remind ourselves that nothing is gained without mutual respect, especially in the heat of disagreement.
Japan's global image should be better than what it is ' certainly not the image its clumsiest politicians tend to present to the world.
Its political system is a parliamentary democracy that takes in aspects of American mass politics and
Japanese authoritarian structures.
The result is often not a thing of beauty ' nothing to brag about like, say, elegant Japanese floral arrangement. But it has worked well enough to offer the imperial monarchy a continuing presence but at the same time not a political role.
This is an achievement of no small significance that Asian neighbors might admire more attentively ' especially Thailand.
The current government offers Shinzo Abe as prime minister (PM).
He is from the bluntly nationalistic clan of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), that famously creaky but oft-serviceable umbrella of various factions and interests.
Its last noisily nationalistic-style prime minister was the redoubtable Junichiro Koizumi (2001-2005). He was also the only party leader in recent memory to enjoy a full five-year run as PM.
One difference between the current Abe and the prior Koizumi is that the former's nationalism can seem chilling while the latter's seemed more coolly crafted for domestic consumption than international action.
Like Bill Clinton in his first term as president, Koizumi brought a deft finesse to domestic politics but only slowly matured internationally. By contrast, Abe seems all too sure about issues of international tension that might better be wrapped in wise diplomatic ambiguity.
It is telling that Koizumi has emerged from self-imposed obscurity to work on behalf of former PM Morihiro Hosokowa (1993-1994), who is trying to resuscitate his career on a platform calling for gradual but relentless phase-out of Japan's reliance on domestic nuclear power.
On this issue, Koizumi, after the Fukushima Daiichi meltdown of March 11, 2011, threw in with Hosokowa as a virtual anti-nuclear power campaigner.
That position reaches deep down into the political soul of the Japanese people, who remain among the most anti-nuclear and pacifist on the face of the earth.
Should critical Asian neighbors not note this at least as much as Japan's war crimes of seven decades ago? What would be wrong with balancing emotions across Asia on all sides of such issues?
However unexpected, Koizumi's intervention in the current uphill bid of Hosokowa to become the next Tokyo governor runs up against the incumbent Abe government's candidate and so is a long-shot. But the very fact of his open efforts on behalf of an outspoken critic of PM Abe, stoutly pro-nuclear, is significant. It suggests doubts within the LDP itself about the direction of its current leader.
This unfortunately includes a combative attitude toward Asian neighbors, a no-holds-barred preference for nuclear energy, a Cold War style internal-security policy, and a poking of holes in Japan's social safety net.
PM Abe offers many positive qualities and is clearly not incompetent ' unlike some former PMs whose stumbles and bumbles belied Japan's greatness.
But he seems a leader more enamored with Japan's past as an imperial power than one trying to fashion a new vision for this great people and culture, such as former PM Yasuhiro Nakasone (1982-1987), who managed to be a nationalist without scaring half the world to death.
It could be that I am terribly wrong in my dour assessment of Abe and his government.
If so, at a latter time, I will apologize. But, increasingly, the Japanese people now appear worried as well, fearing that the prime minister may be leading them into a dangerous place.
Notably, the bluntness of his quarrels with Beijing and Seoul would appear to be losing their domestic appeal as exemplars of Japan standing up for itself.
Abe's core support is probably more narrow and shallow than is generally believed.
Washington, which has sought to induce Seoul and Tokyo to kiss and make up (to little avail), and which has tried to stay on the sidelines of Tokyo-Beijing friction over who owns those rocky Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands, can only sigh.
The path of a deepened and more fraternal community in East Asia is not through bluster and confrontation but through dogged diplomacy and consistent cooperation.
This is why Koizumi's re-entrance, though behind the scenes, is worth watching carefully.
This is a politician of tremendous gifts and instincts who has a track record of knowing where the Japanese people are headed by managing to stay one step ahead of them. And this may be the case yet again.
The writer, Loyola Marymount University's Distinguished Scholar of Asia and Pacific Studies, is the author of the Giants of the Asia series and of the recent In the Middle of the Future. His next book ' In the Middle of China's Future ' is due out in September.
