Featured Articles
“Getting ASEAN Right in US Indo-Pacific Strategy,” The Washington Quarterly 45(4) (2022), 155-175.
“…the United States and its allies and partners, particularly Japan and Australia, should contribute to maintaining ASEAN unity by clarifying the institutional division of labor between US-centric frameworks and ASEAN. In so doing, they can assure ASEAN member states and ensure the organization’s continuous raison d’être in Southeast Asia and East Asia. This would help maintain ASEAN unity, such that it can forge a united front against excessive intrusion from China, for instance by preventing the establishment of new foreign bases in Southeast Asia. Of course, this means the United States and its allies would face the same diplomatic limitations to their influence over the region. However, a more united Southeast Asia would become more strategically stable and generally supportive of the existing rules-based international order, which would contribute to the realization of the US-led vision of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific.”
“Conceptualizing equidistant diplomacy in international relations: the case of Singapore,” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, 22(3) (2022) [With Teo Ang Guan]
How can we systematically conceptualize equidistant diplomacy? This article argues that while ‘equidistant diplomacy’ has its own tactical utility to signal and shape a state’s image of political neutrality to the target states, it is not indicative of the state strategy. This is because state strategy is generally determined by material capabilities and is categorized as balancing, bandwagoning, and hedging. Rather, equidistant diplomacy is perception managementmerely an independent diplomatic tactic aimed at signaling a neutral image through three main tools: paralleling, downplaying, and broadcasting. This diplomatic tactic is most likely to be part of ‘hedging’ behavior. However, states can similarly employ equidistant diplomacy for balancing or bandwagoning if they desire to project a neutral image and their target states do not force them to alter this tactic with diplomatic or material sanctions. With this conceptual framework, Singapore’s diplomatic behavior vis-a-vis the United States and China from the 1990s will be examined.
“Japan’s ‘Indo-Pacific’ question: countering China or shaping a new regional order?” International Affairs 96(1) (2020):49-73.
Japan's primary objective of the ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ (FOIP) strategy is to shape and consolidate regional order in the Indo-Pacific region based on the existing rules-based international order. The concept initially aimed to achieve two different objectives—shaping a regional order in the Indo-Pacific and ensuring the defence of Japan; however, Japan has gradually shifted its strategic focus onto the former, separating national defence from the FOIP concept, which reflects a change in the degree of its commitment to the two objectives. On the one hand, as its overall security strategy, Japan has determined to steadily enhance its national defence by increasing its own defence capabilities and strengthening the US–Japan alliance, while transforming its partnerships with like-minded states, such as Australia and India, into a diplomatic, and potentially military, alignment. This has been brought about by shifts in the regional balance of power, particularly the rise of China and the relative decline of the United States. On the other hand, as part of its FOIP strategy, Japan's attempts to build a new regional order in the Indo-Pacific region aim to defend the existing rules-based order established by the United States from challengers, particularly China. Yet, given the strategic uncertainty over Japan's international coalition-building efforts to create a new regional order, Japan has made its approach flexible; Tokyo is using its ambiguous FOIP concept to gauge other states' responses, understand their perspectives, and change its strategic emphases accordingly—so-called ‘tactical hedging’. Japan has pursued similar means to achieve the two key objectives. Nevertheless, the country's core interest, the defence of Japan, is more imperative than building a regional order in the Indo-Pacific region, and Japan faces different types of challenges in the future.
“’The Concept of “Hedging” Revisited: Case of Japan’s Foreign Policy Strategy in East Asia’s Power Shift,” International Studies Review 20(4) (2018): 633-660
This article argues that the concept of “hedging” should be understood in the context of the “balancing-bandwagoning” spectrum within the “balance of power” theory, in which hedging is located between balancing and bandwagoning as the state's third strategic choice. Although polarity— unipolar, bipolar, and multipolar—largely determines the likelihood of hedging behavior, during a period of power shift, strategic uncertainty emerges. States, particularly secondary powers, attempt to calculate the risk of balancing, bandwagoning, and hedging, adopting an optimal strategy. To identify states’ strategic behavior, it is important to first examine their economic and military capabilities, and if these indicators are not decisive enough to identify balancing, bandwagoning, or hedging behavior, diplomatic factors should be taken into account, although those are a relatively weaker indicator.
Recent Articles
“Struggle for Coalition-Building: Japan, South Korea, and the Indo-Pacific,” Asian Politics & Policy, 15(1) (2023), 63-82.
One of the most important defining features of Japan's “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” (FOIP) vision is coalition-building. Given the Yoon administration's strong political will to commit to the Indo-Pacific affairs and improve its ties with Japan, can Japan and South Korea finally forge cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region? I argue that Japan has not incorporated South Korea in its FOIP vision because of four main factors: timing, leadership transition, commitment to regional and global strategic affairs, and differing perspectives on China. Particularly, the negative impact of South Korea's leadership change and its fluctuating commitment to regional and global affairs have nurtured Japan's skepticism toward South Korea's potential role in the Indo-Pacific region. In this context, the key to overcoming such difficulties and incorporating South Korea into the Indo-Pacific network depends on the Yoon administration's conceptualization and institutionalization of its Indo-Pacific strategy and Japan's support for South Korea's current diplomatic activism.
“Institutional Dilemma: Quad and ASEAN in the Indo-Pacific,” Asian Perspective 47(1) (2023), 27-48. [SSCI]
How is the future of the Indo-Pacific institutional arrangements envisioned by the Quad and ASEAN? Are they mutually exclusive or compatible? How can the institutional competition between the Quad and ASEAN in the Indo-Pacific be avoided? I argue that the institutional competition between the Quad and ASEAN can be provisionally alleviated through strategic ambiguities about the institutional division of labor in the Indo-Pacific. However, such strategic ambiguities do not resolve normative inconsistencies between the Quad and ASEAN, which would probably trigger institutional competition in the future. To resolve such difficulties, both the Quad and ASEAN need to create a mechanism that clarifies their regional institutional division of labor.
「ASEANアーキテクチャにおける『信頼醸成』」 (“Confidence Building” in ASEAN Architecture) 『国際安全保障』(“Journal of International Security” by Japan Association for International Security) 50(3) (2022), 14-32.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has nurtured its own security architecture based on the Asian version of “confidence building” since the end of the Cold War. In the immediate post-Cold War era, there was a political demand for the establishment of an inclusive institution that would nurture shared recognition of regional security and security issues in the Asia-Pacific region. While the regional great powers, particularly the United States, China, and Japan, were the candidates to establish such an institution, they were also potential strategic rivals. Consequently, ASEAN—the collective of small and middle powers that are relatively politically neutral—became the most qualified actor for such a role. Making the most of its comparative advantage, ASEAN established the ASEAN Regional Forum, the prototype of ASEAN-led institution, and to ensure the advantage in the future, ASEAN embedded three characteristics in ARF: ASEAN centrality, ASEAN way, and Track-2 diplomacy. These are also applied to other ASEAN-led institutions, which contributed to the establishment of ASEAN security architecture. However, the existence of ASEAN security architecture has been ultimately based on US presence that ensures strategic stability in the Asia-Pacific region. Further, the architecture was concretely consolidated as a regional confidence building measure, so that it became increasingly difficult for ASEAN to transform it into a more result-oriented system. Given the current intensification of US-China rivalry and the relative decline of US influence, strategic uncertainty increases, and thus, ASEAN is organizationally at an inflection point.
“Japan’s Strategic Approach toward Island States: Case of the Pacific Islands,” Journal of Indo-Pacific Affairs, 5(7) (2022), 62-83.
This article explores the development of Japan’s ways, means, and ends of engaging the Indo-Pacific island states, particularly the Pacific Islands. In so doing, it analyses how Japan situates those island states in its Free and Open Indo-Pacific vision, what national interests Japan has for the Pacific Islands, and how Japan approaches the Pacific island states bilaterally and multilaterally. The paper then briefly examines Japan’s policy toward other island states, namely Sri Lanka and Maldives, in comparison with the Pacific Islands and discusses the future prospect of Japan’s strategic engagement with the Indo-Pacific island states.
“A New Strategic Minilateralism in the Indo-Pacific,” Asia Policy 17(4) (2022): 27-34.
Examining the institutional development and key characteristics of the Indo-Pacific's new strategic minilateralism, particularly the Quad and AUKUS, this essay argues that such frameworks are largely a Western construct that attempt to fill the expectation and capability gaps in regional security systems for underwriting the existing regional order. There are basically two types of minilateralism: one aims to shape the regional order through rule- and norm-making, while the other focuses on military cooperation to check rising powers' behavior. Both share the same strategic [End Page 27] objective—to defend the existing international order from challenges posed by states that provide alternatives to it, particularly China. While these institution-building efforts are creating a new regional institutional architecture in the Indo-Pacific, its development remains an ongoing process. The success of minilateralism depends on how the United States and other members of these groupings formulate a grand design for minilateral frameworks and develop an optimal division of labor among themselves.
Recent Book Chapters
“The Enduring Dilemma of Japan’s Uniqueness Narratives” [with Saori Katada] in Daniel Deudney, G. John Ikenberry, and Karoline Postel-Vinay, eds., Debating Worlds: Contested Narratives of Global Modernity and World Order (New York: Oxford University Press, 2023).
In this chapter, we argue that Japan has faced an enduring dilemma of its own uniqueness narratives. On the one hand, Japan went through in- tense periods of assimilation in the forms of Westernization after country-opening in the late 1800s and the post–World War II US occupation and democratization pressure, when the country was in a weak position. On the other hand, when Japan gained power and prominence, it tended to promote a narrative of its unique characteristics and was not able to utilize its assimilated universal values to lead. In a way, Japan was not able to deploy its own “narrative of the global” that would “call for universal action or to help set international norms and rules.” We identify such a trend at the times of the interwar Tenno-sei (imperial system) narrative and the nihonjinron boom during the 1980s. This boom (uniqueness) and bust (assimilation) narrative cycle has swung to the side of assimilation in the twenty-first century during the time of Japan’s relative weakness, where Japan has capitalized on international contribution and support of the rules-based order. The Japanese narratives of its success as the only Asian nation that had managed to successfully modernize and militarize in the Western dominant world in the early 1900s, or as a peaceful economic juggernaut in the 1980s, had only a limited impact on global norm-setting. That is because these narratives posed by Japan have failed to generalize the country’s liminal existence and experiences, and never fed into a useful universal narrative of the global.
“Strategizing Institutional Arrangement in Japan’s FOIP: Quad, ASEAN, and Tactical Hedging,” in Srabani Roychoudhury, ed., The Indo-Pacific Theatre: Strategic Visions and Frameworks (Oxon and New York: Routledge, 2023).
How can Japan strategise its institutional arrangements in the Indo-Pacific? ASEAN and Quad are important institutions for Japan, but Japan has yet to devise a particular strategy toward regional institutions. In this context, this chapter argues that Japan’s tactical hedging has been useful in garnering political supports for the gradual institutionalisation of the Quad, which helps information-sharing and monitoring of the Indo-Pacific strategic situation and devise each member state’s strategy. At the same time, the tactical hedging enabled Japan to quickly respond to ASEAN’s general concern about its political marginalisation by the existence of the Quad by incorporating the ASEAN Centrality in its FOIP vision. Although the co-existence of the Quad and ASEAN has been ensured in the short term, the role of ASEAN is yet to be defined, potentially creating inter-institutional tension in the existing multi-layered institutional arrangement in the Indo-Pacific. To alleviate such potential tensions, it becomes necessary to establish an institutional linkage between the Quad and ASEAN, which contributes to maintaining communication channels, enhancing political assurance to ASEAN and exploring potential areas of cooperation and an institutional division of labour. Given its strong diplomatic relations with all member states in the Quad and ASEAN, Japan plays a crucial role in bridging the Quad and ASEAN.
“Countering Emerging Infectious Diseases and COVID-19: Development of ASEAN’s Institutional Arrangements and International Cooperation” in Anoma van der Veere, eds., Public Health in Asia during the COVID-19 Pandemic (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022).
This chapter argues that ASEAN’s mechanisms to tackle emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) have been developing gradually since the declaration made at the ASEAN Health Ministers Meeting (AHMM) in 1980. While the 2003 SARS crisis significantly enhanced ASEAN’s cooperation to counter EIDs, ASEAN had already laid a foundation for such cooperation before 2003. This chapter shows that ASEAN has tended to focus on the regional rather than global level due to a lack of financial and technical resources and ASEAN’s long-standing institutional norms. The recent intensification of great power rivalries, particularly between the United States and China, means that relying on external actors for medical support would entrap ASEAN in great power politics. As such, ASEAN needs to make efforts to build its capacity to respond to EIDs.
Other Articles/Book Chapters
ARTICLES
“Emerging Powerplay in the Mekong Subregion: A Japanese Perspective,” Asia Policy 17(2) (2022): 28-34.
“Quad 3.0: Japan, Indo-Pacific, and Minilateralism,” East Asia Policy, 14(1) (2022), 20-38.
“How strategic is “asymmetric” strategic partnership? Japan’s partnership diplomacy toward Cambodia and Laos,” Asian Security 18(2) (2022): 93-118.
“Japan's FOIP under the Suga administration: Transition and Future Challenges in Southeast Asia,” East Asia Policy 13(3) (2021): 84-100.
“Institutional Collapse and Shifting Balance of Ontological Security: Role of Malaysia’s Dual Identity in the Decay of ASPAC,” Pacific Review 33(5) (2020):842-871 [With Zul Hazmi bin Nordin]
“The Evolution of Japan’s ‘Misplacement’: From The Meiji Restoration to the Post-Cold War,” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 33(4) (2020): 572-587.
“Misplaced States and the Politics of Regional Identity: Towards a Theoretical Framework,” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 33(4) (2020): 505-526. [With Wali Aslam, Leslie Wehner, Janis van der Westhuizen, Cameron Thies, and Feliciano de Sa Guimarães].
“Japan’s Diplomatic Strategy toward East Asia: Creation and Evolution of ‘Dual-Track Diplomacy’ in the Post-Cold War Era.” Baltic Journal of European Studies 9(2) (2019): 40-60.
“Japan’s ‘Free and Open Indo-Pacific’ Strategy: Tokyo’s Tactical Hedging and the Implications for ASEAN,” Contemporary Southeast Asia 41(2) (2019): 286-313.
“ASEAN’s Evolving Institutional Strategy: Managing Great Power Politics in South China Sea Disputes,” Chinese Journal of International Politics 11(1) (2018): 49-80.
“Japan’s Strategic Interests over the South China Sea: Beyond the Horizon?” Australian Journal of International Affairs 72(1) (2018): 16-30.
「『安全保障化』のツールとしての地域機構：ASEANとECOWASの比較研究」(Regional Institutions as a Tool for “Securitization”: Cases of ASEAN and ECOWAS) 『国際政治』(“International Politics” by Japan Association of International Relations) 189 (2017): 167-176.
“The Rise of Asia, Power Shifts, and Strategic Rivalries” Moving Worlds 16(2) (2016): 59-71.
“Image and Substance Failures in Regional Organisations: Causes, Consequences, Learning and Change?” (With Meng Hsuan Chou & Michael Howlett), Politics and Governance 4(3) (2016): 50-61.
“The Rise of China and Japan's Balancing Strategy: Critical Junctures and Policy Shifts in the 2010s,” Journal of Contemporary China 25(101) (2016): 777-791.
“Japan’s Strategic Coordination in 2015: ASEAN, Southeast Asia, and Abe’s Diplomatic Agenda," in Singh, D. and Cook, M. (eds), Southeast Asian Affairs 2016 (Singapore: ISEAS, 2016): 67-79.
“The Yasukuni Question: Histories, Logics, and Japan-South Korea Relations,” The Pacific Review 29(3) (2015): 331-359.
“Institutional Transformation of ASEAN: ZOPFAN, TAC, and the Bali Concord I in 1968-1976,” The Pacific Review 27(5) (2014): 729-753.
“Explaining Transformation of ASEAN’s Security Functions in East Asia: Cases of ARF and ASEAN+3,” Asian Regional Integration Review 4 (2012): 1-27.
“The Process of ASEAN’s Institutional Consolidation in 1968-1976,” RSIS Working Paper 234 (2012).
「日米同盟の『ソフト・パワー』：HADR機能強化へ向けて」(Soft Power of the US-Japan Alliance: Enhancing HA/DR Capabilities)『国際安全保障』(“Journal of International Security” by Japan Association for International Security)39(3) (2011): 74-85.
“The U.S. and East Asian Regional Security Architecture: Building ‘Regional Security Nexus’ on ‘Hub-and-Spoke,’” Asian Perspective 35(1) (2011): 1-36.
“Competing Institutions in East Asian Regionalism: ASEAN and Regional Powers,” Issues & Insights 10(23) (2010).
“Regionalizing the Japan-US Alliance: Toward the Construction of a Peaceful Power Transition System in East Asia,” Issues & Insights 10(8) (2010).
“Normative Power of ASEAN Way: Potentials, Limitations, and Implications for East Asian Regionalism,” The Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs 10(1) (2010): 80-95.
“The Anatomy of North Korea’s Foreign Policy Formation: Realism, Juche, and Suryong System,” North Korean Review 5(2) (2009): 21-33. [SSCI]
BOOK CHAPTERS
“Japan’s Strategic Vision on Indo-Pacific Institutions: Quad, Quad-Plus, and ASEAN Centrality,” in Jagannath Panda and Ernest Gunasekara-Rockwell, eds., India-Japan-ASEAN Triangularity Between Alignment and Alliance (London: Routledge, 2022).
“Nurturing the ‘Quad-Plus’ Formula: Institutional Perspective of Japan’s FOIP,” in Jagannath Panda and Ernest Gunasekara-Rockwell (eds.), Quad Plus and Indo-Pacific: The Changing Profile of International Relations (Oxon and New York: Routledge, 2022).
“Wedge Strategy, Japan-ASEAN Cooperation, and the Making of EAS: Implications for Indo-Pacific Institutionalization,” in John Ciorciari and Kiyoteru Tsutsui, The Courteous Power: Japan and Southeast Asia in the Indo-Pacific Era (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 2021) [forthcoming].
「シンガポールの外交戦略：『脆弱性』と『実用主義』」北岡伸一編『西太平洋連合のすすめ：日本の「新しい地政学」』(東京 [Tokyo]：東洋経済新報社[Toyo Keizai Shimpo-sha], 2021年).
“ASPAC or ASEAN? Institutional Evolution and Survival in Contemporary Maritime Asia,” in Shigeru Akita, Hong Liu, and Shiro Momoki, eds., Changing Dynamics and Mechanisms of Maritime Asia in Comparative Perspectives (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).
“Singapore’s Distinctive “Quasi-Bases”: Regional Security Environment, National Discourse, and Path-Dependence” in Shinji Kawana and Minori Takahashi (eds.) Exploring Base Politics: How Host Countries Shape the Network of U.S. Overseas Bases (Oxon and New York: Routledge, 2021).
「シンガポールの『準基地』政策──基地紛争の予防と管理」川名晋史編『基地問題の国際比較――「沖縄」の相対化』(東京 [Tokyo]：明石書店[Akashi Shoten]、2021年).
「日本の東アジア地域秩序構想──冷戦後における継続と変化」佐橋亮編『冷戦後の東アジア秩序－秩序形成をめぐる各国の構想』(東京 [Tokyo]：勁草書房[Keiso Shobo]、2020年).
「靖國問題の認識構造：マクロ・ミクロの『歴史認識』超えて」佐藤史郎・川名晋史編『安全保障の位相角』(京都 [Kyoto]：法律文化社 [Horitsu Bunka Sha]、2018年).
「多角的安全保障の枠組み」(Multilateral Security Frameworks) in Shiro Sato and Shinji Kawana (eds.)『日本外交の論点』（Debates over Japanese Diplomacy）(京都 [Kyoto]：法律文化社 [Horitsu Bunka Sha]、2018年).
「歴史認識」(Historical Recognition) in Shiro Sato and Shinji Kawana (eds.)『日本外交の論点』（Debates over Japanese Diplomacy）(京都 [Kyoto]：法律文化社 [Horitsu Bunka Sha]、2018年).
「应对中国崛起：日本走向硬性制衡」in 『中国的大周边关系』(China’s relations with neighbors) （Singapore: Global Publishing, 2017年）pp. 151-176.
「中東の混迷とアジアの安全保障」西原正（監修）『アジアの安全保障2016-2017』(東京：平和・安全保障研究所、2016年).
BOOK REVIEW
“Critical Dialogues: ‘Enacting the Security Community ASEAN’s Never-ending Story’” by Stephanie Martel/ 'Managing Great Power Politics: ASEAN, Institutional Strategy, and the South China Sea’ by Kei Koga,” Pacific Affairs 96(3) (2023)
“Japan's New Regional Reality: Geoeconomic Strategy in the Asia-Pacific, by Saori Katada. New York: Columbia University Press, 2020, 344 pp., $35.00 paper (ISBN 9780231190732),” Social Science Japan Journal (2023) [online].
“H-Diplo Review of Bhubhindar Singh, Reconstructing Japan’s Security Policy: The Role of Military Crises. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020. 204 pp. $78.99 (hardcover), ISBN-13: 978-1474446228,” H-Diplo Review Essay 379 (2021).
“Negotiating Governance on Non-Traditional Security in Southeast Asia and Beyond. By Mely Caballero-Anthony. New York: Columbia University Press, 2018, 336p. $105.00 cloth, $32.00 paper,” Perspective on Politics 18(4) (2020): 1287-1289.
“Path Dependence, Resilience, and the Gradual Transformation of Regional Architectures in Asia (Roundtable in Asia Policy 15.1: Andrew Yeo’s Asia's Regional Architecture: Alliances and Institutions in the Pacific Century,” Asia Policy 15(1) (2020): 135-138.
“The Burden of the Past: Problems of Historical Perception in Japan-Korea Relations—Kan Kimura Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2019 $75.00 U.S. (Hardcover), xiv+249 pages, ISBN: 978-0-472-07410-5,” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific (2020).
“Patrick Cottrell, The Evolution and Legitimacy of International Security Institutions (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016),” 『国際政治』(Kokusai Seiji—“Journal of International Politics” by Japan Association of International Politics) 192 (2018).
“Evelyn Goh: Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia,” 『国際安全保障』（Kokusai Anzenhosho—“Journal of International Security” by Japan Association for International Security) 42(2) (2014): 114-118.