ABSTRACT
On the eve of the twenty-first century, Japan’s foreign economic policy experienced a profound transformation as the government actively negotiated bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) that deviate from the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) most-favored nation principle by awarding market access preferences to members only. For a country that based its postwar export-led recovery on the centrality of the multilateral system this was undeniably a major policy departure with at least two important ramifications: the prospects for domestic market opening and Japan’s contribution to the budding process of East Asian regional institution building.
