The Rise of Governance and the Japanese Intermediation in Transitional Vietnam: The Impact of Japanese Knowledge-Based Aid to Vietnam in the Doi Moi Years

In the late 1980s, the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Vietnam, hereafter) underwent a period of reforms known as doi moi (renovation), opened its economy to global flows of goods and capitals and adopted an “omnidirectional” strategy aimed at building relations with former “enemy” states like Japan and the US. These multiple transitions presented the country’s communist leadership with new challenges: first and foremost, transforming the country’s governance from socialist to a partially neoliberal one in the attempt to accommodate international partners’ and investors’ demands. The present study will address the following research question: by which means did the Vietnamese leadership succeed in surviving the demise of the USSR and conform to the emerging neoliberal global order? Against the backdrop of the global rise of the good governance model for international development, this article will shed light on Japan’s role during Vietnam’s first phase of reforms in the early 1990s through its government-led knowledge-based aid initiatives up until the draft of the country’s first Comprehensive Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy. It will argue that Japan offered a certain development know-how and a model of state-mediated growth which suited Vietnam’s Communist party’s needs to keep the single-party rule

Japan’s “Last Hope”: Myanmar as an arena for Sino-Japanese competition, coordination and global standardization

Despite competing strategical interests over Southeast Asia that have emerged in the last decade, with the launch of wide scope geopolitical strategies Chinese and Japanese initiatives have been characterized by a certain degree of implicit coordination, particularly in offering support to the Myanmar state’s territorializing strategies for economic development. The case of the Thilawa Special Economic Zones (SEZ) is exemplary, as it was a Japan-led project which became a model and benchmark example for similar development initiatives supported by the People’s Republic of China

Em’power’ing chihō?: The Adoption of the SDGs Framework Its Consequences on Local Governance

Since 2015, the UN-sponsored Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have become a dominant policy framework in Japan. Its adoption has favored the strengthening of international partnerships and has influenced trends in policymaking domestically, in the so-called regions (chihō) particularly with regards to initiatives at the urban planning and management level. The SDGs framework and its standardized measuring indicators have in fact come to encompass previously devised policies in respect of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)-based ecologically sustainable urbanism (smart city). Considering these facts, what makes a city smart today? How do previously widespread ideas on smart cities (SCs) interact with new frameworks such as that of the SDGs? How, in other words, do international commitments affect local policymaking? This article will offer a preliminary multilevel analysis focusing on both national and local policymaking level to show how the SDGs framework has become all-encompassing and comprehensive. Furthermore, the adoption of said framework appears consistent with long-standing national level policies intended to foster local government (jichitai)’s autonomy and financial self-sufficiency. With the adoption of the SDGs framework, jichitai have increasingly leveraged on their capacities to (a) use a common language (that of the SDGs) to comply with the central government’s directives; (b) create a place identity through the implementation of specific policies in respect of technology or welfare; and (c) foster partnerships with private actors

Gambling on the ‘Little Dragon’: Toward an EU-Japan strategic convergence on Vietnam?

The present article aims to analyse recent EU-Japan joint engagement with Vietnam in the context of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. It seeks to do so by illustrating the historical transformations in the geopolitical arrangements centred on the Asia-Pacific region between Japan and the EU in the light of ‘situational’ US policies toward the region under Trump, Japan’s strengthened global role, Vietnam’s historical struggle to diversify its foreign policy vectors and maintain autonomy, and growing expectations of EU engagement in the region as a champion of free trade and the rule of law

A 'Post-Carbon' Diplomacy? Japan's Southeast Asia Conundrum

In October 2020, Japanese prime minister Suga Yoshihide chose Vietnam and Indonesia as the destinations of his first official visit abroad. From a security standpoint, there is little doubt that the two countries play a crucial role in the Japanese–American grand strategy, launched by Suga’s predecessor, Abe Shinzō, of building a Free and Open Indo-Pacific to counter China’s assertiveness. Security, however, is just one element of a more intricate puzzle of competition and cooperation between Tokyo and Beijing in this region of Asia. Suga’s trip to Southeast Asia (SEA, hereafter) was also chosen as the occasion to unveil his government plans to make Japan carbon neutral (i.e., to slash the country’s emissions to a level that can be absorbed by nature) by 2050

Mutual Transformations – Southeast Asia and Japan in the 21st Century

This special issue examines the complex and evolving relations between Japan and Southeast Asia. Historically rich in resources, Southeast Asia attracted imperial powers, including Japan, significantly transforming the region. Post-war ecosystems were influenced by Japanese occupation during WWII, shaping leaders and industrial development. Japanese investments and Official Development Assistance (ODA) since the 1960s have facilitated regional growth. Despite Japan's cautious diplomacy due to its US alliance, it diversified support in the 1990s, including infrastructure, legal, and political aid to transitional economies like Vietnam. Japan remains a significant investor, expanding aid to address climate change and maintaining trust in ASEAN countries. Recent geopolitical shifts, including China’s rise and US-China competition, have pushed Southeast Asia to strengthen ties with both powers, positioning Japan’s evolving role as crucial for regional security and development. The issue includes analyses of Japan’s strategic empowerment of Southeast Asia, capacity building, nostalgia in foreign policy, and smart technologies in urban planning, illustrating broader trends and reducing historical asymmetries

Mutual Transformations – Southeast Asia and Japan in the 21st Century

This special issue examines the complex and evolving relations between Japan and Southeast Asia. Historically rich in resources, Southeast Asia attracted imperial powers, including Japan, significantly transforming the region. Post-war ecosystems were influenced by Japanese occupation during WWII, shaping leaders and industrial development. Japanese investments and Official Development Assistance (ODA) since the 1960s have facilitated regional growth. Despite Japan's cautious diplomacy due to its US alliance, it diversified support in the 1990s, including infrastructure, legal, and political aid to transitional economies like Vietnam. Japan remains a significant investor, expanding aid to address climate change and maintaining trust in ASEAN countries. Recent geopolitical shifts, including China’s rise and US-China competition, have pushed Southeast Asia to strengthen ties with both powers, positioning Japan’s evolving role as crucial for regional security and development. The issue includes analyses of Japan’s strategic empowerment of Southeast Asia, capacity building, nostalgia in foreign policy, and smart technologies in urban planning, illustrating broader trends and reducing historical asymmetries

“Greening” Speculative Urbanism?Space Politics and Model Circulation in South Korea and Vietnam’s Special Economic Zones

As products of the waves of deregulation and liberalization of trade and investments in the region in the 1980s and mid-1990s, special economic zones (SEZs) have emerged as an important tool of economic governance in East and Southeast Asia. Recently, governments and investors around the region, have favored multi-purpose SEZs conceived for land and real estate development which exhibit several similarities such as eliciting tourism as the main driver of local development and a declared “eco” and “green” configuration. The Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ) in the Republic of Korea (ROK) and the Van Don SEZ in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) are two illustrative cases of urban policy diffusion as a complex phenomenon combining the ROK’s increased international activism and SRV’s own institutional structure and preferences in terms of development goals. Based on a close reading of reports, official documents, qualitative interviews and site visits, this article will further contribute to the debate on the complexity of urban policy diffusion in contemporary East and Southeast Asia