Japan-U.S. Security Treaty of 1960 and Foreign Policy Process in Postwar Japan

Abstract

The article focuses on the processes in Japan’s domestic politics that accompanied the preparation, signing, and ratification of the 1960 Japan–U.S. Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security. Using this case as an example, the following features of the foreign policy process in postwar Japan are demonstrated. First, key decisions were taken by a limited number of people, among whom the key role was played by Prime Minister Kishi Nobusuke and Foreign Minister Fujiyama Aiichiro, as well as the Foreign Ministry officials who assisted them. Second, the attempts of influential politicians from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and factions led by them to exert a decisive influence upon the Government’s foreign policy course had no result and were motivated mainly by these politicians’ striving to enhance their prestige and influence in the domestic political arena, rather than by their principled position regarding foreign policy issues. Third, the anti-Treaty protest movement initiated by opposition forces and various civil society organizations, while managing to mobilize a significant number of supporters, was still affected by contradictions amongst the forces that joined it. Ultimately, this movement also failed, not being able to prevent the signing and ratification of the Treaty, though it succeeded in bringing down the Kishi government that resigned due to the political crisis into which the protests escalated.