Abe Shinzō on Southeast Asia: Maritime Policy and the “Abe Doctrine”

Sammanfattning: Since his return to office in 2012, Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzō has been widely recognised as pursuing a more proactive foreign and security policy than previous prime ministers. This thesis examines the maritime policies of Prime Minister Abe applicable to the South East Asia region as an example of his changed approach to foreign and security policies. First, this thesis addresses the question as to what policies Abe has espoused, and if he has been consistent in his policy pronouncements throughout his term. This thesis uses discourse analysis on translated transcripts of Prime Minister Abe’s public speeches and statements to identify and consider the constancy of the relevant policies promoted by Abe. Subsequently, the thesis compares these findings to the ‘Abe Doctrine’, a concept recently developed to understand Abe’s policies, to test the current effectiveness of the Abe Doctrine concept. This thesis finds that current ideas for an ‘Abe Doctrine’ are largely accurate but require greater attention to how ‘values-based diplomacy’ is used by Prime Minister Abe in different policy contexts.