Are there any theories of international relations in Japan?

摘要

This article argues that there are theories of international relations (IR) in Japan and that these theories are mostly of middle range type. I first give a brief survey of IR studies in Japan and its disciplinary backgrounds. On that basis, then I focus on the three outstanding cases of fledgling theories of IR as developed in the 1920s and 1930s, namely Nishida as an innate constructivist, Tabata as an international law theorist presupposing the natural freedom of individuals, and Hirano as an economist placing regional integration higher than state sovereignty, to develop the argument that there are indeed theories of IR in a fledgling form already before World War II.