Japan seeks respect — but from whom?

Japan’s resumption of ODA to Burma’s junta begs questions about its motives and what its political values really are.

Japan’s recent resumption of Official Development Assistance (ODA) to Rangoon’s military regime suggests that the region’s economic superpower has seriously lost its bearings in Asia’s troubled waters. Tokyo’s extension of a two and a half billion yen (US$19.5 million) loan to repair an airport runway in Rangoon, at a time when Japan’s economic difficulties have compelled it to trim its ODA budget by 10%, comes after a ten year hiatus in such assistance to Burma. Following the brutal crackdown o­n pro-democracy demonstrations in 1988, Japan suspended its generous funding of Burma’s development efforts, which in the 1980s placed Burma in the top ten amongst Japan’s ODA recipients, a fact which did not prevent the country’s economic collapse in 1987. Since 1988, international public opinion and political pressure from the United States has constrained Tokyo’s beneficence towards its erstwhile World War II ally, but over the past ten years, Japan has written off more than 40 billion yen in loans to Rangoon. This is, however, the first time that it has been so bold as to extend a new loan. The question is, what inspired this move, since there has clearly been no improvement in the political situation in Burma. Japanese policymakers have evidently made the decision that they can no longer afford, politically or economically, to stand o­n principle. Observing that “ODA represents o­ne of the nation’s diplomatic and strategic tools,” Kenichi Ito, president of the Japan Forum o­n International Relations, Inc., which recently submitted recommendations o­n ODA policy to Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, pointed to the need to discuss ways of “enhancing the quality of ODA because the quantity is falling.”It may be difficult to see how financing a military dictatorship contributes to this goal of enhancing the quality of Japanese ODA, but it is noteworthy that in a full-page special report o­n discussions between bureaucrats and academics concerning the need for changes in ODA policy, published in the Daily Yomiuri o­n March 14, Myanmar (Burma) was the o­nly country, apart from the United States and China, referred to specifically. “There have been calls for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to accept Myanmar as a member,” noted Keio University professor, Atsushi Kusano, “and it has been said that Japan should have supported this proposal more actively.”Kusano, who also served as chairman of the policy council’s task force, went o­n:“Tokyo is always concerned about how the United States will react. But the United States and European nations have invested far more in Myanmar than Japan has over the past five years.“Japan should employ a more pragmatic approach as far as business competitiveness is concerned, or else it will lose markets.”There is certainly nothing new about Japan, described by Ito as an “economy-centered state,” putting economic pragmatism ahead of other principles. However, it is evident that Japan’s economic difficulties and increasing impatience with criticism from the West may be leading to a tendency to make tacit political alliances with those who share similar feelings of irritation. Unlike the United States, which has always been able to distract attention from its periods of poor economic performance by taking bold, dramatic action o­n the international stage, Japan in its moment of economic vulnerability has repeatedly been told that its overseas initiatives, such as its plan last year to create an “Asia Fund” to provide its ailing neighbors with much-needed financial resources, are unwelcome. Always eager to open Japan’s markets, the United States has made it clear that the best thing Japan can do for the rest of Asia is put its own house in order and increase domestic demand for foreign goods and services. Thus Japan, perhaps tired of being told to behave like a good housewife whose place is in the home, has shown signs of succumbing to the flattering attentions of governments eager for access to purse-strings significantly looser than those of the IMF. Japan would probably do well to clearly separate its quest for political influence from its purely commercial concerns. The country’s most successful political endeavor to date has been in Cambodia, where a Japanese peace plan has effected some measure of reconciliation between arch-rivals Hun Sen and Prince Ranariddh Norodom. Cambodia has also given Japan an opportunity to demonstrate that its military is capable of responsibly fulfilling its international obligations as a peacekeeping force. Commercial interests were not a driving force in Japan’s involvement in Cambodia, although “yen diplomacy” certainly had a role to play.