Opinion | Japan can be a dynamic alternative to superpower hubris – just ask Southeast Asia

Name: Tokyo 2020 Olympic Village opens to the media
Uploaded: 2021-07-07T00:00:14.000Z
Duration: 1 min 33 s
Description: Tokyo 2020 Olympic Village opens to the media

As a pre-eminent middle power with sufficient autonomy and resources, Japan can help prevent superpower conflict

Not only did Japan, under Abe, rescue the Trans-Pacific Partnership, it has offered a constructive alternative to China’s Belt and Road Initiative

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Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and his then Vietnamese counterpart Nguyen Xuan Phuc feeding the fish in a pond at the Presidential Palace in Hanoi on October 19, 2020. Photo: Reuters

Richard Heydarian

Published: 8:00am, 7 Jul 2021Updated: 8:00am, 7 Jul 2021

“The vision I am aiming for is that of ‘a beautiful country, Japan’,” declared Shinzo Abe in his maiden speech as prime minister before the Diet in 2006. As the first Japanese leader born after the Second World War, Abe envisioned his country’s re-emergence as a global force, one that is “filled with charm and vitality” and “open to the world”.

The upcoming Summer Olympics in Japan, which were postponed last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic, would have been his crowning achievement, capping more than a decade of transformational leadership. And his long-time right-hand man and hand-picked successor, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, seems determined to push ahead with the games despite opposition at home and scepticism abroad.

In many ways, the forthcoming Olympics are a metaphor for Japan’s steady re-emergence, one that has been clouded by controversy but may yet be game-changing in an era of uncertainty and upheaval. Although much subdued, this would be Japan’s ultimate comeback party following the “lost decades” of economic stagnation, demographic decline and political infighting.

In stark contrast to its dark imperial past, and as far more than just an addendum to a declining American empire, Japan can now truly become a force for prosperity and stability in Asia. And as a pre-eminent middle power, with sufficient autonomy and resources to independently shape its strategic environment, Japan can also help prevent superpower conflict between the United States and China.

It’s easy to write Japan off as a has-been. After all, few countries have experienced as dramatic a decline as Japan’s in contemporary history. Up until the 1980s, the Asian country was seen as America’s biggest rival, with Japanese conglomerates gobbling up studios and real estate from Hollywood to New York.

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Tokyo 2020 Olympic Village opens to the media

Amid a historic asset boom in high-flying Japan, Tokyo’s real estate prices were at one point nearly 350 times more expensive than Manhattan’s. The Imperial Palace alone was worth more than the entire state of California. Predictably, the bubble eventually burst, yet Japan was still a formidable power up until the twilight years of the 20th century.

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