An alternative explanation of Japan's whaling diplomacy in the post-moratorium era

Journal of International Wildlife Law and Policy

Volumn 10, Issue 1, 2007, Pages 55-87

  Ishii, Atsushi ^a   Okubo, Ayako ^b  

^a TOHOKU UNIVERSITY   (Japan)

^b Ocean Policy Research Foundation   (Japan)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION; HUNTING; LEGISLATIVE IMPLEMENTATION; MARINE POLICY; WHALING;

ASIA; EURASIA; FAR EAST; JAPAN;

EID: 34247887698     PISSN: 13880292     EISSN: 15481476     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13880290701229911     Document Type: Article

References (157)

1. RL. Friedheim, Moderation in the Pursuit of Justice: Explaining Japan's Failure in the International Whaling Negotiations, 27 OCEAN DEV. & INT'L LAW 349 (1996)
2. A. Wong, The Roots of Japan's International Environmental Politics (2001)
3. M. Danaher, Why Japan Will not Give Up Whaling, 14 PACIFICA REVIEW 103 (2002)
4. K. Hirata, Beached Whales: Examining Japan's Rejection of an International Norm, 7 SOC. SCI. JAPAN J. 177 (2004)
5. I. Miyaoka, Legitimacy in International Society: Japan's Reaction to Global Wildlife Preservation (2004)
6. K. Hirata, Why Japan Supports Whaling, 8 J. INT'L WILDLIFE LAW & POL'Y 129 (2005).
7. Throughout the article, English translations of Japanese words are given in brackets. Additionally, English translations of the titles and quotations from references in Japanese are tentative translations by the authors.
8. Friedheim, supra note 2.
9. We put the word scientific in quotation marks because, as explained afterwards, it is highly controversial whether Japan's research whaling program since 1987 is actually scientific or not.
10. Several Japan's scientific whaling under Art. VIII was conducted both before and after the 1982 moratorium of commercial whaling. When using the word 'scientific' whaling, we mean only scientific whaling conducted since 1987 under Art. VIII of the ICRW. Research whaling is used as a general word to refer to whaling for research purposes.
11. K. Van Wolferen, The Enigma of Japanese Power: People and Power in a Stateless Nation (1990).
12. S. Yonemoto, Chisei-Gaku no Susume: Kagaku-Gijutsu-Bunmei no Yomitoki [New Knowledge Policy Studies: Explaining the Civilization of Science and Technology] (1998) (in Japanese).
13. For the importance of history in the current IWC stalemate, see HN. Scheiber, Historical Memory, Cultural Claims, and Environmental Ethics in the Jurisprudence of Whaling Regulation, 38 OCEAN & COASTAL MGMT. 5 (1998). For a comprehensive account for the history of whaling diplomacy with a legal focus,
14. see A. Gillespie, Whaling Diplomacy: Defining Issues in International Environmental Law (2005).
15. T. Shinobu, Kokuren-Ningen-Kankyō-Kaigi ni okeru Shōgyō-Hogei-Moratoriamu-Mondai [The Issue of Commercial Whaling Moratorium in the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment], 6 J. POL'Y STUD. 171 (2005) (in Japanese).
16. In Id., Shinobu quotes an official document written by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
17. See Id. at 185-186.
18. In Id., Shinobu quotes an official document of the Japanese Government.
19. See id. at 186.
20. For example, domestic regulation of contaminated whale meat falls under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.
21. For a detailed explanation of major actors in Japanese environmental policy making, see Wong, supra note 2.
22. For example, see Japan Whaling Association, Are the Whales Really Threatened with Extinction? (1973); 24 JWA, Road to Settlement of the Whaling Controversy-Japan's Position and Proposals (1979)
23. JWA, Ed., Is the Moratorium Justifiable? The Scientists Speak Out (1984)
24. JWA, Ed., Kujira-Karuchā [Whales-Culture] (1985).
25. For a critique for using domestic measures to enforce international whaling agreements, see DM. Wilkinson, The Use of Domestic Measures to Enforce International Whaling Agreements: A Critical Perspective, 17 DENV. J. INT'L L. & POL'Y 271 (1989). For a detailed explanation of the Japan-United states confrontation,
26. see K. Sumi, The Whale War Between Japan and the United States: Problems and Prospects, 17 DENV. J. INT'L L. & POL'Y 317 (1989).
27. K. Isshiki, The Asahi Shimbun, November 28, 1984, at 3 (in Japanese).
28. This reference refers to the remarks of Tatsuo Saitō in Nichi-Geiken no Setsuritsu to Hogei-Mondai o Meguru Kokusai-Jōsei [The Establishment of the Institute for Cetacean Research and the Whaling Issue in the International Society], inNihon-Geirui-Kenkyūjo Jū-Nenshi (Institute for Cetacean Research,Ed., 1997) (in Japanese).
29. Nihon Keizai Shimbun, August 1, 1984, at 9 (in Japanese).
30. Hogei Mondai Kentōkai, Wa ga Kuni Hogei no Kongo no Arikata ni Tsuite: Hogei Mondai Kentōkai Hōkoku (1984) (in Japanese).
31. The episode on the controversy between tg]the then Prime Minister Nakasone and the FA presented here is based on WONG, supra note 2 where Wong cites her interviews with officials in the FA and MOFA, an officer of JWA, and a researcher working for the Diet. See Wong, supra note 2, at 117.
32. Wong, supra note 2, at 118.
33. Institute for Cetacean Research, supra note 18.
34. The research result was published as T. Akimichi et al., Small-Type Coastal Whaling in Japan: Report of an International Workshop (1988) and was presented at IWC40 (1988). However, HiroyukiWatanabe warns that the research may be politically biased by pointing out several omissions of important aspects of Japanese whaling history that could be disadvantageous to the relief allocation campaign.
35. See H. Watanabe, Hogei-Mondai ni okeru Bunka Hyōshō no Seijisei ni tsuite [The Politics of Cultural Representation in the Whaling Issue], 4 J. ENVTL SOC. 219 (1998) (in Japanese).
36. IWC, Resolution on Japanese Community-Based Whaling, Resolution 1995-3, Appendix 4, Chairman's Report of the Forty-Seventh Annual Meeting, Forty-sixth Report of the International Whaling Commission (1996).
37. For a detailed account, see WCG. Burns, The Berlin Initiative on Strengthening the Conservation Agenda of the International Whaling Commission: Toward a New Era for Cetaceans?, 13 RECIEL 72 (2004).
38. We omit Hirata (2005), supra note 2 because its case-specific arguments and conclusion are almost the same as Hirata (2004),
39. supra note 2 reviewed here.
40. Friedheim, supra note 2.
41. Id.
42. Id.
43. Id.
44. Id.
45. Id.
46. Id.
47. Id. In his book chapter arguing that the current situation of the IWC is Pareto optimal, Victor follows Friedheim's argument by commenting that [it] appears Japan still does not know how the game should be played. See DG. Victor, Whale Sausage: Why the Whaling Regime Does not Need to Be Fixed, in Towards a Sustainable Whaling Regime 292, 307 (RL. Friedheim, Ed., 2002).
48. Friedheim, supra note 2.
49. Wong, supra note 2.
50. Id. at 1.
51. Id. at 2.
52. Id. at 33.
53. Id. at 129.
54. Id. at 112-113.
55. Id. at 112.
56. Danaher, supra note 2.
57. Id. at 119.
58. Id. at 119.
59. Id. at 120.
60. Id. at 120.
61. P. Clapham et al., Whaling as Science, 53 BIOSCIENCE 210, 210 (2003). The current situation of Japan's data disclosure has slightly changed. The SC unanimously agreed at IWC55 (2003) on Rules for data availability in the Scientific Committee, and so the SC has now a formal procedure for data access to primary data of Japan's scientific whaling.
62. See Report of the Scientific Committee, 6 (supplement) J. OF CETACEAN RES. AND MGMT. 1, 56-57, 406-408 (2004). However, whether this procedure works properly is yet to be seen. Additionally, under Article VIII of the ICRW, Japan is not required to follow any advice or recommendations from the SC or the IWC regarding the conduct of their scientific whaling program.
63. Danaher, supra note 2 at 120.
64. M. Danaher, Public Awareness of Environmental Issues in Japan, in EAST ASIAN CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES 30 (S. Totosy de Zepetnek & J. Jay J, Eds., 1997), quoted in id. at 113.
65. Danaher, supra note 2 at 113.
66. Id.
67. Hirata (2004), supra note 2.
68. Miyaoka, supra note 2.
69. Id. at 11.
70. K. van Wolferen, The Japan Problem, 65 FOREIGN AFFAIRS 288, 289(1986).
71. Id.
72. Id.
73. Id.
74. Id.
75. VAN WOLFEREN, supra note 7, at 109.
76. Id. at 227.
77. Id. at 223.
78. For a detailed explanation and analysis of the Kisha-Kurabu system, see I. HALL, Cartels of the Mind: Japan's Intellectual Closed Shop (1998).
79. Whiting, R. Prying Open Japan's Press Clubs. 1986 (November) TOKYO JOURNAL 11.
80. VAN WOLFEREN, supra note 7, at 94.
81. Id. at 247.
82. Id. at 246.
83. Id. at 246.
84. Id. at 246.
85. Id. at 303.
86. Id. at 304.
87. Id. at 145.
88. Id. at 145.
89. Id. at 339.
90. Id. at 313.
91. The remainder of this section including this paragraph is largely based on Yonemoto, supra note 8.
92. MIYAOKA, supra note 2, at 92.
93. Danaher, supra note 2;
94. Burns, supra note 26.
95. THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, June 3, 1999, at 11 (in Japanese).
96. Bitter Division over Whale Hunts, BBC NEWS, May 22, 2002, available at 〈news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/ 1999931.stm〉 (Last visited on April 8, 2006).
97. The recent success of Japan to pass the St. Kitts Declaration may mark the beginning of this strategy. See IWC Resolution 2006-1 St.Kitts and Nevis Declaration, available at 〈http://www.iwcoffice.org/ meetings/resolutions/resolution2006.htm〉 (Last visited on December 26, 2006).
98. This has been proposed every year from 1997 in the IWC meetings.
99. Only strategy #4 is a necessary and sufficient condition for Japan to resume commercial whaling.
100. For example, see KC. Balcomb III, CA. Goebel, Some Information on a Berardius bairdii Fishery in Japan, 27 REP. OF THE INT'L WHALING COMMISSION 485 (1977)
101. RL. Brownell Jr. et al., Report of the Ad Hoc Intersessional Sperm Whale Group Meeting, 1 (supplement) J. OF CETACEAN RES. & MNGT. 147 (1999)
102. I. Kondo, T. Kasuya, True Catch Statistics for a Japanese Coastal Whaling Company in 1965-1978, unpublished document presented to the 54th Scientific Committee of the International Whaling Commission, IWC/ SC/O13 (2002).
103. For example, see AKIMICHI et al., supra note 24.
104. Though not all Japanese major newspapers have been checked, there are indications that it can be reasonably assumed that other newspapers are much the same as the Asahi Shimbun.
105. Official document by MOFA quoted in Shinobu, supra note 10, at 178-179.
106. Regarding this point, Kokusai PR. Hogei-Mondai ni Kansuru Kokunai-Seron no Kanki [promoting domestic support for the whaling issue], unpublished report, at 138(in Japanese) refers to an article by M. C. Davidson appeared in Ajinomoto Company's public relations journal Mai Famirii [My Family].
107. Id.
108. Id.
109. Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Shokuryō Jukyū Hyō [Inventory of Food Supply and Demand] 2005, available at 〈http://www.kanbou.maff.go.jp/www/fbs/dat/1-1.pdf〉 (in Japanese; Last visited on May 20, 2006).
110. THE ASAHI SHIMBUN (Western Headquarters Edition), January 4, 2002 at 31 (in Japanese).
111. For example, a poll was undertaken by the Public Relations Office, Cabinet Office of the Japanese Government in 2002. For details, see Public Relations Office, Cabinet Office of the Japanese Government, Hogei-Mondai, 2002(8) GEKKAN SERON-CHŌSA [MONTHLY PUBLIC OPINION SURVEY 3 (in Japanese). An English summary of this report is available at 〈http://www.jfa.maff.go.jp/whale/document/ 20020315publicpollsimple.pdf〉 (Last visited on December 26, 2006).
112. The Asahi Shimbun's opinion poll in 1993 showed that only 11% of the total respondents supported the lifting of the moratorium because they wanted to eat whale meat (The Asahi Shimbun, March 15, 1993, at 3 (in Japanese)), and dropped to 6% in 2002 in the same kind of opinion poll by the Asahi Shimbun (THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, March 30, 2002, at 37 (in Japanese)).
113. In the words of Junko Sakurai, former Greenpeace Japan campaigner, the Japanese citizens who are said to be pro-whaling are largely anti- anti-whaling in reality. J. Sakurai, e-mail communication with one of the authors (Atsushi Ishii), July 31, 2006.
114. S. Yonemoto, THE MAINICHI SHIMBUN, July 17, 2005, at 2 (in Japanese).
115. M. Heazle, Lessons in Precaution: The International Whaling Commission Experience with Precautionary Management, 30 MARINE POLICY 496 (2006).
116. Wong quotes her interview with Junko Sakurai to point this out. See Wong, supra note 2, at 122.
117. IWC, Verbatim Record of the 45th Annual Meeting of the IWC (1993).
118. For an example of an official statement by Japan, see IWC, Verbatim Record of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the IWC (1991) at 69.
119. For example, see IWC, Report of the International Working Group to Review Data and Results from Special Permit Research on Minke Whales in the Antarctic (1997) IWC doc. SC/49/Rep1;
120. IWC, Report of the Workshop to Review the Japanese Whale Research Programme under Special Permit for North Pacific Minke Whales (JARPN) (2000) IWC doc. SC/52/REP2. Japan's scientific whaling, however, is always a highly controversial issue in the discussions of the SC, especially regarding the necessity of lethal research.
121. Government of Japan, The Program for Research on the Southern Hemisphere Minke Whale and for Preliminary Research on the Marine Ecosystem in the Antarctic (1987) IWC doc. SC/39/04 presented to the Scientific Committee, 1987 (unpublished) at 3.
122. S. J., Mayer, A Preliminary Review and Evaluation of Scientific Whaling from 1986 to 1996, available at 〈http://www.wdcs.org/ dan/publishing.nsf/allweb/43F20B985BA31218802568F10035E91F〉 (Last visited on May 23, 2006).
123. Government of Japan, Plan for the Second Phase of the Japanese Whale Research Program under Special Permit in the Antarctic (JARPA II) - Monitoring of the Antarctic Ecosystem and Development of New Management Objectives for Whale Resources, (2005), available at 〈http://www.icrwhale.org/eng/SC57O1.pdf〉 (Last visited on May 23, 2006).
124. While the Japanese delegation has long been denying this, the recent establishment of a joint company, namely 'Geishoku-Labo' [whale diet laboratory], for whale meat promotion by the FA and ICR may show that the whaling camp has become defiant and begun to implicitly acknowledge this. The aforementioned whale meat remainders clearly necessitated such promotion to expand demand and thereby lowering whale meat price. See THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, May 11, 2006, at 11 (in Japanese).
125. Anonymous, Tōron: Chōsa-Hogei no Zehi [Critical Discussion: The Pros and Cons of 'Scientific' Whaling], THE MAINICHI SHIMBUN, October 3, 2005, at 3 (in Japanese).
126. T. Kasuya, Hogei Mondai o Kangaeru [Considering the Whaling Issue], 16 EKOSOFIA 56, 62 (2005) (in Japanese).
127. This is based on authors' interviews with former and current members of the SC, and Mayer, supra note 105 which argues that members of the Scientific Committee often split into whaling and non-whaling camps according to nationality when special permits are considered.
128. IWC, Verbatim Record of the 41 st Annual Meeting of the IWC (1989) at 101-102.
129. See Mayer, supra note 105;
130. Clapham et al., supra note 49;
131. F. Briand et al., An Open Letter to the Government of Japan on Scientific Whaling, NEW YORK TIMES, May 20, 2002.;
132. NJ. Gales et al., Japan's Whaling Plan under Scrutiny, 435NATURE 883 (2005).
133. Yūzō Suwa reported that, in the IWC, the meaning of sound science asserted by Japan is merely perceived as science supported by the Japanese Government.
134. See Y. SUWA, AMERIKA WA KANKYŌ NI YASASHII NO KA [IS AMERICA ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY?] 236 (1996) (in Japanese).
135. Friedheim, supra note 2.
136. For a good overview of the RMS issue, see GILLESPIE, supra note 9.
137. Government of Japan, Suggest draft for the Revision of Chapter V of the Schedule 'Supervision and Control,' (1997) IWC doc. IWC/49/RMS1 presented to the IWC AnnualMeeting(unpublished), quoted in Briand et al., supra note 112.
138. Y. Iino, Kaitei-Kanri-Seido ni okeru Kanshi/Torishimari-Seido o meguru Giron no Genjō to Mondaiten [The Current Situation and Problems of the Negotiation on the Inspection and Observer Scheme in the Revised Management Scheme], 399 GEIKEN-TSŪSHIN 16 (1998) (in Japanese).
139. See id. at 18, which also provides an explanation on the RMS issue from the whaling camp's view.
140. Report of the Revised Management Scheme Working Group, (2005) IWC doc. IWC/57/Rep 6.
141. Id.
142. Id. at 6.
143. Opening Statement of the Government of Ireland, Forty-Ninth Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission, 1997.
144. The former US commissioner John Knauss is proposing a similar package as a balanced compromise in the IWC negotiations. See J. Knauss, The International Whaling Commission - Its Past and Possible Future, 28 OCEAN DEV. & INT'L LAW 79 (1997).
145. Additionally, Friedheim argues that Japanese authorities had failed to address the reason for why Japan should enjoy a monopoly of commonly owned cetacean resources. See Friedheim, supra note 2, at 376.
146. This support was only a slight concession by the United States because it was conditional on decommercializing coastal whaling and proper functioning of the RMP.
147. This was obtained through attending the IWC54 (2002) by one of the authors (Ayako Okubo).
148. Keiji Takeuchi, a journalist of the Asahi Shimbun, reported that this change reflected the intention of Prime Minister Koizumi in caring for the US' repulsion against the Japanese refusal of the bowhead whale quota. 149 See K. Takeuchi, The Asahi Shimbun, July 4, 2002, at 2 (in Japanese).
149. For example, see Liberal Democratic Party, Jiyū-Minshutō Kokusai-Hogei-Inkai Taiō Kentō Purojekuto Chīmu Chūkan-Hōkoku [Interim Report of the Working Group on International Whaling Commission, LDP], May 31, 2005 (in Japanese).
150. Art. 65 of UNCLOS reads [s]tates shall co-operate with a view to the conservation of marine mammals and in the case of cetaceans shall in particular work through the appropriate international organisations for their conservation, management and study.
151. Y. Iino & D. Goodman, Japan's Position in the International Whaling Commission, in THE FUTURE OF CETACEANS IN A CHANGING WORLD 3 (W.C.G. Burns, & A. Gillespie eds., 2003).
152. See K. vanWolferen, Sekai ga Nihon oMitomeru Hi [The Day That theWorld Can Take Japan Seriously Again] 29 (2005) (in Japanese). Some say even that Japan is still occupied by the US or the 51 st state of the US.
153. For example, Japan openly admits in the IWC plenary meetings that she was forced to accept the moratorium by the US (e. g., IWC, supra note 101, at 198) despite the fact that Japan had any chance to exercise its sovereign right to maintain the reservation to the moratorium.
154. T. Yamawaki, E. K. Nishiyama, & K. Takagi, The Asahi Shimbun, September 15, 2000, at 3.
155. Friedheim, supra note 2.
156. Wong, supra note 2.
157. Victor, supra note 35.