Japan's Foreign and Security Policy Under the Abe Doctrine ― New Dynamism or New Dead End?

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo's foreign and security policy—highly charged with ideological and historical revisionism—contains the potential to shift Japan onto a new international trajectory. Its degree of articulation and energy makes for an 'Abe doctrine' capable of displacing the 'Yoshida Doctrine' that has been Japan's guiding grand strategy in the post-war period. Abe has already begun to introduce radical policies that look to transform national security policy into a more muscular military stance, bolster US-Japan alliance ties to function increasingly for regional and global security, and attempt to encircle China's influence in East Asia. The 'Abe Doctrine' is dynamic but also high-risk. Abe's revisionism contains fundamental contradictions that may ultimately limit the effectiveness, or even defeat, the doctrine, and along the way inflict collateral damage on relations with East Asia and Japan's own national interests.

Christopher W. Hughes is Professor of International Politics and Japanese Studies, University of Warwick, UK. He has held visiting professorships at Harvard University, University of Tokyo, and Waseda University. He is the author of Japan's Remilitarisation (2009) and Japan's Reemergence as 'Normal' Military Power (2004).