Crisis of Liberal Internationalism: Japan and the World Order

Japan faces challenges and opportunities in a new era of uncertainty, with the weakening of the rules-based order threatening its trade-based prosperity and leaving it vulnerable to China and North Korea. Its response to these challenges is complicated by controversies over constitutional revision and its history, and the absence of virulent strains of populism has helped to provide a stable platform from which to pursue its international agenda. However, with a rapidly aging population, widening intergenerational inequality, and high levels of public debt, the sources of Japans stability are becoming increasingly difficult to sustain.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 415 pages
Publication date: 30 December 2019
Publisher: Brookings Institution

Japan has been a crucial anchor of Asian stability and global peace and prosperity for seven decades, but its role within an American-led liberal international order is now under siege from illiberal forces such as China and Russia and its very core, the United States under Donald Trump. This poses particular challenges for Japan, as explored in this book. Noted experts survey the difficult position that Japan finds itself in, both abroad and at home. The weakening of the rules-based order threatens the very basis of Japan's trade-based prosperity, with the unreliability of U.S. protection leaving Japan vulnerable to an economic and technological superpower in China and at heightened risk from a nuclear North Korea. Japan's response to such challenges is complicated by controversies over constitutional revision and the dark aspects of its history that remain a source of tension with its neighbors. The absence of virulent strains of populism has helped to provide Japan with a stable platform from which to pursue its international agenda. Yet with a rapidly aging population, widening intergenerational inequality, and high levels of public debt, the sources of Japan's stability—its welfare state and immigration policies—are becoming increasingly difficult to sustain. Each of the book's chapters is written by a specialist in the field, and the book benefits from interviews with more than 40 Japanese policymakers and experts, as well as a public opinion survey. The book outlines today's challenges and opportunities for Japan in a new era of uncertainty.

Weight: 626g
Dimension: 223 x 153 x 30 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780815737674