Japan North Korea Relations

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan provides an April 2002 fact sheet about international relations between Japan and North Korea. Information about the history of diplomatic relations between the two countries, the number of Japanese nationals residing in North Korea, trade between the two countries, Japanese investment in North Korea, and Japanese economic assistance to North Korea is available. The ministry provides a chronological timeline of the dates of official visits of Japanese and North Korean diplomats and government officials to one another's countries.

North Korea’s contemporary relations with Japan have been fraught with tension. Tactics employed by Pyongyang have included abductions of Japanese citizens, missile launches over Japanese territory, intrusions into Japanese sovereign waters, and nuclear tests in defiance of Japanese and international condemnation. In light of the security risk the DPRK poses, this book examines how the state, market, and society in Japan have framed North Korea as a salient evil, and have in turn constructed and manipulated the risks posed by their neighbour. Using the example of Japan’s post-Cold War responses to North Korea, this book studies the concept of risk in international relations, and its interactive relationship with domestic civil society. It focuses on how security risks are identified and re-evaluated by policy makers, mass media, and civil society stakeholders, and in doing so disentangles the complex processes by which Japan has framed and recalibrated risks in response to the DPRK. By exploring how risks identified with Pyongyang’s behaviour towards Japan have been mediated between the state, market, and society via mainstream discourse in Japan, Ra Mason highlights the way in which these processes are causally linked to key actors’ conceptions of risk. Indeed, this book provides an original theoretical framework – distinguishing between risk and traditional threat perceptions – through which to address issues of national security and identity, as well as the norms which inform them. Japan’s Relations with North Korea and the Recalibration of Risk will be welcomed by students and scholars across a wide range of fields including Japanese politics, Asia-Pacific studies, international relations, and security studies.

Japan and South Korea are Western-style democracies with open-market economies committed to the rule of law. They are also U.S. allies. Yet despite their shared interests, shared values, and geographic proximity, divergent national identities have driven a wedge between them. Drawing on decades of expertise, Brad Glosserman and Scott A. Snyder investigate the roots of this split and its ongoing threat to the region and the world. Glosserman and Snyder isolate competing notions of national identity as the main obstacle to a productive partnership between Japan and South Korea. Through public opinion data, interviews, and years of observation, they show how fundamentally incompatible, rapidly changing conceptions of national identity in Japan and South Korea—and not struggles over power or structural issues—have complicated territorial claims and international policy. Despite changes in the governments of both countries and concerted efforts by leading political figures to encourage U.S.–ROK–Japan security cooperation, the Japan–South Korea relationship continues to be hobbled by history and its deep imprint on ideas of national identity. This book recommends bold, policy-oriented prescriptions for overcoming problems in Japan–South Korea relations and facilitating trilateral cooperation among these three Northeast Asian allies, recognizing the power of the public on issues of foreign policy, international relations, and the prospects for peace in Asia.

The contributors to this book demonstrate empirically how Japanese public opinion is formed amid strained Japan–South Korea relations. Studying public opinion in Japan and South Korea is critically important for exploring the causes and consequences of the deterioration of the relationship between the two countries. Japan–South Korea relations are at their worst level since World War II. Faced with North Korea’s nuclear threat and China’s regional and global advances, Japan and South Korea are each allied with the US and function as key stabilizers within the Asia–Pacific "Pax Americana." These relations play a decisive role in East Asia’s international security. The contributors explore a variety of social scientific methodologies—both conventional quantitative surveys and experiments, as well as quantitative text analyses of published books and computational analyses of social media data—to disentangle the dynamic relationship between Japanese public opinion and Japan–South Korea relations. An invaluable resource for scholars of East Asian regional security issues.

Bringing together issues that are highly relevant to contemporary Japanese foreign policy, this comprehensive text analyzes the formation of the North Korea policy in the context of great power relations in East Asia.

This book examines the major security and related issues between the United States, Japan and North Korea (officially, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea - DPRK). Although focusing mainly on current issues, this book also provides sufficient historical background to enable readers to appreciate the many nuances that have been ignored by policymakers, analysts and the media. Where appropriate, the book examines the security interests of other nations in Northeast Asia, specifically South Korea, China and Russia. The central purpose of the book is to objectively analyze the policymaking processes of Washington, Tokyo and Pyongyang with respect to the DPRK's nuclear weapons and other important security issues, and ultimately to provide practical ways to improve the security environment in Northeast Asia. Ongoing security-related issues include nuclear missile testing by the DPRK; its removal from the U.S. list of states sponsoring terrorism, and the abduction of Japanese nationals by North Korean agents that occurred during the 1970s and 1980s. Unlike other books, which typically take the position that North Korea is a rogue state run by an irrational, belligerent and autocratic leader, this book reveals the fundamentals of Pyongyang’s security concerns in the region. This book will be of great interest to students of North East Asian politics, Asian security studies, US foreign policy and Security Studies/IR in general.