Environmental Politics in Japan: the Case of Wildlife Preservation

This book provides an analytical study of the reasons and influences underlying Japan's less than progressive policy record on wildlife preservation, domestically and globally, since 1980. Apart from a common sense of purpose that binds the different policy actors together, it is argued that Japan's poor record on wildlife preservation is a derivative of the way environmental NGOs have been marginalised and excluded from the policy process. This argument links to Japan's public safety, and food and economic security concerns whereby these concerns tend to frame and guide policy-making on wildlife and nature issues. The book analyses both Japanese state behaviour towards global and domestic wildlife issues, and the changing relationships between the Japanese state, foreign pressure and environmental NGOs. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Ramsar Convention are the two environmental regimes which provide the context and issues for the analyses.