ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to clarify the role of Japan in the process leading up to the establishment of RCEP. Section 8.2 discusses what and how Japan’s strategy in East Asia/Asia-Pacific has changed since the end of the 1990s and depicts how changes in Japan’s strategy led to Japan’s active posture to take a principal role in the launch of the RCEP negotiations. Section 8.3 clarifies the transformation of Japan’s trade policy and policies towards Asia, which made Japan engage proactively in the regional FTAs. This section focuses on the complex situations in which several regional FTAs have been discussed and examined since the mid-2000s, and how and why Japan was involved in them. Section 8.4 clarifies Japan’s initial goals, which it wanted to accomplish in RCEP, while considering Japan’s involvement in other regional integration frameworks, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Japan–China–Korea FTA (CJK FTA). Section 8.5 reviews the RCEP negotiations over 8 years and clarifies Japan’s involvement in them. This section also indicates how the importance of RCEP for Japan and other participant countries changed after the withdrawal of the United States from the TPP, and how Japan had a strong influence on certain changes in the characteristics of RCEP. The final section clarifies what Japan accomplished through the RCEP negotiations. It also outlines tentative prospects as to how RCEP can and will shape the regional order in East Asia/Indo-Pacific.
