Japan’s Unilateral Change of the Diaoyu Islands Status Quo Challenges Post-war International Order
Reasons for Japan’s Provocations over the Diaoyu Islands
During negotiations on normalization of China-Japan diplomatic relations in 1972 and upon signing the Sino-Japanese Treaty of Peace and Friendship in 1978, the then leaders of the two countries, acting in the overall interests of China-Japan relations, reached an important understanding and consensus with respect to “leaving the issue of the Diaoyu Islands to be resolved later.” This opened the door to normalization of China-Japan relations, resulting in tremendous progress in China-Japan relations as well as stability and tranquility in East Asia over the ensuing 40 years. Although Japan has repeatedly denied this consensus since the second half of the 1990s, for various internal and external reasons, high-ranking Japanese officials, including Japanese foreign ministers, have stated that restraint should be exercised on the Diaoyu Islands issue for reasons of the overall interests of China-Japan relations. In 1992, then Japanese Prime Minister Miyazawa Kiichi indirectly acknowledged the consensus on shelving these disputes when China’s National People’s Congress passed the Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone. It is thus clear that the Japanese government also agreed at that time that the Diaoyu Islands disputes should not affect China-Japan relations, and that Japan acknowledged that the disputes should be shelved.
The Chinese government has always emphasized its stance of “grasping sovereignty, shelving disputes and co-exploiting the resources of the Diaoyu Islands.” On the basis that China has sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands, China would like to achieve a win-win situation through co-development and shelving disputes. The Japanese government, however, in spite of agreeing to shelve the disputes, has nonetheless insisted on various occasions, such as in parliament, that the Diaoyu Islands are inherent territory of Japan and Japan has no plans to talk with other countries since there are no disputes on this issue. Japan has remained inactive in co-exploiting the resources of the islands – an attitude that foreshadowed the status quo.
On September 11 of 2012, the Japanese government signed a purchase contract on the Diaoyu Islands with their so-called “private owners” and officially nationalized them. It claimed that Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara’s proposed purchase of the Diaoyu Islands would have a destabilizing effect and that nationalizing the islands is in the interests of their peaceful and stable management. The real reason, however, is that the Japanese government has made nationalization of the Diaoyu Islands a national policy.
In 2007, the Japanese government promulgated the Basic Act on Ocean Policy, and meanwhile declared its basic principles on security governance of offshore islands in a bid to strengthen its ocean management. The Japanese government regarded tightening its governance of offshore islands as points of reference for an exclusive economic zone as vital. “Nationalization” of the islands was an important step in its policy. In 2011, Japan nationalized 23 offshore islands that did not include the Diaoyu Islands. The recent “nationalization” of the Diaoyu Islands was hence triggered not by Shintaro Ishihara’s plan to purchase them, but according to the Japanese government’s guiding policy on the Islands. The farce played out by Shintaro provided the government with an excuse to act on its ulterior motives.
Japan’s aim in nationalizing the Diaoyu Islands, even at the expense of provoking disputes, is to strengthen its control over them. These audacious moves can be analyzed from the following perspectives.
First, when disputes about the Diaoyu Islands arose in the 1970s, Japan’s actual measures were aimed at curbing their escalation. While taking a passive attitude to further negotiations on the Islands, Japan had acquiesced to China’s stand of “shelving disputes” because, having had actual control of the Diaoyu Islands, Japan believed this stance would be beneficial to its continuing control of them. Upon, however, Japan’s ratifying of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea – the UN’s Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf requiring all member countries to submit data about their territorial waters – Japan’s ambitions to expand its territorial waters grew. Japan’s cabinet subsequently passed the Basic Act on Ocean Policy, delimiting an exclusive economic zone several times its actual territorial area. The Diaoyu Islands have, of course, been taken as a point of reference for its expansion of territorial waters.
Second, Japan’s current political landscape has given it another motive for such provocations. Self-interest clearly played a main role in driving Japan’s senior-generation politicians into reaching consensus on “shelving disputes” with China. They did, however, understand the value of the overall interests of China-Japan relations, and did not display strong nationalistic sentiments. This provided a good environment for the stable development of China-Japan relations and China’s economic development. The collapse of Japan’s bubble economy, however, has exacerbated Japan’s current political tendency. Unable to pinpoint an effective solution to their economic problems and hence to gain the people’s support, Japan’s politicians have become disposed towards a populist stance calculated to win over the public by arousing their nationalism. Their vision on China-Japan relations has consequently narrowed. Seiji Maehara and Noda Yoshihiko are representatives of this political tendency by virtue of their respective behaviors in the 2010 boat collision accident in China’s territorial waters around the Diaoyu Islands and the recent “nationalization” farce.
