5 - Between Democracy and Economic Development: Japan's Policy towards Burma/Myanmar Then and Now

Summary

Introduction

It has been said that among all the Asian countries, Japan is in a position to exercise the strongest influence on the military government of Myanmar. The country has a deep history of “friendship” with Burma/Myanmar and the Japanese Government itself emphasizes that Japan is the only country which possesses the means for negotiating both with the military junta and NLD. However, the Japanese Government has been blamed by both human rights activists and Japanese business circles. Human rights activists criticize Japan as supporting the military junta through the provision of economic assistance, while Japanese business circles are dissatisfied with their government's policy to keep the amount of ODA at a low level by freezing the new yen loans since 1988. Additionally, after May 2003 when Aung San Suu Kyi was detained, Japan, in concert with the United States and the EU, also froze most of the economic assistance for a while. This more recent policy is a means of attempting to bring pressure to bear on the junta through a quasi-policy of economic sanctions.

Has Japan supported the military government? This is not an easy question to answer. Although the Japanese government emphasizes that it has been making all possible efforts at promoting both democratization and the economic development of Myanmar, actual policies seem to suggest a passive willingness to support the junta through economic assistance in order to foster change towards democratic norms. However, such intentions do not appear to have been met with any success yet. It would appear that Japan's position is vaguely between democratic and economic development. In order to understand the reason why Japan has been caught in this middling position, I will survey the historical nature of relations between the two countries before examining the recent situation. Finally, I will discuss the activities of Myanmar nationals residing in Japan and their impact on the bilateral relationship.