1. Answering Beijing’s Growing Assertiveness beyond the Senkakus: Balancing Japan-China Relations
- Author:
- Valerie Niquet
- Publication Date:
- 05-2021
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Japan Institute Of International Affairs (JIIA)
- Abstract:
- To Japanese authorities, there is no such thing as the “Senkaku question”. China is pursuing with increased assertiveness a strategy of coercion, using ambiguity and “grey zone” operations to put the onus of potential escalation on Tokyo.1 The vague and ambiguous nature of this strategic power play makes it all the more dangerous and complex. When Tokyo proclaims, with reason, that “the government continues to control and administer the territory by such means as patrolling and law enforcement,” it seeks to answer the permanent pressure that China exerts in the zone.2 However, the maintenance of the status quo, when China exerts an almost continuous pressure in the waters surrounding the Senkaku Islands and Japanese fishermen do not have access to part of Japan’s own national territory, poses other types of problems that the People’s Republic of China tries to exploit at the service of broader ambitions. It also poses a challenge in crisis management: how can the Japanese government be active and in control of situational developments, and not just reactive, without going as far as sparking a major incident in the East China Sea?
- Topic:
- International Relations, Bilateral Relations, Geopolitics, and Crisis Management
- Political Geography:
- Japan, China, and Asia