ANU - ARC Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security (CEPS), ANU Program

In September 2008, the Australian National University’s Department of International Relations, its Department of Political and Social Change and the University of Tokyo were awarded a grant by the Australia-Japan Foundation of the Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs (DFAT) to conduct an in-depth exploration of the growing and increasingly significant Australia-Japan bilateral security relationship. The project would be implemented primarily through the convening of workshops involving academic and policy experts, and would explore an array of important dimensions now shaping the relationship. These included more formal and systematic defence relations between themselves and in the context of their respective alliances with the United States, how the two countries collaborate (or, in rare cases, differ) on multilateral security politics in the Asia-Pacific region, and how both are confronting increasingly complex and ‘non-traditional’ global security issues. The underlying research question driving the project was the extent to which a judicious ‘mix’ of bilateral and multilateral security politics could best serve both Australia’s and Japan’s rapidly evolving security requirements, or if both states were better off assigning priority to underwriting the postwar U.S. ‘hub and spokes’ alliance system as the best means for ‘like-minded democratic powers’ to engage in regional and international order-building during the early 21st century. The workshop format, a residency by a Japanese postdoctoral research fellow at the ANU to support key aspects of the study, and the eventual conversion of project findings to published outputs, were key features of this initiative.

To derive answers to the questions about structures and processes of alliance politics and multilateral security organisation, the project managers (Professor William Tow from ANU’s Department of International Relations, Professor Rikki Kersten from ANU’s Department of Political and Social Change and Professor Kiichi Fujiwara from the University of Tokyo) solicited a team of highly respected scholars and policy analysts to interact in two major workshops convened in March and September 2009 (details of the March 2009 workshop are available below). They were able to link the project to several other commensurate studies undertaken by the ANU and the University of Tokyo to examine similar issues but from a slightly broader perspective. The John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation is underwriting research by both the ANU and the University of Tokyo to research various components of evolving Asian security politics (Tow, Kersten and Fujiwara are all involved in that research initiative). The International Alliance of Research Universities’ (IARU’s) ‘Security Project’ is also investigating inter-relationships between traditional and non-traditional security components where the national security interests of both Australia and Japan are intersecting. The ARC Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security (CEPS), funded by the Australian Research Council, with components hosted by both the ANU and Griffith University, is also focusing on the forces of structural change in the Asia-Pacific region influenced by new threats and policy responses which naturally dovetails with the AJF project. Resources generated by these research initiatives were exploited by the principal investigators of the AJF project to help forge a highly competent and motivated group of participants for addressing its objectives.

Appointing a post-doctoral Japanese security studies scholar was an initial pre-requisite for project implementation. We received a relatively small number of applications due to fairly exacting requirements related to quality control. We were, however, fortunate in being able to appoint one of Japan’s best young academics in international relations to this position – Dr Ryo Sahashi from Tokyo University. Mr Sahashi commenced his stay at the ANU in early July 2009 and completed his residency in the International Relations Department on 18 September 2009, just prior to delivering his research results to the AJF Tokyo workshop on 21-22 September 2009. He assisted with organising and administering this workshop.

Dr Sahashi’s project focused on identifying and assessing three ‘tiers’ of regional security interaction and cooperation in the Asia-Pacific. Aspects of this project directly relating to Australia-Japan relations include an extensive assessment of ‘middle power diplomacy’ in an era of rapid and intensifying regional structural change; the relevance of bilateral alliances that the U.S. maintains with Japan and Australia in such a dynamic setting; and how Japan and Australia are advancing or responding to various ‘order-building’ initiatives in the region. They also demonstrate how specific Australian-Japanese collaboration could be applied to realising the two countries’ mutual security objectives in the region. The policy implications of this analysis are significant as Japan’s new government settles into establishing its diplomatic and strategic identity and as the Australian government moves to facilitate the consolidation of its own multilateral security diplomacy. Dr Sahashi’s paper generated from his research results has been published as a Working Paper for the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre (SDSC), in December 2009.

Download Dr Sahashi's Working Paper » (PDF 172KB)

An interim report submitted to the AJF at the end of April 2009 provided a comprehensive summary of the Canberra workshop. It should be noted here that Professor Tow communicated in writing to those who presented papers at that event, offering critiques of first drafts and, more specifically, how subsequent versions of the papers could focus on various dimensions of the four key themes emerging from the initial March proceedings in subsequent versions for presentation at Tokyo (the four themes evolved around (1) Japan as an increasingly ‘adaptive state’ in the regional security politics; (2) Australian-Japanese responses (individually and/or collectively) to a ‘rising China’; (3) how domestic politics in both Australia and Japan are becoming more central ‘drivers’ for both countries’ foreign policy formulation; and (4) how a ‘nexus’ of global and regional security concerns is emerging in areas of both ‘traditional’ and ‘non-traditional’ areas of security policy. Two new papers were prepared by Dr Thomas Wilkins and Dr Donna Weeks, respectively, for the Tokyo workshop. Dr Brendan Taylor of ANU’s Strategic and Defence Studies Centre served as this workshop’s ‘senior mentor,’ and Ambassador Ishii Masafumi, now serving in the Policy Planning, International Security Policy section of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Foreign Policy Bureau, also attended and offered highly valued comments at the end of the workshop’s first day. Representatives from the Australian Embassy in Tokyo also attended the proceedings. Workshop participants were graciously hosted by Ambassador Murray McLean for a dinner at the Embassy on the evening of 22 September. Project organisers are deeply grateful to Mr Richard Andrews, the Embassy’s Minister-Counsellor (Political) for facilitating various logistical aspects of the workshop.

All four conceptual points stipulated above continued to play a significant role in our Tokyo deliberations. The ‘adaptive state’ and domestic political concerns proved to be especially important given that a new Japanese government underwritten by political forces previously in opposition had formed two weeks prior to the second workshop’s commencement. Several papers (by Professor Kersten, Professor Ando, Dr Walton and Professor Fujiwara) underscored the importance of this new political dynamic as it would affect Japan’s ‘worldview’ and foreign policy behaviour and how it might impact on both Australia’s and Japan’s political leaders. Some historical cross-comparisons were offered to support this analysis (particularly by Kersten and Walton). It is noteworthy, however, that the second workshop appeared to emphasise more traditional factors of regional security as opposed to the Canberra workshop’s concentration on comparing and contrasting ‘traditional’ and ‘non-traditional’ factors vying for predominance in both Australian and Japanese security politics. In part, this tendency to ‘explain the present by understanding the past’ was understandable given the policy uncertainties associated with the emergence of a new government in any major democratic power such as Japan.

Yet several papers focused on the uncertainties over realising normative consensus and on other preconditions required for a viable regional ‘community-building’ process. Recent North Korean bellicosity regarding nuclear issues clearly shaped the tone of some presentations (although it was acknowledged that that states’ oscillating posture on this issue appeared to be shifting toward a new stage of moderation at the time the workshop convened). A preliminary conclusion was reached that the current Australian government’s security diplomacy directed toward the region had fared relatively well during the Rudd government’s year and a half in office, but that more work needed to be directed toward ensuring that the scope and depth of Australia-Japan bilateral ties achieved by Australia’s previous government would be preserved and expanded. This was particularly challenging given the increasing weight of Sino-Australian commercial and political relations and the growing uncertainties surrounding the future global role of the United States in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC).

Professor Kersten published two op-ed pieces in the Canberra Times leading up to and immediately following Japan’s national election, and her pieces have been reprinted in various other outlets and blogs. Ms Sheila Flores has been exceedingly diligent in maintaining the content of the project’s web pages located within the CEPS ANU Program in Policing and Security website. Both Professors Fujiwara and Professor Sahashi were in constant demand by Japanese media sources to be commentators on Australia-Japan relations throughout the Project’s duration, and both of these Japanese scholars will continue to focus on this subject via their participation in the ANU’s project on bilateral and multilateral security politics underwritten by the MacArthur Foundation.

Professor Tow has continued his role as the project’s ‘editor-in-chief’ by organising other outlets for the work generated by this project. As this report is being written, we have secured a commitment from the Australian Journal of International Affairs to have four of the papers presented at the Tokyo workshop published in a special issue of that publication scheduled for February 2011. We have also solicited the Palgrave Macmillan commercial press to publish all of the project papers presented at that workshop as a volume with Professor Kersten and Professor Tow prospectively serving as its co-editors. If we are successful in negotiating such an arrangement with Palgrave or with another commercial press, we anticipate that a book presenting all of project papers should be published by the middle of 2011. These two projected ‘end products’ will form part of the core for teaching materials to be introduced into our 2010-2011 visual classroom project component, also supported by the AJF and involving both the University of Tokyo and Keio University.

This project’s achievements are largely the result of some extraordinary support rendered by very good people. Those who merit special mention include Ms Chizuko Horiuchi and Ms Sheila Flores who organised project-related events, achieved efficient budgetary oversight, and coordinated the many administrative details that invariably accompany any such undertaking. Other ANU colleagues were also instrumental to project success: Dr Brendan Taylor, Professor Hugh White, Tomoko Satake and Yusuke Ishihara were especially important in this context. Credos are also due to the team from the University of Tokyo – our project’s institutional collaborator – who did so much to make the September workshop a success and who assisted so effectively in the coordination of Japanese participation. Professor Kiichi Fujiwara, Miyuki Otsuka and Wakana Mukai were particularly effective in this context and we are most grateful for their efforts extended on the project’s behalf. The contributions of the Australian Embassy in Tokyo have already been cited in this report but it is appropriate at this juncture to express our gratitude to Ambassador McLean, Richard Andrews, Hugh Watson, Peter Roberts and Noriko Honda for their time and contributions in making the Tokyo workshop, in particular, such a positive and productive experience. Special acknowledgment is also due to Senator Russell Trood who delivered a timely and comprehensive keynote address at our Canberra workshop. Finally, such a project would not have been possible without the material and moral support of the Australia-Japan Foundation. We single out Deborah Peterson, Ben Esguerra, Warren Smith and Deb Blakie here but also wish to commend all of the AJF and DFAT personnel with whom we have had the pleasure to work in making this project a successful one.

CEPS and the Australia-Japan Foundation (AJF) Partnership

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