The United Arab Emirates and Japan: Diversifying Bilateral Relationships and Challenges in the Context of Japan’s New Foreign Policy Focus and US-Japan Relation

2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 269-294
Author(s):  
Sumiyo Nishizaki
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Middle East ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Liberal Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Energy Needs ◽  
Post September 11

In this article, I analyze the Japan-Middle East-U.S. triangle relationship. Japan’s Middle East policies, the author contends, have been influenced by its energy needs and relationship with the United States. Fully aware of its status as a country with hardly any energy resources, Japan has engaged in energy diplomacy and investment in oil fields in the Middle East. This article describes how, despite pursuing an energy strategy largely independent of the United States, Japan has constantly needed to take into account its relationship with the Americans, and Japan has slowly shifted toward more frequent support for American policy especially after the Gulf War in 1990. At the same time, Japan’s Middle East policies have been influenced by its domestic politics. For example, former Prime Minister Koizumi’s post-September 11 plan to let Japan’s military forces play a more prominent role in the War on Terror was crushed by his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). This article explains that LDP politicians were afraid that supporting the war would undermine Japan’s economic interests in the Muslim world and how the Democratic Party of Japan which took office this September has attempted to pursue a more independent position in its relations with the United States. This article also explores the shifts in Japan’s Middle East policies under the new administration and their implications on US-Japan relations.

How Much Does Money Matter?

2000 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
GARY W. COX ◽  
MICHAEL F. THIES
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Liberal Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Demographic Variables ◽  
Campaign Spending ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Electoral Outcomes ◽  
Expected Performance ◽  
The Impact

Japanese elections are notorious for the money that flows between contributors, politicians, and voters. To date, however, nobody has estimated statistically the impact of this money on electoral outcomes. Students of American politics have discovered that this question is difficult to answer because, although performance may depend on spending, spending may also depend on expected performance. In this article, the authors specify a two-stage least squares model that explains the vote shares of Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) candidates as a function of their own spending, spending by other candidates, and a battery of control variables. The multiple-candidate nature of Japanese elections means that district-level demographic variables are largely unrelated to any particular LDP candidate's vote share, so that these variables can be used to create instruments for campaign spending. The authors find that the marginal dollar of campaign spending buys the spender a great deal more in Japan than is true in the United States.

Phantom Peace

2020 ◽  
pp. 55-80
Author(s):  
Kenneth Kolander
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Middle East ◽  
National Security ◽  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Strategic Alliance ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
The United States ◽  
To Come

The themes of national security and domestic politics intersect in the second chapter. Based on the papers of Henry “Scoop” Jackson and J. William Fulbright, the chapter uses the conflict between the two Democratic senators to show how the growing Soviet presence in the Middle East, combined with the deteriorating situation in Southeast Asia in the late 1960s and early 1970s, brought about a major upheaval within the Democratic Party as well as a rise in conservative support for Israel from the halls of Congress. Jackson, who ran for president in 1972 and 1976, and Fulbright, the longest-tenured chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, staked out very different positions for the proper relationship between the United States and Israel. A discussion about the Jackson-Fulbright conflict encourages broader thinking about congressional participation in U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and also exposes significant political fault lines that would complicate the making of U.S. policy toward Israel for years to come. The United States and Israel developed a strategic alliance during this period, in addition to the special relationship, which involved an enormous increase in weapons sales from the United States to Israel.

Japan's Kishida has limited scope to reset China ties

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Liberal Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Coast Guard ◽  
Maritime Security ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Intermediate Range ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Limited Scope

Significance Kishida's factional background within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) suggests a dovish orientation towards China. Impacts A lacklustre LDP result in the general election would empower its junior coalition partner, the Komeito, to resist bold security reforms. Larger coast guard vessels and drones will enhance Japan's maritime security. Japan may decide to host intermediate-range missiles co-developed with the United States, to be deployed in Okinawa.

Promoting Undergraduate Research at MESA

2018 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 160-161
Author(s):  
Jeff VanDenBerg
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Middle East ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Undergraduate Research ◽  
The United States ◽  
Application Process ◽  
Research Workshop ◽  
Middle East Studies ◽  
Professional Context

In November 2017, the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) sponsored the fourth annual Undergraduate Research Workshop in Washington, D.C. Organized by MESA's Committee for Undergraduate Middle East Studies, the workshop provides an opportunity for talented undergraduate students to present their scholarship in a professional context. Participants are selected through a competitive application process, and, since the program's inception have come from universities in Sweden, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Singapore, Canada, Mexico, France, and across the United States.

Kremlin wants 2018 Russian poll to give real mandate

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Election ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Liberal Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
National Narrative ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Fourth Term ◽  
The Government ◽  
One Year

Subject Kremlin strategy for the 2018 presidential election. Significance With one year to go before the 2018 presidential election, the Kremlin strategy that will frame the process is starting to take shape. The nature of Vladimir Putin’s campaign has a bearing on his fourth term, during which he must either identify a successor or engineer an extension of his tenure beyond 2024. Impacts Putin will rally populist sentiment on the back of foreign policy successes in Crimea and Syria. A possible rapprochement with the United States would restrict the national narrative of ‘Russia encircled’. The Liberal Democratic Party and the Communist candidates will criticise the government but will not run opposition campaigns.

The End of the Middle East’s Unipolar Era

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 293-306
Author(s):  
Seyed Hossein Mousavian ◽  
Salman Ameri
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Middle East ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
The United States ◽  
Regional Security ◽  
Security Issues

Abstract This Policy Insight article argues that a growing security partnership between Russia, Iran, China, Turkey, Iraq, and Syria (rictis) will push the Middle East into an era of bipolarity. The paper demonstrates that rictis has significant convergence on regional security issues, and that these interests are distinct from those held by the American Security Camp, a collection of states that include the United States, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates. The paper also argues that rictis has military and energy advantages that allow it to confront the American Camp’s regional dominance. Our analysis demonstrates how rictis might help deter unilateralism and democratize regional decision-making.

Obama's wavering: US foreign policy on the Egyptian crisis, 2011–13

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergio Fabbrini ◽  
Amr Yossef
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
The United States ◽  
International Experience ◽  
Us Foreign Policy ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Impact

The existing literature explains the wavering course of President Barack Obama's policy on the 2001–03 Egyptian crisis as attributed to either his personal characteristics (lack of an international experience, predisposition to sermonize rather than to strategize) or to the impact of the decline of the United States as a global superpower (inability to influence foreign actors and contexts). Although both explanations are worthy of consideration, this article seeks to demonstrate that they are insufficient when accounting for the uncertainties shown by the United States during the Egyptian crisis. Domestic factors, particularly the internally divided US political elite and a foreign policy team with different views, played a crucial intervening role in defining the features of US foreign policy. It was domestic politics that made the Obama administration ineffective in dealing with the new scenario that emerged in the Middle East and in Egypt in particular.

Oil and the Great Powers

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anand Toprani
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Middle East ◽  
World War I ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Energy Needs ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Alternative Sources

During the first half of the twentieth century, a lack of oil constrained Britain and Germany from exerting their economic and military power independently. Having fought World War I with oil imported from the United States, Britain was determined to avoid relying upon another great power for its energy needs ever again. Even before the war had ended, Whitehall began implementing a strategy of developing alternative sources of oil under British control. Britain’s key supplier would be the Middle East—already a region of vital importance to the British Empire, but one whose oil potential was still unproven. There turned out to be plenty of oil in the Middle East, but Italian hostility after 1935 threatened British transit through the Mediterranean. As war loomed in 1939, Britain’s quest for independence from the United States was a failure. Germany was in an even worse position than Britain. The Third Reich went to war dependent on petroleum synthesized from coal, meager domestic crude oil production, and overland imports—primarily from Romania. German leaders were confident, however, that they had sufficient oil to fight a series of short, localized campaigns that would deliver to them the mastery of Europe. Their plan derailed following Germany’s swift victory over France, when Britain refused to make peace. This left Germany responsible for satisfying Europe’s oil requirements while cut off from world markets. A looming energy crisis in Axis Europe, an absence of strategic alternatives, and ideological imperatives all compelled Germany to invade the Soviet Union in 1941—a decision that ultimately sealed its fate.

Legitimating Power: The Domestic Politics of U.S. International Hierarchy

2013 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 74-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Lake
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
The United States ◽  
Western Hemisphere ◽  
Policy Preferences ◽  
Distributional Consequences ◽  
Regime Types

The United States has maintained international hierarchies over the Western Hemisphere for more than a century and over Western Europe for nearly seven decades. More recently, it has extended similar hierarchies over states in the Middle East. How does the United States exercise authority over other countries? In a world of juridically sovereign states, how is U.S. rule rendered legitimate? Hierarchy has interstate and intrastate distributional consequences for domestic ruling coalitions and regime types. When the gains from hierarchy are large or when subordinate societies share policy preferences similar to those of the United States, as in Europe, international hierarchy is possible and compatible with democracy. When the gains from hierarchy are small and the median citizen has policy preferences distant from those of the United States, as in Central America, international hierarchy requires autocracy, and the benefits of foreign rule will be concentrated within the governing elite. In the Middle East, the gains from hierarchy also appear small, and policy preferences are distant from those of the United States. As a result, the United States has backed sympathetic authoritarian rulers. Although a global counterinsurgency strategy might be viable over the long term, the costs of establishing effective hierarchies in the region imply that the United States is better off retrenching “East of Suez.”

scholarly journals Domestic Factors of the Biden Administration’s Strategy in the Middle East

2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (11) ◽  
pp. 24-30
Author(s):  
I. Shumilina
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Arab Countries ◽  
White House ◽  
The Government ◽  
Middle East Policy ◽  
Principal Lines

In the early months of Joe Biden’s administration in the White House, Middle East issues were not identified as a priority of its foreign policy. Individual steps in this direction, however, suggest that the administration will adhere to the principal lines of conduct for the United States towards American partners and allies (Israel, the Arab monarchies of the Gulf and others), as well as towards the main conflict nodes in the region (Syria, Libya, Yemen). At the same time, it is also obvious that its tactical emphasis has shifted in its approach to a number of the most important problems of the region – in particular, the Palestinian-Israeli standoff (namely, restoration of relations with the government of Mahmoud Abbas) and the situation around Iran (return to the renewed nuclear deal – JCPOA) and Turkey (overcoming the cooling of relations with Ankara). Apparently, we can talk about Biden’s revival of the Middle East policy pursued under Barack Obama’s administration. This process is largely due to the domestic political calculations of the Biden team and the Democratic Party as a whole. The author of the article tries to assess the influence of American immigrant’s communities from the Arab countries and Turkey on Joe Biden’s Middle East policy.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document