There are three stages in the relationship between diplomacy and economy during the Showa era. The first is the pre-Manchurian Incident period, during which the principle of international cooperation of the 1920s was still dominant. Japan's lifting of the gold embargo and its participation in the international limitation of naval armaments in 1930, were the final examples of international cooperation in the 1920s.
After the Manchurian Incident of 1931, the spirit of international cooperation diminished considerably, and Japanese foreign policy makers tried to replace the former policy of multilateral cooperation with that of bilateral cooperation in diplomacy and economy. The new prescription was a revised version of the principle of international cooperation of the 1920s.
With the outbreak of the undeclared war against China in 1937, even the policy of bilaterlism increasingly lost validity. Both diplomacy and economy were geared for war, ultimately leading to the Pacific War.
The third stage is the post-war period in which both diplomacy and economy regained their autonomy from military affairs. Reconstruction of the economy was given priority over all other national goals. Diplomacy served the Japanese economy as a means to its internationalization.
As an introduction to the special feature articles of this issue on the diplomacy and economy of the Showa era, this article tries to illustrate the disintegration of the international regime based upon treaties concluded at the Washington conference in 1922, which brought drastic changes in the former relationship between diplomacy and economy. It sheds light upon the four power financial consortium to China as the economic framework of the Washington international regime, which was organized by Japanese, Amirican, British, and French banking groups in 1920, with the “complete support” of their respective governments.
The special concern is how international relations among the four powers changed, as their respective policies, especially British policy toward the China consortium, changed from the beginning of the 1920s to the eve of the undeclared war between Japan and China in 1937. This introductory article shows how the original positive British policy toward the China consortium gradually changed to a negative one, parallel with the decline of the Washington international regime.

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The purpose of this paper is to describe clearly the effects of the World Monetary and Economic Conference held in London in 1933 on Japan-United States relations.
Generally speaking, the London Economic Conference was largest international economic conference between the Wars, but it was not successful because of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's opposition to the European nations'plan. That is, Roosevelt wanted freedom to devalue the dollar in order to raise domestic prices as a counter to the deflationary effects of the depression. The London Economic Conference could not rebuild the international monetary system. However, there have been few studies about this topic in connection with Japanese diplomatic history, but I believe the result of the conference had a tremendous effect on Japan-United States relations, and this analysis will illustrate Japan's cooperation towards the United States after leaving the League of Nations on March 27, 1933.
Japan's response to the London Economic Conference was as follows:
(1) Japan wanted freedom to carry out its own domestic economic policy. Therefore, Finance Minister Korekiyo Takahashi was opposed to a return to the gold standard system and did not want to participate in any treaty which aimed at stabilizing the yen exchange rate.
(2) Because Japan believed that tariff wars would prevent the recovery of industry and trade for each nation, government and businessmen were anxious to reduce high tariffs and to conclude an international treaty to sweep away limits and embargoes on exports and imports.
As a result, the conference could not conclude international treaties not only on a monetary system, but also on trade issues.
Japanese businessmen thought that the failure of the conferece became a common symbol of a basic change in the world economy. It brought unstable exchange rates and rampant protectionism. But the Japanese government was calm, because the United States also abandoned the gold standard system and President Roosevelt had exactly the same idea about economic policy, that is, both wanted a managed monetary system. Also, Secretary Cordell Hull's proposal for a reciprocity treaty fascinated Japan, when faced with the European nations' protectionism.
In conclusion, the result of the London Economic Conference brought about a situation where Japan could cooperate with the United States economically.

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Duning the period of the Inukai Cabinet and the Saito Cabinet three control comittees on Manchurian matters were formed by the Government. In March 1933 Manchukuo decided “The Economic Construction Plan” by bolstering the power of the Kwantung Army. Although this decision was informed in advace to the Japanese Government, the Kwantung Army completely took the leadership and political friction arose between the two.
In Japan the irritated Government and Army Ministry held heated discussions and fixed economic policy toward Manchuria in the above ministry's economic policy committee on Manchurian matters. They decided also “The Fundamental Principles of Guidance toward Manchukuo”. At this stage the Army Ministry intended to take an initiative in the Government under the slogan of “the Government in full force” system, preventing the Kwantung Army from arbitrarily acting on economic matters. While the Kwantung Army complained about policy, they were obliged to compromise on “the Government in full force” system.
In these circumstances of 1934 Prince Chichibu visited Manchukuoto celebrate its imperial system and also Emperor Pu Yi was scheduled to visit Japan. Imperial friendship between Japan and Manchukuo played an important role as political ceremony. Pu Yi, who was inspired by the Kwantung Army declared the unification of Japan and Manchukuo; thus the scheme of the Army was achieved.
At the end of 1934 policy toward Manchuria was renewed through Jiro Minami's assumption of the post of Commander-in-Chief, the Kwantung Army and the establishment of the Bureau for Manchuria. One of the important articles of this policy was the Economic Joint Policy Committee on Japan-Manchuria matters indicated in “the Government in full force” system. This Committee was organized under the subjection of Manchukuo to Japan, completing the basic policy toward manchuria.

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One of most distingushed features which can be found among controversies on political economy in prewar Japan is the intensive concern for development shared by almost all participants. Such concern had a great influence on the framework of politics in prewar Japan, and it was no exception in the case of foreign economic policy. The purpose of this essay, therefore, is to analyze the formative process of the New East-Asian Order with special reference to works of Takahashi Kamekichi, one of most productive economists in this era, and thereby to suggest the changing configuration of images of development and its meaning to politics.
Takahashi presented the thesis of the deadlock of the Japanese economy (yukizumari-ron) in his early works. It was the first attempt to apply Marxian theory systematicaly to the development of Japanese capitalism with carefully complied statictics, and Takahashi's thesis became widely influential in the proletarian movement in the late Taishô period. He participated in the formation of a united labor party, and took an initiative in drafting its economic program based on his thesis. The rising of the left wing which was influenced by the Comintern, however, forced him out from the party and then Takahashi became very critical to the literal interpretation of Marxian and Leninist theory.
The theory of petty imperialism was a challenge to the left wing. Arguing the extent to which Lenin's five criteria of imperialism was applicable, Takahashi denied the attainment of Japanese capitalism to the stage of imperialism. The denial of the orthodoxy of Leninist theory and his affirmative attitude toward expansionism irritated the left wing theorists, and their reaction resulted in a major debate, the debate on Japanese capitalism (Nihon shihon-shugi ronsô). From Takahashi's viewpoint, however, it was a necessary development of his early thesis, and his antipathy to the Washington system underlying the petty imperialist theory had its origin in his earliest work. His theory presented the eagerness of Japan to rise up to the “Center” from the statue of the “Semi-periphery”, this could be argued as a corollary of the debate on Japanese capitalism, whose subject was the desirable model for late-developing capitalism.
When the Great Depression arose in 1929, Takahashi advocated interventionist economic policy under a managed currency. Possibly, such a policy would bring about the revival of democracy as the New Deal policy had done in the United States. In fact, however, he leaned toward state corporatism and became sceptical of parliament democracy. The emerging block economy made him also negative to the cooperative world economic system. Although he expected the sucsess of the London World Economic Conference in mid-1933 with its American leadership, he found it soon to be unsuccessful. Besides, Britain's attack on Japan for dumping outraged him. Britain's action seemed to him the downfall of European primacy and the emergence of Japan as a world power.
Confident of Japanese economic power, Takahashi set out to plan the East-Asian block economy and the development of East-Asian countries under the tutelage of Japan. For example, he pointed out that Korea had attained the stage of “take-off” from an agrarian economy to an industrial one, and that the vertical division of labor between Korea and Japan was rapidly emerging with the progress of Japanese heavy industry. For China, he critcized Chang Kai-shek's reform of the currency with support from Britain to the effect that it was a mere transference of the advanced country's system, and that China should adopt the model for the late-developing countries such as early Meiji-Japan or Formosa. It was evident that his criticism had a bias in view of the belligerency between China and Japan; but it should be noted that it was based on his framework of a developmental model for the late-developing capitalism

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Konoe Fumimaro is generally thought to have been a feeble and volatile political leader. But in his first government, he was the one who attempted to overcome the gigantic ‘Kogi Kokubo Shugi’ policy or ‘Military centralized industrialism’ which no one had ever been able to stop. And he tried to run Japan's economy by a peaceoriented ‘Kyogi Kokubo Shugi’ policy or ‘Regular industrialism’ instead.
Being involved in the Marco Polo bridge incident unexpectedly, however, Konoe still convinced himself that Japan could punish China soon by using Japan's economic power. Because he had a strong belief in Japan's monetary‘power policy’ which had been proceeded all through the Manchurian Empire, inner Mongoria and Northern China challenging the circulation of Chiang Kai-shek's ‘Legal Tender’. This was the reason why Konoe did not repress Kôgi Kokubo Shugi's landslide escalation in the eary stage of the war.
Finally at the end of 1937, the ‘currency war’, turned against China, and Chiang Kai-shek resigned his seat in the Cabinet.
In January 16, Konoe proclaimed his famous ‘Aitetosezu’ (or refuze to deal) statement against China. By this statement Konoe wanted to thrust his sword in Chiang Kai-shek's political reputation. But it failed to lead to Chiang's military collapse. On the contrary Wang Ching-wei and ‘the East-west military cliques’ lost their power in the Chinese government who both had once organized the ‘anti-Chiang movement’ in the ‘Kuomintang’ (the Chinese Nationalist Party).
Chiang Kai-shek revived his influence three months later and this time he strengtend the alliance with CCP (the Chinese Communist Party) and fully used CCP's power to increase his power.
In June 1938, Konoe's political initiative was at last nominal, and ‘Kogi Kokubo Shugi’ had already replaced Konoe's treasure, ie, ‘Kyogi Kokubo Shugi’.

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Following the occupation of Nanking (December, 1937), the question of how to deal with the currency system in central China so as to weaken the Chiang Kai-shek regime became an important issue for Japan. Most papers concerning this issue have discussed only economic assaults on the Chinese currency, like the Hua Hsing Commercial Bank and similar economic maneuverings.
However, the situation was more complex. Firstly, the Chinese currency system, introduced with the help of the Britain government adviser Leith-Ross in 1935, was strong, and it looked difficult to destroy. Secondly, even if Japan could succeed in destroying the system, it seemed unlikely that Japan could make an alternative currency system by herself, and the destruction would bring about serious economic confusion in the occupied areas, too. Thirdly, in spite of the existence of anti-British forces in Japan, from an economic viewpoint, the Japanese government strongly needed good relations with Britain and the U. S. A. for the purpose of strengthening her wartime economy, and Britain was anxious about her interests in central China, especially the maintenance of the Chinese currency system. On this occasion the Japanese government placed high hopes on Munakata Hisanori's currency plan for occupied central China.
The aim of this article is to introduce the hitherto almost unknown Munakata Plan and to examine its political meaning and role. Munakata was a banker of the Bank of Japan, and he had assisted the Chinese currency system reform plan of Leith-Ross, which originally envisioned Anglo-Japanese cooperation on China issues, but which Japan had declined. Now, as the Japanese Army, Navy, and Foreign Ministry's adviser, he made what was essentially a revival of the Leith-Ross's plan, but this time with Japanese participation. His planwas roughly as follows. Under Japan's military and economic mastery over China, Japan reforms the currency system in central China with the cooperation of Britain and other powers, through which she would put an end to the war. Upon the end of hostilities she is able to exploit postwar China.
The Munakata Plan was promoted with the support of Ikeda Shigeaki (Cabinet Councillor, and later Minister of Finance and Commerce and Industry) and Prime Minister Konoe, the Army General Staff, the Navy and the forces in central China. The plan was also approved by the Cabinet, and it became evidence which the Chamberlain Cabinet used in its decision not to give financial aid to China.
The defeat of the Munakata Plan was caused mainly by the international factor of Britain's disagreement. However, the opposition of the Ministry of the Army, combined with the difference of stances on China policy between the idealistic Foreign Minister Ugaki and other imperialistic pro-British leaders, like Ikeda, and Ugaki's later resignation also affected the Munakata Plan's failure.
Now, from today's viewpoint, the Munakata Plan may not seem feasible, but the hope placed by the Japanese government on the plan in the harsh diplomatic environment indicates the high level of importance Japan's moderate leaders attatched to her economic needs.

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The Sino-Japanese War, which erupted in 1937, had a great effect on the beginning of the Pacific War. In particular, aside from intensifying the hostility between Japan and the United States, the Sino-Japanese War transformed Japan into a powerful war machine. As the United States Strategic Bombing Survey pointed out, Japan could not go to war with the United States without the buildup of armaments that took place during the Sino-Japanese War. Fighting against China, Japan prepared for the new and massive war to come.
Japan, as is well kown, is poor in resources and must depend on foreign countries for their supply. However, which country was it that supplied to Japan oil, scrap iron, steel and machinery which made enabled her to march on China and to begin anoter major war? According to statistics, the Unied States supplied to Japan more war materials than any other country. She continued exporting to Japan indispensable munitions for nearly four years following the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese Incident. Without war materials from the United States, Japan's armed forces in China would have collapsed before the outbreak of the Pacific War. Surely the United States, as Elliot Janeway stated, was “Japan's partner”.
On August 10, 1937, Senator Gerald P. Nye who was a leading isolationist from North Dakota, commenting about the increase in shiping of iron and steel from the United States, told the assembled Senators that he thought “the only return we may expect from a continuation of this exportation … is the probability that one day we may receive this scrap back home in the form of sharpnel in the flesh and in the bodies of our sons”. Unfortunately, Nye's prediction proved right.
In this article, we will thoroughly examine the relationship, which joined Japan and the United States during the Sino-Japanese War.

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Owing to its change of government, the United States was not prepared to participate in tariff negotiations in 1953. Because U. S. participation was a precondition for a GATT tariff conference to be held, Japan could not enter GATT through the normal accession procedures. In addition, several countries such as Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand, made objections to Japan's making use of “simplified accession procedures”. Under these circumstances, Japan chose to enter GATT through the “provisional accession” formula. The formula consisted of two parts: (1) Decision regarding the participation of Japan in the Sessions of the Contracting Parties; and (2) Declaration regulating the Commercial Relations between Certain Contracting Parties and Japan. Complicated diplomatic processes were involved in the eventual adoption of this two part formula.
This article describes Japanese provisional accession in 1953, with a main focus on the roles of Toru Hagiwara, the Japanese Minister to Switzerland, and Wyndham-White, the Executive Secretary of GATT; the diplomatic offensive by the United States and Japan towards Britain and Britain's change of policy; and the diplomatic process between the Commonwealth countries and its final outcome.
The success of Japanese provisional accession owed much to the active role played by Wyndham-White, who was not merely a messenger or coordinator behind the scenes, but rather the main player who first postulated the idea of provisional accession. Secondly, the strategy of separating provisional accession into two parts proved fruitful. Though Britain was obliged to abstain from voting due to Commonwealth connections, even Britain did not want the first part of the provisional accession to fail as a result of such an action.

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It has been a practical rule that trade frictions between the industrialized states have been alleviated and finally resolved by intergovernmental negotiations. However, the trade conflict over Japan's exports of television receivers and other consumer electronic products to the United Kingdom in the early 1970s has been mitigated and settled by so-called nongovernmental diplomacy between both British and Japanese industries concerned, which might be called a rare model case as such.
Japan's exports of colour TVs to the U. K. practically started in 1971 and perplexed the British consumer electronics industry from the very beginning, because Japanese counterpart was already known at that time for having damaged the American industry concerned by their irresistible exports. After many contacts between British government and manufacturers' association, both British and Japanese consumer electronics industries began their own consultation about trade friction on the advice of British Secretary of State for Trade and Industry in 1971 and the regular meetings of their representatives were alternately held in England and Japan once, twice or three times a year until 1988.
Under their government's guidance, Japanese manufacturers had restrained their exports of TVs and audio products called music centres to the U. K. for a couple of years (colour TV from 1973 to 1975, monochrome TV, 1973-74, music centre, 1978-80) to alleviate over-supply of the products in British domestic market and the British rivals' anguish about it.
In addition, they devised, so to speak, confidence building measures like an emergency “hot-line” communication system and unofficial rules for crisis management. They gradually shifted from a relationship of asymmetric interdependence to one of symmetric interdependence by learning that they both had common interests. It can be generally said that there are much more merits in mitigating and settling trade conflicts by flexible interindustry consultations, in other words nongovernmental diplomacy, than by inflexible intergovernmental negotiations.
But the competition laws of some countries have been unfortunately being insuperable obstacles to wide-ranging interindustry consultations. The future developments of transnational relations throughout the world might hopefully change the circumstances of nongovernmental diplomacy.

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Japanese warships transported five hundred million yen in gold bullion (about 450 tons) equivalent to about one trillion five or six hundred million yen at current prices, from Russia to Canada in the middle of the First World War. This bullion was the specie which was transferred to the Russian account at the Bank of England in Ottawa to supplement the overseas specie reserves. These reserves were for the purpose of purchasing munitions from America. Japan undertook to take part in this operation for the sake of showing cooperative unity with the Allied Powers. The supreme commander of the operation was the president of the Bank of England who oversaw allied finances. The operation was carried out according to a secret treaty between Russia and Britain which had been concluded at the urging of the American government.
As the First World War developed into a major conflict, the Allied Powers relied heavily on imports of munitions from America which was at the time neutral. Russia had purchased vast amounts of munitions from America with the financial support of Britain. When the limit of this support was reached the trade finance situation between Russia and America reached an impasse. Britain wished to relieve the situation and enable the munitions trade to Russia to continue, as it was strategically vital that Russia maintain the Eastern front. The most effective method would have been for Russia to make one colossal transfer of specie. However, the threat of German U-boats in the sea near Europe had made that idea unfeasible. Therefore, a plan was worked out whereby Japanese warships would transport the gold across the Pacific Ocean to Canada. By taking on the role of transporter, Japan was able to impress upon the Allied Powers her cooperative attitude and turn Allied indebtedness to her advantage at the peace conference and in post-war deplomacy. Further, during the war the Japanese government had had difficulty in repatriating her foreign specie holdings. When Britain offered to sell Japan a part of the specie gold if she agreed to the transport plan, the Japanese government was more than happy to accept. In all, Japan imported a total of about 65 tons (worth about 80million yen)of gold in this way.
During the First World War the center of international finance shifted from London to New York. The colossal specie transfer operation from Russia mentioned above was one of the events which symbolized the change. Japan played an unusual role in this event, a role which helps us to understand both Japan's position and in what ways she coped with international relations during First World War which pivoted on the international financial situation.
In the first chapter, we look at the tight financial situation governing the munitions trade between Britain, Russia and America and consider how this gave rise to the necessity for the Russian specie transfer. In the second chapter, we discuss the process of the Japan-Russia munitions trade and the negotiations regarding the settlement of accounts. The third chapter gives a detailed description of the negotiations between Japan and Britain concerning the transportation of the gold and actual voyages of the Japanese warships.

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