Japan's Intelligence Reforms

Japan, long known as a ‘spy paradise’, is reconstructing its intelligence capabilities. In a narrow sense, this can be understood as the continuation of a long gradual trend of Japan ridding itself of restrictions that limited the state’s role in national security over the post-war era. In a deeper sense, its implications are more meaningful than other steps in this process (reconciling collective defence with the peace clauses of the constitution, permitting the export of lethal weapons) because – as spy writer John le Carré observed – a country’s intelligence service is the ultimate measure of a nation’s political health and the true expression of its collective subconscious.

In this seminar, Dr Philip Shetler-Jones will explain proposed legal and institutional changes before exploring what this says about the direction of Japanese society, its threat perceptions and the demands the current international environment makes on Japan to engage in statecraft with a full set of tools.

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