Should we be optimistic or pessimistic about the new DPJ government? Foreign Policy prognosis.

Last night Japan made history; throwing out the LDP and giving Hatoyama’s DPJ an overwhelming majority in the Diet and clear mandate to pursue his policies.

Before the election, while most observers (myself included) believed that the DPJ would be able make government without a coalition partner. But I was surprised that the DPJ took the 300-plus seats which had been projected by the opinion polls, a landslide.

Make no mistake about it; this is a great result for Japan as a whole. If the DPJ had unexpectedly failed to win government somehow, the subsequent administration would have faced a huge legitimacy deficit, big enough indeed to put Japan national debt in the shade. Or, if the DPJ had won government but needed to form a coalition to do so, it is unlikely that it could aggressively pursue its preferred policies. And that is surely the point; this outcome means that the DPJ has the ability aggressively pursue the kinds of policy shifts that Japan needs, for instance in foreign policy.

But this doesn’t mean the DPJ will. In fact, although the DPJ has displayed a preference to lean away from the US towards Asia, the specifics of such an important strategy move are still undecided, suggesting that little will in fact change. Thus, the DPJ is at risk of drifting with Japan’s foreign policy. This risk, when the rise of China, the re-ordering of the US’s Asian priorities and a financial crisis conspire to make decisiveness more than virtue, but a necessity, needs to be faced head on.

For instance, with regard to the DPJ’s potential drift away from the US; during the election the existence of a secret agreement which undercut Japan’s non-nuclear principles (hikaku gensoku) came to light. The DPJ has promised to investigate whether a secret agreement exists, but has not promised necessarily to report the outcome to the Japanese people. Likewise, although the DPJ had promised to reach a trade deal with the US, promises here have also been diluted. Both trade and security aspects of the US relationship might drift.

On the flip side, the DPJ has declared its interests in Asia. But what precisely they intend to do is still a vague and uncertain. The DPJ has indicated its interest in an FTA with South Korea, but at the same time there remain questions about whether the DPJ will have the spine to take on the domestic agricultural lobby. At the same time, Korea has its own concerns about an FTA with Japan, although agriculture is no longer one of them. Interestingly, the DPJ has proposed a new party level bureau to manage CCP-DPJ exchange, that is to say a direct exchange between the Chinese Communist Party and itself. Apart from the dubious utility of such an arrangement, it is uncertain if the Chinese side will accept such a proposal in any case. Indeed, the DPJ may learn that Asia is not willing to embrace Japan, and Japanese initiatives, quite as eagerly as the DPJ believes.

We will see the DPJ do will foreign policy soon enough, for an early indication of Japan’s orientation looking to FTAs seems a good bet as no doubt there will be a declaration about this soon enough.