Japan’s Coast Guard Capacity Building under Abe Shinzō: Between Power, Money and Norms

Abstract

For Japan’s former prime minister Abe Shinzō, security cooperation with Southeast Asia was central to preventing the South China Sea from turning into a “Lake Beijing” – completely under Chinese control. This paper explains why Abe’s security engagement in the region focused mainly on providing Capacity Building Assistance (CBA) to Southeast Asian coast guards agencies to counter China’s maritime assertiveness. Answers are provided by looking at not only international but also domestic factors. Based on key variables of post–Cold War Japan’s foreign policy, namely the US-Japan alliance, the dominance of economic tools, and normative and institutional constraints on the use of force, the analysis concludes that CBA was an ideal response to the complex demands and restrictions of Japan’s security policy. In particular, the economic benefits of providing CBA are an important finding of the analysis and one that has not yet received much scholarly focus.