A 'Post-Carbon' Diplomacy? Japan's Southeast Asia Conundrum

In October 2020, Japanese prime minister Suga Yoshihide chose Vietnam and Indonesia as the destinations of his first official visit abroad. From a security standpoint, there is little doubt that the two countries play a crucial role in the Japanese–American grand strategy, launched by Suga’s predecessor, Abe Shinzō, of building a Free and Open Indo-Pacific to counter China’s assertiveness. Security, however, is just one element of a more intricate puzzle of competition and cooperation between Tokyo and Beijing in this region of Asia. Suga’s trip to Southeast Asia (SEA, hereafter) was also chosen as the occasion to unveil his government plans to make Japan carbon neutral (i.e., to slash the country’s emissions to a level that can be absorbed by nature) by 2050

“Greening” Speculative Urbanism?Space Politics and Model Circulation in South Korea and Vietnam’s Special Economic Zones

As products of the waves of deregulation and liberalization of trade and investments in the region in the 1980s and mid-1990s, special economic zones (SEZs) have emerged as an important tool of economic governance in East and Southeast Asia. Recently, governments and investors around the region, have favored multi-purpose SEZs conceived for land and real estate development which exhibit several similarities such as eliciting tourism as the main driver of local development and a declared “eco” and “green” configuration. The Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ) in the Republic of Korea (ROK) and the Van Don SEZ in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) are two illustrative cases of urban policy diffusion as a complex phenomenon combining the ROK’s increased international activism and SRV’s own institutional structure and preferences in terms of development goals. Based on a close reading of reports, official documents, qualitative interviews and site visits, this article will further contribute to the debate on the complexity of urban policy diffusion in contemporary East and Southeast Asia

The Rise of Governance and the Japanese Intermediation in Transitional Vietnam: The Impact of Japanese Knowledge-Based Aid to Vietnam in the Doi Moi Years

In the late 1980s, the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Vietnam, hereafter) underwent a period of reforms known as doi moi (renovation), opened its economy to global flows of goods and capitals and adopted an “omnidirectional” strategy aimed at building relations with former “enemy” states like Japan and the US. These multiple transitions presented the country’s communist leadership with new challenges: first and foremost, transforming the country’s governance from socialist to a partially neoliberal one in the attempt to accommodate international partners’ and investors’ demands. The present study will address the following research question: by which means did the Vietnamese leadership succeed in surviving the demise of the USSR and conform to the emerging neoliberal global order? Against the backdrop of the global rise of the good governance model for international development, this article will shed light on Japan’s role during Vietnam’s first phase of reforms in the early 1990s through its government-led knowledge-based aid initiatives up until the draft of the country’s first Comprehensive Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy. It will argue that Japan offered a certain development know-how and a model of state-mediated growth which suited Vietnam’s Communist party’s needs to keep the single-party rule

Gambling on the ‘Little Dragon’: Toward an EU-Japan strategic convergence on Vietnam?

The present article aims to analyse recent EU-Japan joint engagement with Vietnam in the context of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. It seeks to do so by illustrating the historical transformations in the geopolitical arrangements centred on the Asia-Pacific region between Japan and the EU in the light of ‘situational’ US policies toward the region under Trump, Japan’s strengthened global role, Vietnam’s historical struggle to diversify its foreign policy vectors and maintain autonomy, and growing expectations of EU engagement in the region as a champion of free trade and the rule of law

Japan’s “Last Hope”: Myanmar as an arena for Sino-Japanese competition, coordination and global standardization

Despite competing strategical interests over Southeast Asia that have emerged in the last decade, with the launch of wide scope geopolitical strategies Chinese and Japanese initiatives have been characterized by a certain degree of implicit coordination, particularly in offering support to the Myanmar state’s territorializing strategies for economic development. The case of the Thilawa Special Economic Zones (SEZ) is exemplary, as it was a Japan-led project which became a model and benchmark example for similar development initiatives supported by the People’s Republic of China

Towards European “Smart Communities”? EU’s Energy Preoccupations and the Lesson of Post-Fukushima Japan

While Japan notoriously suffers from a structural lack of primary energy sources while being prone to natural disasters, it has been able to attain an unprecedented industrial development. The earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis of 2011 pushed successive national governments toward comprehensively reviewing its energy strategy, with substantial progress being made. The policies adopted by Japanese authority since 2011 point to the materialisation of community-based power networks, which, if adopted on a wider scale, might contribute to enhanced energy self-sufficiency and security. In the light of decarbonisation strategies adopted by both the EU and Japan and of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, this issue is even more urgent. For these reasons, increased communication and coordination on energy and urbanisation issues between EU and Japan is highly desirable

Smart Energy for the World: The Rise of a Technonationalist Discourse in Japan in the Late 2000s

In recent years, "smart city" has become a buzzword in discussions about urbanisation. While in Europe and North America the initial utopian optimism has now receded, due to booming implementation costs and surveillance concerns, the smart city model has taken root in rapidly urbanising Asia in particular, thanks to the activism of China and Japan. For the latter, smart city technologies and technical know-how represent the new frontier of export goods. In April 2018, the Government of Japan and that of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam announced the construction of a new smart city on the outskirts of the Vietnamese capital Hanoi that is set to become Japan's largest ODA project to date. Despite changes in the global hegemonic narratives on smart cities, the new project bears the features of an urban settlement that revolves around technological data collection for the sake of perfect efficiency, rather than for its prospective inhabitants. Against this backdrop, how did the Government of Japan succeed in constructing a convincing narrative for made-in-Japan smart cities? Since 2011, thanks to specific initiatives by Japan's government and investments by Japanese tech companies in the sector, a Japanese discourse on smart cities has emerged. Through an examination of earlier critiques of the smart city model and a close analysis of official policies and books by energy policy intellectuals, this paper will identify the main features of the Japanese discourse on smart cities and place it in the context of an evolving broader global narrative. The study demonstrates how the Japanese discourse on smart cities largely reflects a corporate managerial vision of the city and, at the same time, a “technonationalist” approach that informs the country's foreign policy

Dalle piazze a Twitter contro l’egemonia di Abe: La strategia comunicativa del Partito democratico costituzionale alle elezioni del 2017

Japan ranks second in the world in terms of the number of Twitter users. Since 2009, under the Democratic Party’s 3-year permanence in power, politicians and administrators have turned to Twitter massively to build a direct communication with their constituency. It was, however, only in 2017 that Twitter has become a propaganda tool and a locus of political debate among Japanese politicians and netizens. The Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) is an exemplary case of this transition. Born a few weeks before the vote of 22 October 2017, it managed to get attention and consensus, also thanks to a massive use of social networks, and, finally, to confirm itself as the first opposition party. A year after its foundation, however, it has failed to broaden its electoral base and consolidate itself locally. However, the article aims to identify the factors behind its swift success: on the one hand the role of the leader Edano Yukio and on the other the construction of a "counterhegemonic” narrative (though short-lived) capable of obtaining consensus in the immediacy of the election. This analysis intends to use the textual material available online (for example: tweets more relevant from a political-programmatic point of view) to identify the narrative framing of the political campaign, regularities and innovations within it to enlarge the CDP’s chances to gain at the ballot. In addition, the article intends to assess the role of social networks such as Twitter for politicians even in a seemingly neutral web space such as Japan’s

Development as a Brand? Japanese Aid to Asia and the Case of Vietnam in a Historical Perspective

The aim of this proposal is to analyze the role of Japan in contemporary international relations. More specifically, my analysis will focus on the relationships Japan has forged with Southeast Asian countries, particularly underlining the strong link between Japan and Vietnam over the last decade. What will be taken into consideration in this context is the image requalification process Japan has been implementing since the promotion of the “Fukuda Doctrine” in 1977. Japan has indeed become one of the most active promoters of economic cooperation and development in Asia. I shall therefore consider to what extent Vietnam has benefitted from Japan's economic proactivity and on the other hand, to what extent Japan has affirmed itself in the region, countering the rising of China. From the point of view of economic and democratic development, in fact, since 1945 Japan has undergone a massive transformation that impacted on the relation with other Asian countries. The military occupation of Asia in the 30's, promoted under the banners of dōbun dōshu (“same culture, same race”) propaganda led to deep exploitation of countries natural resources, workforce and reduced millions of people to poverty. Instead, after 1945, Japan started considering that a peaceful context could help its expanding economy. As a result, through the promotion of the Official Development Assistance (ODA) since 1954, Japan began to rehabilitate itself in the eye of its neighbouring countries. As for the Vietnamese case, Ōno (2009; 84-86) pointed out that since 2001, the Socialist Republic of Vietnam has been among the top four recipients of Japan's aid. Official Development Assistance has provided nearly two trillion yen in infrastructural and social development projects in the last few years. In my paper, Japanese ODA in Vietnam could therefore be interpreted as a “branding” tool to enhance what Simon Anholt calls “national reputation” (Anholt 2010). As also underlined by Negri and Hardt (2000) in fact in the new political order of globalization, “sovereignty has taken new forms”. In conclusion, the questions I shall address are how Japan has succeeded in “rehabilitating its image” and what is the real aim behind this strategy in a future perspective