Establishment of a Positive Bilateral Interaction Model in the Russia-Japan Dialogue after the Cold War: Analysis of the 1990’s Negotiations Tactics / Формирование модели позитивного двустороннего сотрудничества в российско-японском диалоге после завершения «холодной войны»: анализ тактик ведения переговоров в 1990-е гг.

Малашевская Мария Николаевна ORCID: 0000-0003-3087-8722 кандидат исторических наук доцент, Кафедра теории общественного развития стран Азии и Африки, Санкт-Петербургский государственный университет 199034, Россия, г. Санкт-Петербург, ул. Университетская Наб., 11, оф. 4а Malashevskaya Maria Nikolaevna PhD in History Docent, the department of Theory of Social Development of Asian and African Countries, Saint Petersburg State University 199034, Russia, g. Saint Petersburg, ul. Universitetskaya Nab., 11, of. 4a m.malashevskaya@spbu.ru Другие публикации этого автора

This paper examines diplomatic interaction of Japan and Russia, which has been going along the lines of the United Nations values stated, for example, in “Manila Declaration on Peaceful Settlement of International Disputes” (1982), that stipulates the “spirit of co-operation” and “friendly relations” between states, the principles of “avoiding disputes” and “settling international disputes by peaceful means in a manner that ensures international peace and security, and justice” as cornerstone values ^[8]. The USSR and Japan have had a years-long territorial dispute on some isles of the Kurile chain, which ought to be settled by negotiations as a foundation for interstate dialogue. Meanwhile, the confrontation between Japan and the USSR in the Cold War times minimized the chances to establish a ‘normal’ results-oriented model of cooperation till the end of the 1980’s, when the termination of the Cold War allowed to introduce a model of positive interaction based on peaceful means and common values. This research examines the attempt of implementation of interests-oriented and results-oriented relations focusing on the micro-level analysis of traditional and new negotiation tactics applied by the Japanese side in the dialogue with the late Soviet Union and the young Russian Federation in the last decade of the 20th century.

Notable, that from the end of the 1970’s the cultural dimensions of international relations attracted attention of the researchers around the world, and, so, the joint volume “Cultural Factors in International Relations” was published in 1981, a collection of papers devoted to the negotiators behavior during high-level bilateral talks. In his introduction to the volume, R.P. Anand underlined: “The representatives of states engaged in the process of negotiation of agreements at diplomatic conferences were conditioned by their cultural backgrounds and traditions in spite of being bound to protect the immediate interests of their countries in accordance with their briefs or instructions” ^{[1, pp. 17 – 18]}. Therefore, traditional behavior constituted by cultural identity and meanings becomes a leading factor in trans-national and cross-cultural talks among participants, forming the understanding of national interests and economic or security profits.

The late 1980’s can be considered as the time of great opportunities for the Japanese diplomacy to implement energetic activity towards the USSR. That was connected with the changes in the foreign policy doctrine of the Soviet leadership made by the head of the Soviet government M.S. Gorbachev in the mid-1980’s (“the policy of perestroika”, “new political thinking”). The Japanese government had nothing but promptly react to the rise of this kind of opportunity aiming to submit territorial claims to the USSR. Japanese diplomats began to apply wider instruments intending to achieve this purpose at the negotiations with the Soviet government. On the other hand, application of various negotiation tactics ought to be regarded as the evidence of transition of the bilateral relations to a new level of more productive, mutual interests-oriented cooperation and establishment of a ‘normal’ climate for the bilateral dialogue.

From the late 1980’s till the early 2000’s there were dramatic changes of the bilateral Soviet, then Russian dialogue with Japan. Owing to the “perestroika” policy in the USSR high-level bilateral dialogues intensified, resulting in the Soviet leader M.S. Gorbachov's visit to Japan in 1991. After the USSR collapse in 1992 – 1993, the two ministries of foreign affairs conducted negotiations concerning the Russian president B.N. Yeltsin's visit to Japan, however, due to non-effective negotiation tactics the president's visit to Japan was canceled in 1992. Nevertheless, with the reconsidered negotiation methods it became possible for the Russian president to undertake an official high-level visit to Japan in 1993 and to sign an official framework for the Russian-Japanese cooperation – “Tokyo Declaration”, in which any ideological restrictions on forming a positive results-oriented interaction model were delayed while common values of democracy and market economy were officially welcomed. “Tokyo Declaration” should be viewed as a step towards establishing new relations based on mutual interest. Notwithstanding this, there followed a four-year pause in bilateral negotiations (1993-1996), caused by the inner political and economic situations and challenges both in Russia and in Japan. The period between 1996 and 2001 saw a rise in the bilateral relations, in the form of a series of high-level talks in 1997 – 1998 – “no-necktie meetings” in Krasnoyarsk and Kawana and the official visit of the prime-minister of Japan to Moscow, with the “Moscow Declaration on Establishment of Creative Partnership between the Russian Federation and Japan” signed in 1998 as their result. This agreement shows mutual understanding on perspectives of bilateral cooperation and is to be considered as a foundation for results-oriented model of Japan-Russia cooperation, whereas the results-oriented paradigm is understood as the main pillar of a positive interaction model. V.V. Putin – Mori Yoshiro negotiations in 2000 – 2001 revealed mutual interest in intensifying and deepening of bilateral cooperation in various fields, aiming at advancing economic, political, international, security and cultural cooperation.

(1) Establishment of a basic concept for diplomacy

Formulation of a conceptual basis for the policy is considered as a fundamental value for the Japanese political thinking, which describes both its internal and foreign policy. This kind of approach allows to emphasize the priority goals and to draw up the action plan to achieve them. At the summit-meeting with M.S. Gorbachev in Moscow in the spring of 1989, the foreign minister Uno Sosuke suggested that the concept of “Equilibrium Balance” (kakudaikinko:) should be applied for the Soviet-Japanese dialogue. The concept was announced after a long period of stagnation in the bilateral relations and was expected to give a new impulse to the partnership between the USSR and Japan. “Equilibrium Balance” consisted of five points: (1) signing the peace treaty; (2) strengthening the relations based on mutual trust; (3) developing bilateral business contacts; (4) promoting people-to-people communication; (5) preparing M.S. Gorbachev's visit to Japan ^{[21, p. 127],[38, pp. 25 – 27]}. This concept represents a comprehensive action program. The essential feature of this approach is its positive perspective aimed at strengthening the constructive dialogue, rather than at deepening the existing contradictions, however it was just the last point to be put into force.

On September 24, 1991 during the session of the United Nations General Assembly, the concept of “Five Principles of Nakayama” was declared by the foreign minister Nakayama Taro, only two years after the announcement of the previous approach. New approach was declared at the time of a rising internal political crisis in the USSR and this step demonstrates Japan's attention to the changes in the Soviet Union. The concept consisted of the following five points: (1) full-scale support for reforms and full cooperation with the republics of the USSR; (2) rapid expansion and strengthening of the relations with all the republics, particularly with the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic (RSFSR), that shared the border with Japan; (3) maintenance and development of cooperation with the USSR with the purpose to transform it into a full-blooded member of the community of the Asia-Pacific Rim countries; (4) providing the USSR with assistance in its integrating into the international economic space and such organizations as the IMF and the World Bank; (5) signing the peace treaty and resolving the “territorial problem”, based on the principle of “legality and justice” which was proclaimed by the leaders of the RSFSR ^{[14],[20, p. 249]}.

Comparing structure and contents of “Five Principles of Nakayama” with “Equilibrium Balance” reveals that “Five Principles” is a more detailed document applying to a number of goals which were set by the Japanese diplomacy towards the USSR. Foreign strategy toward the Soviet Union consisted in political and economic engagements put forward according to this strategic framework. Responding to a more active policy of the USSR in East Asia after Vladivostok speech of M.S. Gorbachev in 1986, the Japanese government reconsidered the Soviet state’s membership in the Asia-Pacific countries community ^{[19, pp. 45-46]}. The first two points of “Five Principles” are of great interest because of their political meaning. The Japanese side started to use separate or parallel talks with the Soviet Union government and the political elites of the republics. These talks can be considered as a foundation of interaction of Japan with the former Soviet republics, including the Russian Federation, after the USSR collapse in December 1991.

The concept of "Five Principles of Nakayama" remained the basis of the Japanese policy toward Russia until the announcement of the following concept in the mid-1990’s. Consequently, the Japanese government seemed to have no accurately formulated strategy of development of bilateral dialogue during the first years of existence of the Russian Federation and no new model could be created. The necessity to promote a new concept rose in 1996, as a result of the Liberal Democratic Party returning to power, which meant three years of political turbulence. Hashimoto Ryutaro's cabinet formulated “Multilevel Approach” (ju:zo:teki na apuro:chi) which consisted in development of multitrack Russian-Japanese ties both on bilateral and international levels. The cornerstone of the concept lies in three principles: “trust”, “mutual interests” and “long-term prospects” ^{[21, p. 227]}. Critical for both sides “territorial question”, which has not been resolved until today, had to become only one of the issues of the Russian-Japanese negotiations agenda ^{[23, pp. 362 – 364],[36, p. 37 – 38]}. High-level talks in 1997 – 1998 (Yeltsin-Hashimoto “no-ties meetings” and official visit of Obuchi Keizo to Moscow in November 1998) were conducted under the ideas of “Multilevel Approach”, which was introduced in the “Moscow declaration on establishment of creative partnership between the Russian Federation and Japan” ^{[33, pp. 14 - 20]}.

However, it should be pointed out that the “Multilevel Approach”, which articulated a purpose to create the basis for ‘strategic partnership’ between Russia and Japan, had a positive effect on the establishment of partnership between the two countries at the dawn of the new millennium ^{[21, p. 214]}. Henceforth, the practice of formulation of the conceptual grounds for bilateral relations continued to be applied and even got a new form. Since the beginning of the 21st century the frameworks of Russian-Japanese relations have had a bilateral basis. For example, in 2003 the president of Russia V.V. Putin and the prime minister Koizumi Junichiro signed “The Russian-Japanese action plan” which designed the main ways of bilateral cooperation at the beginning of a new decade ^[39].

(2) Diplomatic pressure tactics

Diplomatic pressure tactic is the most inefficient negotiation method, because its introduction provoked the fall of bilateral dialogue between Russia and Japan. Using the diplomatic or oral “pressure tactics” for intergovernmental or business negotiations is not a technique used exclusively by the Japanese negotiators. This tactic is widespread in world practice. In business negotiations it is combined with a great variety of other techniques, and quite often it is transformed into an intimidation method aiming to reach short-term results ^[4]. The essential feature of diplomatic pressure is the use of any advantage of one side. However, these tactics, in the opinion of business community, is not effective, because under the pressure the second party has nothing but take a defensive position ^{[32, pp. 107 - 112]}. Kimura Hiroshi highlighted that the intimidation was applied by the USSR during the Japanese-Soviet negotiations in 1977 – the Soviet side estimated the Japanese delegation as a weak and unimportant negotiator, which affected negatively, even harmfully, the results of the bilateral fishery talks ^{[7, pp. 36 - 38]}.

Diplomatic pressure was used by the Japanese side with respect to territorial claims which heavily relied on the economic aid and international recognition of the young Russian Federation and its government. Since the end of the 1980’s, the Japanese participants of negotiations tried to put the “territorial issue” forward at negotiations of all levels, intending to get a favorable for Japan solution. The issue was discussed at international summits, was included into official statements of the prime minister and the minister of foreign affairs, was raised during the visits of parliamentary delegations to Moscow and their meetings with M.S. Gorbachev, etc. The Japanese negotiators of different levels mentioned that “the problem of the northern territories” needs to be solved. That caused annoyance on the side of the Soviet leadership. In his memoirs M.S. Gorbachev describes the Japanese Socialist Party delegation visit on May 6, 1988, when the Socialist Party representatives were the first among Japanese official circles to bring up the question of M.S. Gorbachev's visit to Japan. M.S. Gorbachev specifically notes that the Japanese guest – Doi Takako – “did not manage to avoid raising the question of “unresolved problems” and the Declaration of 1956” ^{[27, p. 259]}, the basic agreement between the USSR and Japan signed for termination of state of war between the two countries.

The “territorial issue” can be qualified as a chief goal for diplomatic pressure used by the Japanese negotiators. At each stage of negotiations, the Japanese side stated its position toward the “Kuril problem”, which annoyed the Soviet part. A visit of one of the leaders of the LDP (and the speaker of the lower house of the Diet at that time) Sakurauchi Yoshio is a telling example of applying these tactics. He arrived in Moscow in July 1990 to prepare M.S. Gorbachev's visit to Japan. In memoirs of the Japanese ambassador in Moscow Edamura Sumio (1990-1994) it is noted that Sakurauchi succeeded in meeting with the president of the USSR and acted in an extremely undiplomatic manner. After the statement of the Japanese position on the “territorial issue”, he demanded from the Soviet leader to pay close attention to this question during his visit to Japan. Edamura Sumio points out that M.S. Gorbachev was greatly displeased with that and said: “If I have to go to Japan to speak there only about one problem, then it might be better to reconsider the question of my visit” ^{[38, p. 50]}. According to the Japanese ambassador memoirs, the situation became very grave, threatening to cancel M.S. Gorbachov’s visit to Japan.

The preparation of the Russian Federation president's visit to Japan in 1992 became the most glaring example of “pressure tactics” employed by the Japanese side. The Japanese diplomats achieved the most deplorable results for diplomacy toward Russia, when, becoming aware of economic and political weakness of the Russian Federation, they sought to put enormous pressure upon president B.N. Yeltsin while his visit to Japan scheduled for the autumn of the same year was being prepared. The Japanese side promoted the necessity of “territorial issue” solution as the highest priority of the 1992 winter-spring bilateral negotiations at all international summits, including a meeting of “G7” in Munich in July 1992 ^[3]. At the final stage of preparing B.N. Yeltsin's visit, at the beginning of September 1992, the minister of foreign affairs Watanabe Michio arrived in Moscow ^[5]. He informed the Russian government about decisive steps of the Japanese side concerning compensations to the inhabitants of the Kurile islands for the cost of their property on the southern Kurile and their legal status after transferring the islands to Japan ^{[34, p. 75]}. Watanabe Michio openly demonstrated that the Japanese side considers the “territorial question” to be solved, confirming the prime minister Miyazawa Kiichi’s vision of the situation, announced during the meeting of “G7” a month earlier.

These actions of the Japanese side were regarded by the Kremlin as unprecedented pressure upon the Russian president leading to an international scandal – canceling the official president’s visit to Japan. One of the motives of the visit cancellation, as is sometimes considered, is a negative reaction of the Russian president to this pressure. The Japanese specialist in Russian affairs, diplomat Togo Kazuhiko expressed the similar vision and called the incident a “failure of the 1992 plan”. It is necessary to mention that many experts in the field of management and negotiations characterize “pressure tactic” as a most destructive if the negotiating parties seek to build up a long-term relationship. Within several years the crisis of trust to the Russian government in Japan was felt, some future-oriented politicians and diplomats spoke of the necessity for the both sides to loosen pressure on each other. Fortunately, some positive changes in model of bilateral interaction could have been noticed. The failure of the so-called “1992 plan” led to revision of the rhetoric on both sides: the Japanese government realized that it was important to refuse from “pressure tactics” in negotiations with B.N. Yeltsin, as his reaction to any external pressure was extremely negative ^{[21, p. 224],[31, p. 104]}. Since 1993, the basic principle of trust-oriented relations between the leaders and people of the two countries has become the priority of the Japanese side and is enshrined in “Tokyo declaration” 1993.

(3) “Face-to-Face Diplomacy”

At the end of the 20th century the Japanese MOFA put forward the principle of “mutual trust” for establishment of the bilateral relations with Russia considering it as a basis for future comprehensive cooperation. “Mutual trust” idea is reflected in “Tokyo Declaration” of 1993, and in his speech in 1997 at the assembly of Keidanren, Japan Business Federation, the prime minister Hashimoto introduced a new strategy toward Russia and welcomed “Eurasian diplomacy” of Japan, in which Russia is to be one of the regional attractors for Japan ^{[21, p. 227]}. The former diplomat and one of the leaders of “Russian school” of MOFA Togo Kazuhiko in an interview given to the author of this paper on December 7, 2017, in Kyoto underlined that trust-oriented relations (shinrai kankei) are to be evaluated as the most important part of diplomatic relations, as one of the ways to strengthen mutual trust in interaction with Russia and other countries as well as the turn to “face-to-face diplomacy” (kao to kao gaiko:) as an extremely fruitful method. Of note is the fact that implementation of this method was widely undertaken after the Cold War termination owing to Russia and Japan’s rapprochement in the 1990’s.

The “face-to-face diplomacy” focuses on strengthening interpersonal communications between Russian and Japanese societies in general. For instance, to represent the ways we mention the case of the diplomat Sato Masaru work conducted in the Soviet political environment at the end of the 1980’s – the beginning of the 1990’s. A vivid example of this diplomacy can be seen in communications of Japanese diplomat Sato Masaru with the Lithuanian politician V.N. Shved, who was a consistent supporter of maintaining the USSR integrity. Shved and Sato had numerous meetings in 1990–1991, discussed domestic situation in the USSR in informal settings in bars and restaurants. Sato wrote, that during one of such meetings, which took place in a casino in the fall of 1990, Shved told Sato about the beginning of the USSR collapse ^{[12, pp. 281 – 282]}.

The “face-to-face diplomacy” began also to be applied at the regional level. For example, the politician Suzuki Muneo used this tactic in the talks with Russian Far East representatives. He was considered as one of influential specialists in the Japanese parliament (a Hokkaido deputy in the lower house) on the Russian-Japanese relations and was involved in bilateral governmental negotiations. Suzuki Muneo mentioned in his memoirs that Sato recommended him to visit Russia as often as possible and establish relations with representatives of the Russian society. Guided by the principle of the “face-to-face diplomacy”, Suzuki Muneo participated the parliamentary delegation in 1995 and made a trip to Kunashir Island where he got acquainted with local communities. He met with the director of one of Kunashir schools, considering these events as a “case” of establishing “face-to-face” network with Russians and studying Russian negotiating culture ^{[17, pp. 175 – 176]}. Suzuki Muneo particularly emphasizes that he enjoyed seeing confidence in the eyes of local Russians.

To perform results-oriented public policy in order to revive good communication with the Russian public opinion after the “failure of the 1992 plan”, Japanese diplomats in Moscow and personally the minister of the embassy (1994–1996) Togo Kazuhiko started to take rather careful steps, such as giving interviews to Russian journalists, in which he emphasized that the trust-oriented relations with Russia were favored by the Japanese government, as well as delivering lectures for the students of Moscow State University and MGIMO University (1995–1996) on the history of Russian-Japanese relations. He came up with the idea of “equilibrium dialogue” with Russia without exerting any emotional pressure on each other ^[35]. The translation of these vision and values into the public diplomacy was expected to deepen trust of the Russian people in the Japanese government actions.

We assume, that trust-oriented and long-term connections are a basic feature of the Japanese political culture. This approach was used toward Russia in the 1990’s. The ambassador of Japan in Russia in 1999-2002 Tamba Minoru emphasized that the purpose of the Japanese MOFA in the middle – the second half of the 1990’s was to establish long-term ties with the Russian side on the basis of mutual trust ^{[18, 2012, p. 18]}. The lawyers Kuroda Kenji and Zhang Danian noted that the focus on the long-term and step-by-step negotiations aimed at establishing confidential relations between partners is regarded to be central to the Japanese business culture ^{[24, p. 201]}. Kuroda and Zhang emphasized that Japanese businessmen studied the culture of negotiations in the western countries in the 1970’s –1980’s, but they did bring the traditions of Japanese management to the international scene ^{[24, p. 206]}. Intentions and actions of MOFA ‘Russian school’ (Sato Masaru, Togo Kazuhiko, Kawato Akio, Tamba Minoru and other diplomats) did not contradict this paradigm, because their efforts were directed to detailed studying of Russian political culture and internal political situation. They tried to search for similar Russian and Japanese negotiation models in order to achieve the most visible results.

Three options of “Face-to-Face Diplomacy”

Henceforth, we examine several sub-tactics which compose the “face-to-face diplomacy”: communication channel,informal negotiations, leaders talks. These tactics and formats of talks were introduced into negotiations on the basis of studying the Russian political culture in the atmosphere of Post-Cold-War rapprochement of Russia and Japan.

Method A. “Communication channel”

One of the most effective and wide spread negotiating tactics for the Japanese negotiators business as well as in diplomatic talks is looking