In retrospect, my coming of “geopolitical age” — figuring out how the world really works — while living in Japan in the 1990s could not have been more fortuitous as I try to make sense of this moment.
The constraints on Japan’s international activities — Article 9 and the mindset that produced and sustained it — forced a reassessment of more traditional means of influence. For sure, militaries, their personnel under arms and their missiles matter, but real power is exercised day to day via economic instruments: Political economy, not plutonium, determines how the world works.
Japan in the early 1990s was a paradox. It was the world’s second largest economy and there were fears that it would soon overtake the United States as the leading economic power. But Japan as “number one” was inexplicable in a world defined by the Cold War and a seeming need for military forces to safeguard the “free world.” After all, Japan’s military capabilities were severely limited by Article 9 of the Constitution. (Critics charged it was precisely the absence of a large military that allowed the country to focus on economic development and devote resources to more productive uses.)
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