Japan and Climate Change: Responses and Explanations

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to assess Japan's response to climate change negotiation in the last decade, and to forecast it in the future. For Japan, hosting the 3rd Conference of the Parties (COP3) to the Convention was a significant milestone that changed Japan's response from reactive to proactive. Since then, Japan has been keen on taking a lead in the negotiation, but without much success. This failure is due to several reasons: (1) Japan's high standard on energy efficiency per GDP and thus its difficulty to make further improvement; (2) Japan's foreign policy has considered U.S.–Japan relation to be the most important, and (3) Japan's culture that cherishes harmony rather than becoming a leader. These features are likely to remain in the future as long as Japan's decision-making system itself remains the same.