The fact that international political theory failed to forecast the collapse of the former Soviet Union shattered the scholars inside and outside of international politics to make doubt that international politics seriously lacks theory. It is a strong blow against the previous effort by theorists of international politics, who are predominantly Americans, to make the body of international political study be more logical-empiricismic and hypothesis-testable.
Two incidents have happened in the midst of the serious debates over the relevance of theoretical contribution of this descipline. They are 1) a new insight of the so-called program-science in contrast to the current scientificlaw-governed science which has made profound impact to help shape the present international politics, and 2) the fast dissemination of the multimedia technology. These two incidents are isomorphically inter-related through one thing, namely information. As is well-known among international political scientists, information has deeply dealt with in the body of this decipline, but today's information age that brings about the new program science and the spreading of multimedia is unpresidentedly over-whelming to completely changes our view of international politics. For this reason, I would like to call it as the Multimedia Turn of the Study of International Politics. This turn would bring new looks of the two key concepts, i. e., the concept of the state and the concept of the way in which international politics moves.
Up to today, we have treated the sate as an analogy of ourselves, i. e., a human being. However, the resent development of molecular biology found that we are a part of the whole living creatures which are totally commanded by genetic programs. Then, we did nothing but regarded the state as a program-governed entity. This fact theoretically emancipates us from an always-man-analogous mindset and gives freedom that the state should be merely a “set of programs.” This is a strong epistemological understanding of the new program science which is advocated by a theoretical sociologist, Professor Tamito Yoshida.
Since the study of international politics has been muich influenced by the modern science which is governed by scientific laws, our causal reasoning of international politics is profoundedly logical-empiricismic. However, as G. Almond once said, what we are describing as international political phenomena is not clock-like but very much clouds-like. A clock works in only one way according to the scientific causal laws, but most social scientific “clouds” move in multiple-ways according to how we perceived clouds. Moreover, what we social scientists deal with are not scientific laws but social institutions which also work in multiple ways. These multiple ways are, according to the program science, exactly the different programs that govern the behavior of ourselves. This is tha same for the behavior of international politics. In my view, the causal structure of the social programs is simple in that: a) the state of social entities is determined by two things, the previous state and a new entries (visual or whatever), and b) the action is soly determined by the current state. I strongly believe that we can reshape the study international politics by folowing this causal reasoning.

View full abstract

The purpose of this paper is to develop the basic framework for analyzing international conflicts on intellectual property rights (IPRs). The framework presented here does not shed light on the legal aspects of the issue, as have been conventionally studied, but on the “economic” motivation and the “political” process of States and Firms. Transnational discord and cooperation between States and Firms caused by those motivations and processes are examined as the primal factor of conflicts.
Section I clarifies the distinctive interests and roles of States and Firms in the protection of IPRs. Firms seek to gain economic profits through their global business networks and international enforcement of IPRs, while States stick to maximizing national welfare by optimizing the cost-benefit balance of domestic IPRs protection. The former often jeopardizes national IPRs systems established by the latter. States attempt to regain welfare but they cannot realize it without Firms' cooperation.
Section II develops the economic-motivation models of three different international conflicts: North-North, South-North, and Multi-lateral. These models are based on economic theories of invention, industrial organization, and strategic trade policy. States promote international transfer of income by utilizing IPRs system as trade policy instruments that help domestic Firms to gain excess profits from foreign markets. Similar efforts of States, however, contradict each other. North-North conflicts center upon domestic procedures of strong IPRs systems. South-North conflicts are the straight choice between strong IPRs systems and weak ones. When conflicts become Multi-lateral, the leaders of Northern nations have to make concessions to other Northern nations so as to press the South.
Section III explains the national and transnational political processes between States and Firms, which spur on or discourage States to conflict. Theories of Triangular Diplomacy and Two-Level Games are relevant to the understanding of the logic of complex processes. “Domestic” Firms may benefit “foreign” States while “foreign” Firms may contribute to “domestic” interests of States, if Firms find it profitable to license their IPRs transnationally or produce goods embodying IPRs overseas rather than export goods. In addition, national IPRs policies cannot help changing income distribution among domestic Firms, which sometimes results in transnational alliances between damaged Firms and foreign States opposed to those policies. Therefore, States are forced to negotiate with Firms, whether domestic or foreign, to realize the international income transfer that was described in the previous section. The more transnational cooperation between States and Firms, the less conflicts between States, and vice versa. Dispute between the U. S. and EC on Section 337 of the U. S. Tariff Act is briefly analyzed to support this hypothesis.

View full abstract

In The Twenty Years' Crisis, E. H. Carr asked: “Will the nation survive as the unit of power?” This essay attempts to answer this question through the analysis of historical development of military technology from the Stone Age to the present Multi-media Age.
The survival of the nation hinges on whether or not the state can function as a security community to secure its citizens, because the state was historically invented as a security commnuity by western thinkers like Hobbes. Although military technology has been developed to strengthen the function of the state as a security community, in reality it has been weakening it, and finally threatens not only the survival of the nation but also of all human beings. Military technology as a means for national security can not meet the needs of the nation as a security commnity to secure citizens. Military technology has advanced too much to be relevant to citizens' security.
Military technology is separated into two categories: weapon systems in a broad sense as hardware, and strategy in general as software. The former is further separated into three levels. The top level of the weapon system consists of weapons such as guns, mines, and warheads that destroy targets directly. On the second level, there are platforms to install and carry weapons such as tanks, ships, aircrafts, and missiles. At the bottom level, there is a so-called infrastructure such as C³I system, logistics, and military education system. The military technology in each category has advanced so much that no country can function as a security community any longer. The invention of the atomic bomb as an absolute weapon, the appearance of ICBMs as an ultimate platform never to be deterred, and the remarkable advancement of C³I system as an ideal infrastructure to widen war-capable space from land to the deep sea and the space, all of these advanced military technologies have been deteriorating the function of the state as a security community.
Furthermore, the development of strategy as software also paralyses it. The MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) strategy to deter nuclear attacks as an ultimate strategy can not work well unless nations mutually abandon the function of a security community. In a sense, MAD needs the sacrifice of citizens' security for national security.
Advanced military technology in the multi-media age provides a possibility that non-state actors physically and psychologically can oppose state ones. A non-stateactor like a man can conduct war against a state by most advanced technologies such as portable nuclear weapons, PGMs (Precisely Guided Missiles) and GPS (Global Positioning System). Additionally, RMA (Revolution in Military Affairs) encouraged by the Information Revolution in the multi-media age will change drastically the function of the sate as a security community.
After all, the nation will survive as the unit of power for the time being, but will be less effective than before, and will coexisit with a non-state actor as a new unit of power. Advanced military technology in the multi-media age will open the door to the pluralistic or multi-centric global security community.

View full abstract

This paper examines U. S. Government policy toward five industry sectors that would become a major part of the multimedia industry and explores a possible U. S. industrial and technology policy in an integrated multimedia industry. First, a brief history of government interventions toward the five industry sectors (semiconductors, computers, software, consumer electronics, and telecommunications) is reviewed for the period since the World War II. It is found that (1) emphasis on international competitiveness of the industries, (2) support toward critical dual-use technologies, and (3) rule-setting for competition in such areas as industry standards and intellectual property rights, are becoming common trends of industrial and technology policies in these sectors since the 1980s.
In the second section, it is argued that the Clinton adiministration's policy is very important in predicting the future direction of industrial and technology policy of the multimedia industry. After discussing the importance of the above three trends of industrial and technology policy in the overall context of technology policy, it is found that the emphasis on international competitiveness and rule-setting activities are the two most important factors in Clinton's multimedia policy. Implications of the merger between competitive strategy and rule-setting activities in a policy context, and issues related to deregulation, standard setting, and intellectual property rights are analyzed from this perspective.
The conclusion of the analysis is that the major role of the U. S. government in the multimedia field is to support establishing basic rules for competition; that is, to construct an infrastructure of multimedia competition by promoting deregulation, helping the industry set industry standards, and strengthening intellectual property rights. These kinds of policy initiatives, which provide U. S. companies with incentives for innovations and new businesses, will become the most important competitive policy of the U. S. government in the coming multimedia era.
One more important role of the U. S. government lies in its foreign economic policy. The U. S. government could extend the rules of the game to foreign countries and help U. S. companies enlarge business opportunities overseas. There already are signs of policy development in this direction, such as the FCC's adoption of the reciprocity concept in telecommunication market access and the U. S. government's arguments for opening up foreign telecommunication markets at WTO. It is argued at the end that we need to consider implications of such U. S. initiative as the “Global Information Infrastructure” from the perspective of this U. S. competitive strategy.

View full abstract

In the United States, a new social paradigm based on Cyberspace is about to be formed, through many trials. By effectively utilizing the interactive characteristics of Cyberspace, the players show a positive stance to change the way of communication, thereby raising the competitive power of companies, and aim at establishing a more democratic society.
In view of the current trends related to Cyberspace, the topic attracting the most attention is the development of digital money and its social effect. It is no exaggeration to say that the success of the digital revolution depends on digital money's mechanism and function. Therefore, we have analyzed the social-economic impact of digital money.
The digital revolution is not only a corporate revolution, but a social and cultural revolution. Hereafter it will be important to devise a scheme for linking various social entities. By doing so, we will be able to create a communicative Cyberspace founded on independence and diversity of each entity.

View full abstract

There seems to be consensus among various literature of economics that the way in which information technology makes impacts on market. That is, the premise of perfect market competition which has been regarded only as a theoretical hypothesis is now a reality as information technology makes it possible to disseminate all necessary information on market. The two-way multi-media supplies almost complete information on commodities and their prices, eradicates geographical barriers by quick dissemination of economic transactions, nulifies governmental regulations by a flow of information over national boundaries, and furthermore, enables small firms to join into market competition because customers can have access to them by network search. Then, both firm organization and distribution system attain maximum efficiency and the Pareto Optimum can be realized.
In view of socio-economics, information is not only of the type of “formal” information which is used in the above discussion, but also of the type of the “tacit” information. The evolving process of information between “formal” information and “tacit” one at various stages of expression, exchange, accumulation, sharing of is independently illustrated by Ikujiro Nonaka for the case of firm organization, by F. A. Hayek for the case of market, and by Susumu Nishibe for the case of a social system. According to them, perfect competiton cannot be universally realized by the advancement of information technology. It is only realized as a unique case, in the American society where information is all regarded as “formal” but not “tacit.” Also, I would like to point out that if information is searched at any time in the network like internet, that network would have tendency to go inward.
This article tries to argue that what would happen and at which level in firms, market, and social system when the multi-media is widely diffused.

View full abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present a historical and geographic macroperspective on the changes in global politics and economics being brought about by communications networks. The Internet is playing a major role in this revolution. We are in the midst of an momentous age, in which two cultures, which began in ancient Egypt about 6, 600 years ago and spread around the globe, are meeting again in the Asia-Pacific region, which includes Japan. The information revolution is making this possible.
We can use the Venetian civilization as the dividing line between the Middle Ages and the modern industrial world. Since then, the phases of global prosperity were punctuated by the industrial, manufacturing, and commercial revolutions made possible by the development of the steam engine, and later the internal combustion engine. The fourth phase of global prosperity began when the American-invented transistor was reborn as the microprocessor.
A key aspect of the information revolution is the migration of publishing onto online services, and making those resources available in real time. This is being made possible by the microprocessor. In turn, this provides us with the ability to use communications networks to improve dialogue among nations, access to education and health care, and solutions for the planet's ecology.
The roots of this information revolution lie in the US's attempt to deal with such problems as its budget deficit, trade deficit, and increasing difficulties with its systems of education and health care. But as the US makes the transition from a National Information Infrastructure to a Global Information Infrastructure, this information revolution also offers opportunities for solving East-West and North-South problems. Communications networks are now linking not only the world's major economic powers, but also post-Soviet Eastern Europe, the Asian-Pacific region, South America, and Africa. From the standpoint of this information revolution, the major power in the twenty-first century—in terms of human resources, language, economic strength, military ability, and communications technology—will not be China or India, it will be the US. The US is the only nation with sufficient resources to leverage communications networks as a means toward peace and prosperity in the twenty-first century. The US can use the information revolution to extend its dominance and prosperity for another hundred years. Rather than compete against the US, Japan should choose to support the cause of world peace by contributing to the expansion of information networks.

View full abstract

Increasingly, countries are undertaking National Information Infrastructure (NII) policies. This governmental approach toward market activities is meant to strengthen domestic economies and industry competitiveness by the construction of an innovative social infrastructure. Interaction between states and markets is extremely complex because it is taking place in the most advanced economic sectors of developed capitalist countries. Also, state-market interaction is significantly different from country to country. This paper explains (a) information policies in economically and geographically different states (the United States and Singapore), and (b) theoretical differences between the NII and the GII (Global Information Infrastructure) from the view point of institutional evolution. A central conclusion is that although different policy paradigms for the construction of information infrastructure have developed in recent years, NII policy programs work commonly as political external-forces acting on markets to stimulate new information industries.

View full abstract

With recent developments in telecommunications, research universities are required to change drastically. As Peter F. Drucker predicts, in the near future when more adults will be engaged in life-long learning, universities will inevitably have to compete with other social organizations like companies, non-profit organizations and some kinds of governments.
Traditionally, research and education at universities have been conducted, with teachers and students sharing the same time and space. However, research and education in cyber space not sharing time and space will be crucially enlarged in the future. To cope with such transformation of its social position, universities are urged to shift from an authoritative, centralized, closed and rigid state to a cooperative, decentralized, open and flexible one. Methods and styles of academic research will also need to take advantage of telecommunication networks.
It is expected that more and more academic achievements will be produced through group communication (rather than personal- or mass communication) by means of productive exchange of opinions among scholars. It has been very difficult to technically support group communication, though it has long been desired. These days telecommunication networks can be applied to support group communication easily, even in cyber space.
Academic communication methods can be divided into four categories along the spatial axis of face-to-face/distance types and the chronic axis of synchronous/asynchronous communication types. Focusing on the possibilities of research and education methods in cyber space, only two categories of synchronous/asynchronous at distance type and one category of synchronous at face-to-face type are discussed.
Three phases of academic telecommunication use are identified and concrete examples are given. In the first phase of using telecommunication as an academic information tool, the present situations of virtual libraries and information resources of IR research are shown. ISA and APSA have already created their home pages, give much useful IR information on them and encourage exchange of opinions among scholars via Internet. In the second phase of using telecommunication as an academic communication tool, virtual seminars of IR carried out in the U. S. and Japan are discussed. In those seminars students are asked to both analyze IR's data and theories and improve network skills. In the last phase of virtual universities, some cases of IR research conducted entirely online, education and administration in the U. S. are briefly mentioned. In MUD students attend seminars, discuss with teacher or among students and send messages to electronic bulletin board, totally in cyber space.
To conclude, future universities will introduce fusion forms of research and education systems based on both the physical world and a world in cyber space, even though the latter is still developing. Hopefully, telecommunication networks will further enable our universities to attain more creative achievements and promote close bonds between teachers and students.

View full abstract

The third Arab-Israeli war of 1967 quickly ended in an overwhelming victory for Israel, in what is called the “Six-day war” by her. At that time, the Arab countries claimed that the United States had participated in the war on the Israeli side, and severed diplomatic relationship with her. Because the U. S. -Egyptian relationship had already been bad before the war, and the Israeli aerial attack was far more efficient than Egyptians had expected, they suspected U. S. -Israeli complicity. In fact, the Johnson administration had repeatedly warned Israel not to initiate hostility, while trying to organize an international fleet to deter Egypt from the use of force. The Arab side, however, continued to maintain that the United States had encouraged Israel to attack Egypt in order to weaken the revolutionary Nasser regime. The then unofficial spokesman of Nasser, Mohamed Heikal, still does so in his recent thick book “1967 al-Infijal (outbreak)” (Cairo, 1990), which is based on declassified documents of the United States and Egypt.
According to him, when Egypt demanded the United Nations Emergency Force (which had been stationed in Sinai Peninsular since the 1956 Suez War) to leave from the Israeli border area, United Nations Under-Secretary Ralph Bunche, an American, advised Secretary-General U Thant not to accept partial withdrawal, thus provoking Egypt to demand total withdrawal and to occupy Sharm el-Sheikh and then close the Strait of Tiran for Israel. It was an American plot to give Israel a casus belli. After that the United States warned Egypt, in cooperation with the Soviet Union, not to initiate hostility while hinting to Israel that she would not, unlike on the occasion of the Suez War, support any United Nations move to sanction Israel if she attacked Egypt.
On the American side, serious studies based on declassified documents as well as interviews with then policy-makers have been accumulated, some of which expressly try to refute the Egyptian accusations. I have studied and compared these books and articles, checked many of the documents and interviewed some people myself, and concluded that it is not that the United States “unleashed” Israel to attack Egypt, but that the Nasser regime itself let, through a series of miscalculations, the Egyptian military provoke Israel into war. However, Israeli decision-makers were wise enough not to attack Arab forces prematurely—they gave time to the U. S. and Britain to try to organize the international fleet. When the Johnson administration found the efforts rather fruitless, it was in fact inclined to let Israel help herself. In this sense the United States was involved in the political process leading to the outbreak of the war.

View full abstract

This article analyzes how the Tojo Cabinet arrived at an agreement to go to war with America, Britain and the Dutch East Indies. The Tojo Cabinet would not to be bound by the ‘Guidelines for Implementing National Policy’ that were adopted by the Third Konoe Cabinet and would ‘return to white paper’. But the Guidelines which were adopted after two weeks reconsideration, specified a deadline for concluding talks with Washington, after which war was to be decided upon. Does this decision meant that The Tojo Cabinet overcome the structural defect of the Meiji Constitution? The decision-making system of the Third Konoe Cabinet was characterized by Ryoron-heiki that incorporate the interests of all the opposing government institutions and Evasion of Decision-Making that evaded decisions in order to avoid conflict. The prime minister could not override the interests of the various government organs. It was owing to the structural flaw in the Meiji Constitution which saw legislative power shared between the Cabinet and the General Staff.
Togo agreed to be Foreign Minister on condition that The Tojo Cabinet was committed to work hard to bring negotiations with the United States to a success. Togo and Finance Minister Kaya stated that if Japan could not win a long war, there was no reason for going into it. Then, how did the Tojo Cabinet come to such a conclusion? This paper examines the following points.
1) Analyzing the logic of ‘Reconsideration of National Policy’. The main purpose of the reconsideration was to deny the possibility of the policy of ‘perseverance and patience’. There were not enough reasons to conclude that the war was the better selection. The reconsideration did not examine the situation of a long drawn-out war. Nevertheless, to get such a conclusion, it was essential for it to be reinforced by uncertain factors such as a favorable change of the international situation, the establishment of ‘selfsufficiency and economic invincibility’.
2) Examination of the ‘concessions’ of Japanese Foreign Policy to America. Foreign Minister Togo adopted, many ‘concessions’. Fixing a term to withdrawal from China, preparation to remove the Japanese troops stationed in the southern part of French Indo-China to the nothern part, were the most important proposals. The Third Konoe Cabinet had collapsed when war Minister Tojo resigned in rejecting plans for the Japanese Army to withdraw from China. The explanation of why and how Togo could succeed to reach an agreement with the Cabinet and the General staff. Can be drawn from the complex decision-making system of the Meiji Constitution.

View full abstract

Treating the roles of Foreign Minister Shidehara Kijuro and Deputy Minister to China Shigemitsu Mamoru concerning the Chinese foreign debt redemption negotiations from 1929 to 1931, this paper examines two choices within the Japanese Foreign Ministry symbolized by these two influential diplomats.
When the National Government came to power in China in the late 1920s, a great amount of debt to foreign countries, such as Japan, Great Britain, and the United States of America, had already been accumulated. Redemption of this Chinese foreign debt became an international issue between the National Government and the related countries. In particular, Japan had extended huge credits to China, such as the so-called Nishihara Loans during the First World War. It could almost be considered a test case for Japanese economic diplomacy led by Shidehara for Japan, Britain, and America to recover their foreign credits to China and at the same time maintain good relations with China.
Sino-Japanese negotiations over the Chinese foreign debt redemption began formally in the spring of 1930. However, some political leaders within the National Government of China, such as Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Cheng-ting, repudiated payment of the Nishihara Loans. Although the international creditors conference was later held in November of the same year, the participating countries failed to reach agreement and Shidehara's attempt to search for Anglo-Japanese cooperation was in vain.
Approaching Chinese Minister of Finance Sung Tzu-wen, Shigemitsu, on the other hand, tried to break the deadlock by conceding to reducing the amount of the Nishihara Loans. Shigemitsu envisioned aiding Chinese nation building led by Chiang Kai-shek and Sung Tzu-wen by linking the foreign debt redemption with Japanese reinvestment into China. Shigemitsu firmly believed economic cooperation with China was indispensable to Japan because the policy of cooperation with America and Britain was no longer working well.
Shigemitsu's plan was seen as going beyond that of Shidehara, whose basic foreign policy outlook was that of cooperation with America and Britain. Shidehara sought to keep Japan in line with America and Britain when he negotiated with China on issues including extraterritoriality and the transfer of foreign legations. Although Shigemitsu went to Tokyo and talked with Shidehara, the gap between them was not bridged. Returning to China, Shigemitsu resumed negotiations and a foreign debt redemption plan was agreed to informally between Japan and China. However, in the end, the debt was not recovered due to the outbreak of the Manchurian Incident.
In the conclusion to this paper, after reviewing the two foreign policy options within the Foreign Ministry symbolized by Shidehara and Shigemitsu, the influence of the Japanese Army after the Manchurian Incident on these two options is discussed.

View full abstract