Legend has it that when Thomas Jefferson was selected as American minister to France, he pointed out that he could only succeed his predecessor Benjamin Franklin, and not replace him. Shinzo Abe, the favored candidate in the impending leadership race in Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, will face a similar problem as he starts his campaign to be Japanese PM. Will he live in the shadow of Koizumi’s legacy, or will he replace it with his own? Some of his policy planks make it clear that he will follow in Koizumi’s political footsteps. However, a continuation of the unabashed nationalism prevalent in Koizumi’s administration may alienate and anger Japan’s East Asian neighbors, to the detriment of Japan.
Shinzo Abe, like outgoing PM Junichiro Koizumi, has expressed his desire to maintain close and friendly relations with the United States. He has however, also remained staunchly supportive of Koizumi’s visits to the Yasukuni War Shrine, a memorial to Japanese war dead, some of whom are Class A war criminals. Koizumi’s visit on August 15 incited rioting in South Korea and widespread anger in China. A great deal of resistance has also come from businessmen based in Japan, who have become concerned that anti-Japanese sentiments may jeopardize vital economic links to their neighbours.
Additionally, Abe has also expressed his desire to revise the Japanese constitution, which only allows Japan to have a “self-defense” force, and not a full-fledged conventional military force like those of other countries. This desire for re-militarization, in addition to Abe’s support for a permanent Japanese presence in the UN Security Council, has continued to put a damper on Sino-Japanese and Korean-Japanese relations. South Korea and China both feel that Japan has not properly atoned for its military aggression against both China and Korea during World War II.
Despite Japan’s frigid relations with China and South Korea, Abe has not clearly outlined a road map for repairing relations with the two nations. In an interview with NTV, he felt that repairing relations will require initiative from Japan’s neighbors: “I would like to see China take a step forward,” Abe said. Instead, he told Liberal Democratic Party members, “Japan will follow a foreign policy…based on national interests,” also saying that “the security treaty with the US forms the center of Japan’s foreign and security policy. We must work to strengthen that stance.”
Such an alignment of interests is bound to hurt Japan. Allowing Sino-Japanese and Korean-Japanese relations to languish will sow anti-Japanese sentiment among the Koreans, as well as the Chinese, who have since 2001 refused to meet with Koizumi due to his war shrine visits. This may lead to a future dearth of collaboration between Japan and its neighbors, which is certain to be harmful to all parties involved in an economic and political sense. If elected as PM, Abe will have to enact his policies carefully, or he may end up rallying his domestic political base at the cost of alienating his neighbors.
