Foreign Policy

Abstract

Japan’s foreign policy goals have been remarkably consistent since Commodore Perry dragged Japan into the world political economy in 1854 — only the means have changed. For almost 140 years the government has single-mindedly attempted to achieve for Japan four interrelated goals: (1) military and economic security; (2) rapid modernization; (3) East Asian and global power; and (4) international recognition of all Japan’s accomplishments. The means to achieve these goals, however, were dramatically different before and after 1945: mercantilist and imperialist before; neo-mercantilist since. Military and technological defeat — by Perry’s gunboats in 1854 and the atomic bomb in 1945 — were the stimulus for both foreign policy eras as Japanese leaders became obsessed with reversing both the cause and the humiliation of these defeats.