Civil-Military Gap in Japan: Comparing the 2004 and 2013 Surveys -- CANCELLED

This paper compares two surveys conducted by the authors in 2004 and 2013 which looks at the possible “civil-military gap” in Japan. These surveys, modeled after the TISS survey, were the first academic attempt to examine the attitudes of Japan Self Defense Force (SDF) officers as well as civilian elites in Japan. In the 2004 survey, we found that (1) SDF officers were more conservative than the civilian elite, (2) on US-Japan alliance issues, there were no evident gap between the officers and civilian elite, while there were signs of gap with the general public, (3) SDF officers long for a greater role in the policy making process. Events that took place between 2004 and 2013, including the SDF dispatch to Iraq, the end of the conservative party rule in Japan, and the 2011 earthquake and the disaster relief efforts by the SDF, suggest that there may be a change of attitudes among both the SDF officers and the civilian elite. A second survey is to be conducted in October 2013, and this paper will compare the 2004 and 2013 survey results to examine whether and why there may be changes in the “civil-military gap.”