The remarkable thing about former Prime Minister Abe is that he started out as a nationalist. In his early years as a politician he focused on restoring Japan’s pride after the shame of World War II and the Tokyo Tribunal. As a prime minister, however, he took both a more pragmatic and a more internationalist approach. Shinzo Abe ended up having a global impact: not only, did he build more regional connections across the Indo-Pacific than any previous Japanese Prime Minister; he also rose up to become the defender of the liberal international order during the Trump Presidency, making strides both in developing international trade agreements and in advancing security alliances.

Shinzo Abe came from a blue blood political family, based in a Yamaguchi prefecture, the former Chōshū Domain (長州藩, Chōshū-han) that led the Meiji Restoration along with Satsuma and Tosa. His grandfather Kishi had led the industrial development of Manchukuo in the 1930s and served as Minister of Commerce in the Tojo Cabinet. Arrested by the American military in 1945 as suspected war criminal, he was released without trial in 1948, in part due his potential role as conservative leader in post-war Japan. He served as Prime Minister from 1957-1960, during which he led the renewal of the US-Japan Security Treaty. Abe’s uncle, Sato Eisaku was also Prime Minister from 1964 to 1972. In fact Prime Minister Eisaku was the longest uninterrupted Prime Minister until Shinzo Abe outlasted him!  Abe’s father, Abe Shintaro, was a leading politician in his time, serving as minister in various portfolios (including the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and Foreign Affairs) between 1972 and 1986. He was narrowly defeated as potential Prime Minister.

In the 1990s and 2000s, Shinzo Abe was well-known for his denunciation of the Tokyo tribunal and its conclusions on Japanese guilt, his links with nationalist groups, and advocacy of a “beautiful” or normal Japan with full autonomy and a real army. The issue that motivated him the most throughout his political life was to change the constitution written by the American occupiers, particularly Article 9, which formally forbade Japan to hold an Army or have the right of belligerency. This was a mission inherited from his grandfather, Kishi. And Shinzo Abe did bring that agenda to office in his first term as Prime Minister in 2006-2007, and quickly lost public support for it.

During his time out of office between 2007 and 2012 and as documented by Tobias Harris, Abe reinvented himself and re-emerged with new ideas and new plans. The combination of his new ideas on governance and the political vacuum left by the disastrous governance of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in 2009-2012 gave an historic new opportunity to Shinzo Abe. Abe won the general election handily in December 2012 and several more elections thereafter.

For nearly 8 years, Abe became the centre of Japanese politics and had total control over both his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and parliament, given the disintegration of the DPJ. Politically, he harnessed the new tools available from recent administrative reforms and more than doubled the size of the Prime Minister’s office, while making full use of new powers to introduce legislation. Furthermore, Abe came to understand that public support could only be earned by focusing first on the economy. He launched the three arrows of Abenomics (monetary, fiscal, and structural), which projected new confidence to the Japanese public. He offered stability and hope to the public. While the public did not agree with all his policies (especially security, media management, and nuclear), they were grateful for the stable governance.

However, the greatest legacy of Prime Minister Abe is certainly on the global front. It is a legacy that was not expected, but Abe grew better and better at it while in office and his initiatives gained more momentum. In essence, Abe accomplished three major things: he invested greatly in the liberal economic order by advancing a series of trade treaties and investing in the G20; he advanced a great regional network in Asia and with India (and even Africa, partly); and he led the creation of the Quad (Quadrilateral Security Summit), the free and open Indo-Pacific, and stronger security alliances, while maintaining pragmatic working relations with China.

First, Abe’s impact on the liberal international order grew particularly salient during the Trump Presidency. Facing dual threats of American isolation and Chinese assertiveness, Abe decided to invest in economic rule-making. In 2017-2019, Abe managed the feat of successfully leading the completion of the Comprehensive and Progressive Transpacific Partnership (CPTPP) despite US withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP); the EU-Japan strategic partnership; a US- Japan trade deal; and finally the completion of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). This combination of four major agreements demonstrated great balancing between stronger links with allies and stabilization of rules with China in the larger region. It served well Japan’s economy.

One major element of this approach to economic partnerships was his really remarkable management of President Donald Trump: not only was he the first leader to greet President-Elect Trump at the Trump Tower, he probably maintained one of the best bilateral relationships while Trump was President, managing to advance US-Japan relations despite real government-to-government tensions over trade and security burden-sharing. In particular, he even managed to obtain Trump’s approval of Japan going alone in February 2017 to rescue the TPP with other partners, even after the Trump withdrawal.

Abe also led a particularly proactive G20 presidency in 2019, which culminated in a series of initiatives and agreements on data governance, trade, quality infrastructure, climate, support for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Osaka G20 was certainly the most effective G20 summit of the Trump Presidency, in large part because of Abe’s skill in maintaining good working relations with both Trump and Xi. Immediately prior to the G20, Abe hosted President Xi Jinping and reached a 10-point agreement with the Middle Kingdom that was quite far-reaching. Interestingly, Abe obtained China’s support for his quality infrastructure initiative (which was initially seen as an initiative against the Chinese Belt Road Initiative) and for the data free flow with trust (which was later blocked by India, Indonesia, and South Africa) through deft diplomacy.

One area where Abe’s global order work was limited was climate change. Abe did make important speeches such as at the 2015 Paris climate conference and at Davos, but these were not followed by major initiatives. The climate arena was later picked up, however, by Prime Ministers Suga and Kishida.

Second, Abe did more to strengthen Japan’s networks and influence in Southeast Asia and India than any earlier Prime Minister. He traveled ceaselessly in the region and launched major infrastructure initiatives and security initiatives. Under his leadership, Japan actually outspent China in Southeast Asia. The impact is remarkable. In Southeast Asia and India, as well as Central Asia, Europe, Canada and beyond, Japan receives extremely high favourability scores, usually the highest scores. One may particularly highlight Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines where Abe spent a lot of energy and efforts. The one black spot in his wide regional engagement was Korea. Relations between Japan and Korea escalated in a very acrimonious direction in the last years of his government, due largely to unresolved historical issues and uncompromising attitudes by both Abe and Korean President Moon Jae-In.

Abe also engaged in intense diplomacy with Russia and Vladimir Putin, primarily in hope of reviving the 1956 Japan-Soviet agreement on partial transfer of two of the four disputed Kurile Islands / Northern Territories (an agreement strongly supported by his grandfather) and reaching a peace treaty. In the process, he also tried to keep Russia connected to the liberal international order. Abe met with Putin personally more than 20 times and hosted him lavishly in Japan, including in a hot spring bath. And Abe took a very soft approach following Russia’s invasion of Crimea in 2014, an approach that stood out in comparison to other G7 partners. To the very end of his time in office, Abe hoped for a diplomatic breakthrough with Putin, but this never came to be. This background makes Kishida’s clean break with Russia in 2022 over the Ukraine invasion even more remarkable.

Abe has had a large footprint on the global security landscape. Abe actually came up with the concept of the Quad partnership (Australia, Japan, India, United States) and also the idea of expanding the Asia-Pacific region to include the Indo-Pacific during his first term in office in 2007. Abe traveled to India and invested in building this bilateral relationship. He met Prime Minister Modi, a rare high-profile encounter when Modi was under western sanctions as leader of Gujarat. In fact, the relation between Abe and Modi was probably the closest one of all relationships for Abe, as eloquently acknowledged by Modi, himself, this year. It is Abe who later convinced the Trump Administration to adopt the Free and Open Indo- Pacific concept that he had fully fleshed out by 2016 and which continues to set the foundation for Japan’s approach to the larger region. With this work, it can be said that Abe did more to strengthen Western alliances in the larger Indo-Pacific region than any other leader, especially given the high esteem for Japan in the region (outside Korea and China).

Shinzo Abe also accelerated military modernization at home and led the controversial reinterpretation of the Constitution in 2015 to allow collective self defence operations. Just before his untimely death, Abe was lobbying for a doubling of the military budget from 1 percent to 2 percent of GDP.

Shinzo Abe, the proud Japanese nationalist, is an unlikely global governance leader. But that is the unexpected legacy of his rule: while he held a tight political ship at home and rolled back some post-war liberal norms, he ended up finding his stride as an advocate of both the global liberal order and the regional security order. He was strongly animated by the desire to constrain the rise of China, yet managed to hold pragmatic diplomatic relations after 2014 with China and earn a degree of respect. In essence, Abe achieved an interesting combination of increased deterrence and polite engagement in his relationship with China (at least in 2017-2020). And in advancing some regional and global public goods, Abe ended up strengthening Japan’s role and Japan’s self-confidence. Abe combined a strong realist streak in his approach to national strength, security, and balance of power with a liberal internationalist commitment to global institutions. He showed proactive leadership in both directions. Such a combination may prove to be the most promising avenue for other Western allies, as long as they can also exhibit Abe’s diplomatic acumen to keep channels of communication working.

Shinzo Abe – a meaningful political life.

Credit Image: Reuters.com