Defense as a budgetary problem: The minimization of conflict in Japanese defense policy-making, 1976-1987.

摘要

The premise of this study is that in order to reduce conflict over defense in Japan, defense policymaking is treated as a budgetary problem. Treating defense as a budgetary problem enables the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to manage the dilemma of restraining Japan's defense buildup to placate the opposition parties, while also gradually increasing capabilities to offset U.S. pressures for greater Japanese defense efforts. Five factors influence the treatment of defense as a budgetary problem: continued Japanese dependence upon the U.S. security guarantee, extended LDP dominance, continued preeminence of the Ministry of Finance in budgeting, continued exclusion of the opposition parties from power, and the structural constraints of state governance.;Three distinct periods appear in the recent treatment of defense as a budgetary problem. The first period corresponds to the establishment of political constraints on defense in the 1970s, deficit spending, and lack of strong commitment to attain defense plans; the second period involves the resumption of the LDP's Diet majority in the 1980s, the shift to fiscal restraint, the reshaping of the defense debate in budgetary terms, and failed attempts to attain defense plans; and the third period concerns the commitment of the LDP to attain the National Defense Program Outline despite fiscal restraints.;The inability of the LDP to take the initiative on defense, as well as the tendency of the bureaucracy to deal with issues along technical lines enhances the treatment of defense as a budgetary problem. Incremental defense allocations do not require the formulation of strategy by the ruling party. Marginal appropriations are also well suited to a political system in which the LDP's taking of initiatives on defense are sensitive with the electorate. Budgetary incrementalism in this context reinforces the tendency of the Japanese state to be reactive when confronted with foreign pressures such as U.S. requests for burden-sharing.;The treatment of defense as a budgetary problem allows the U.S. and Japan to avoid substantive reassessment of defense relations despite relative changes in their economic positions. This depoliticizes conflict in Japanese politics, and in U.S.-Japan relations.