Abstract
‘Sea change’ seems an appropriate cliche to describe the present international scene. Concrete forms in which such a change manifests itself vary, however, from place to place and from issue to issue, making it hard to guess the eventual shape world affairs will take. With this generalised feel of global change as a background, one cannot fail to be struck by the remarkable continuity of one important aspect of Japanese body politic: the Constitution.
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Notes and References
See, for example, Yamauchi Toshihiro, ‘Gunning for Japan’s Peace Constitution’, Japan Quarterly, April–June 1992, pp. 159–67. He is the author of Heiwa Kempo no Riron (Theory of the Peace Constitution) (Tokyo: Nihonhyoron-sha, 1992). See also, Higuchi Yoichi, ‘When Society is Itself the Tyrant’, Japan Quarterly, October-December 1988, pp. 350–6, in which the author discusses a case in which the wife of an SDF (Self Defense Force) serviceman, who was killed while on duty, sued the Veterans’ Association that had requested enshrinement of the dead at Yasukuni Jinja (i.e. a Shinto shrine). The issue was primarily concerned with separation of church and state, but implicitly related to the constitutionality of the SDF itself.
Osamu Nishi, Ten Days Inside General Headquarters (GHQ): How the original draft of the Japanese Constitution was written in 1946 (Tokyo: Seibundo, 1989).
Osamu Nishi, The Constitution and the National Defense Law System in Japan (Tokyo: Seibundo, 1987) p. 9. Nishi quotes Kades from his interview with him on 13 November 1984. See also, Nishi, Ten Days, pp. 36–41 for Kades’s role in the war-renunciation clause.
Nishi, The Constitution, ibid.
Hitoshi Ashida, Ashida Hitoshi Nikki (Diary), vol. 7 (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1987) pp. 298–301 and 318–20.
Nishi, The Constitution, p. 10.
Ashida wrote in his diary that, Japan being a signatory to the Kellogg-Briand Pact and the League Covenant, the idea of war-renunciation and pacifist settlement of international disputes itself was nothing novel to the Japanese, vol. 1, p. 80.
It is interesting to note that the interpellator in question was Sanzo Nosaka, leader of the Communist Party of Japan. His argument ran as follows: We must tenaciously maintain the independence of our nation. The Communist Party of Japan is determined to sacrifice everything in the fight for our nation’s independence and prosperity. There is the risk that Chapter Two (Article 9) of the Constitution will renounce our country’s right of self-defence and threaten the independence of our nation. For this reason our party must oppose this Constitution for the sake of the independence of the nation. Nishi, Ten Days, p. 195.
Japanese Defense Agency, Defense of Japan 1991, pp. 54–5.
Ibid, pp. 55–6. This document maintains, in addition to the four criteria mentioned in the text, that the use of the minimum force necessary for self-defence is different from exercising the right of belligerency, which is prohibited by the Constitution. This is another moot point inherent in Article 9. Until recently, a further device had been in use to determine the minimum level of arms, namely the ceiling of 1 per cent of GNP for the annual expenditures on defence.
Shuzo Hayashi, Chief of the Cabinet Legislation Bureau, Budget Committee of the Upper House, March 1959.
The government’s coordinated view on the treaty area (Far East) as it is stipulated in the US-Japan Security Treaty, presented before the Special Committee on Security Treaty, Lower House, 26 February 1960.
Director of Self-Defense Agency, Michita Sakata, at the Budget Committee of the Upper House, 12 June 1975. Article 5 of the treaty reads as follows: ‘Each Party recognises that an armed attack against either Party in the territories under the administration of Japan would be dangerous to its own peace and safety and declares that it would act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional provisions and processes.’ Any action that the SDF may take under the provision of Article 5 is regarded as the exercise of the right of individual self-defence even if it actually acts in conjunction with US forces. Is it possible, however, to distinguish the activities of the US forces that will be taken under this Article from those under Article 6?
A report submitted by an LDP task force headed by Ichiro Ozawa, formerly Secretary-General of the Liberal Democratic Party, takes a similar position on this issue. See the Ozawa Report, Kokusai shakai ni okeru nihon no yakuwari (Japan’s Role in the International Society), Bungeishunju, April 1992, pp. 132–45. By emphasising the importance of Japan’s positive role in the collective security functions (broadly defined) of the UN, the author does not intend to ignore the importance of another problem — the need to adjust the minimalist interpretation of the right of collective self-defence to the changing reality of US-Japan relations. In his view, a more flexible approach to the collective self-defence issue (which is related to the modus operandi of US-Japan Security) and a more proactive approach to the UN collective security system are not mutually exclusive. The emphasis is that both are necessary. See also, Masashi Nishihara, ‘New Roles for the Japan-US Security Treaty’, Japan Review of International Affairs, vol. 4, no. 1, Spring/Summer 1991, pp. 25–40.
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© 1993 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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Watanabe, A. (1993). Japan’s Postwar Constitution and Its Implications for Defence Policy: A Fresh Interpretation. In: Matthews, R., Matsuyama, K. (eds) Japan’s Military Renaissance?. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-22777-8_2
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