Interested browsers would do well to note this book's subtitle. The focus of this book is clearly on the interaction of Japanese domestic interests and American pressure in the creation of Japanese foreign policy rather than in policy itself. The two questions this book addresses both deal with American influence: 1) should Japanese foreign policy be considered 'reactive' to American pressure (a la Kent Calder's 1988 thesis), and 2) under what conditions is American pressure (gaiatsu) effective? Each of the chapters examines these issues with a different case study. One of the strengths of this book is the wide range of topics, both geographically and in terms of issues. Taken as a whole, this book gives the reader reasonably comprehensive overview of the important issues in Japanese foreign policy.
The most pleasant surprise about this volume is the high quality of presentation. Each of the chapters provides the right mix of historical background and current analysis so a non-specialist reader can follow their arguments without getting lost in details. Since the book's topics range widely, this is important. Surprisingly (given that most of the authors are non-native speakers of English), the chapters are consistently well written. There is relatively little of the awkward sentences and hard-to-read language that characterizes most academic writing.
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