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CIAO DATE: 5/00
Domestic Politics and International Relations in Trade Policymaking: The United States and Japan in the GATT Uruguay Round Agriculture Negotiations
International Studies Association
41st Annual Convention
Los Angeles, CA
March 14-18, 2000
This paper is circulated for discussion and comment only and should not be quoted without permission of the author.
Linked to efforts to promote trade liberalization through trade negotiations has been the recognition of the need not only to better understand the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in American trade policymaking, but also to analyze more effectively the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in other countries' trade policymaking processes.
In order to address this need, this paper, which is a summary of my Columbia University Political Science dissertation, sets forth a contextual two-level game approach that can be used to analyze the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking.
This paper develops the contextual two-level game approach by demonstrating how it can be used to examine the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in American trade policymaking, Japanese trade policymaking, and U.S.-Japan trade negotiations.
The paper then uses the contextual two-level game approach to analyze a particular case study -- the roles of the United States and Japan in the GATT Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations (1986-1994).
The paper concludes by assessing the effectiveness of the contextual two-level game approach, and suggesting areas for further research.
Introduction: The Contextual Two-Level Game Approach to Analyzing Trade Policymaking
From a practical perspective, efforts to unify the world trading system have increased the need to better understand and coordinate various countries' trade policies. From a theoretical perspective, concepts and theories are needed to help organize empirical studies of the reciprocal influence between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking.
Among the various approaches that have been used to explore the relationship between domestic politics and international relations, 1 this paper focuses on the two-level game approach 2 which has been developed in Putnam's "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics" article in International Organization; Evans, Jacobson, and Putnam's Double-Edged Diplomacy: International Bargaining and Domestic Politics; Schoppa's Bargaining with Japan; and Milner's Interests, Institutions, and Information: Domestic Politics and International Relations.
This paper, like Schoppa's Bargaining with Japan and Milner's Interests, Institutions, and Information, strives to improve the two-level game approach. 3 Like Schoppa's Bargaining with Japan, this paper attempts to refine the two-level game approach by focusing on trade policymaking and U.S.-Japan trade negotiations. But, in contrast to Schoppa's Bargaining with Japan and Milner's Interests, Institutions, and Information, this paper starts from a broader and more comparative perspective.
The contextual two-level game approach is developed in this paper using a synthetic strategy that blends the strengths and weaknesses of a variable-oriented and a case-study-oriented approach. 4 Efforts are made to carefully formulate the domestic and international variables involved in trade policymaking, and to precisely conceptualize these variables' relationships to each other through the development and testing of hypotheses, not to mention the selection of appropriate issue areas and case studies. Efforts are also made to strike a balance between theoretical parsimony and the complexity of the trade policymaking process.
The general features of a country's trade policymaking process are specified in terms of variables that are derived from existing theories of comparative politics and international relations. These variables are incorporated into a comparative framework of trade policymaking that has two basic levels - a domestic level and an international level.
The domestic level of the comparative framework of trade policymaking consists of three variables - the state [bureaucracy], the legislature, and other actors in the policymaking process. 5 A country's major negotiator is often within the state [bureaucracy], and therefore the state [bureaucracy] generally plays a major role in trade policymaking. 6 The legislature's role in trade policymaking is often determined by constitutional rules that affect the set of laws and institutional arrangements that govern trade policymaking. 7 Various other actors, such as interest groups, reflect the preferences of particular social forces, political groups or classes in society that struggle for influence in the trade policymaking process. 8
Many diverse actors, whose alliances may shift, participate in trade policymaking. Coalitions form at the domestic level between elements of the state [bureaucracy], the legislature, and other actors. The formation of these coalitions is affected by a number of factors including the "policy preferences of domestic actors, the institutions for power sharing among them, and the distribution of information among them." 9
At the international level, the international trade regime 10 and the position of a particular country in the international political economy 11 can affect a country's trade policymaking. Also, a country's desire to cooperate 12 , the number of countries involved in a negotiation 13 , and negotiating strategies 14 affect trade policymaking.
The domestic and international variables are all interrelated and constitute a comparative framework of trade policymaking that can be used to analyze and compare the trade policymaking of various countries. 15
The individual or individuals that negotiate for a particular country occupy a role between the domestic and international levels. A negotiator must negotiate in two directions at the same time - both with the actors in the domestic politics of his or her country and with the negotiator and sometimes other actors from the other country.
The relationship between domestic politics and international relations and the role of a negotiator in a particular trade negotiation can be analyzed using the following questions:
This paper addresses the last of these questions by examining the following "if, then" testable, clearly falsifiable hypotheses: 18
II. Using the Contextual Two-Level Game Approach to Analyze the Relationship between Domestic Politics and International Relations in American Trade Policymaking, Japanese Trade Policymaking, and U.S.-Japan Trade Negotiations
This section develops the contextual two-level game approach by demonstrating how it can be used to analyze the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in American trade policymaking, Japanese trade policymaking, and U.S.-Japan trade negotiations.
Using the comparative framework of trade policymaking just set forth, the domestic level of American trade policymaking can be conceptualized using three variables - the Executive Branch (including the United States Trade Representative (USTR), the Departments of Commerce, Treasury, and State); Congress (including the relevant Congressional committees); and other actors in the American trade policymaking process (including affected exporting and importing companies and interest groups). Many diverse actors, whose alliances shift, participate in American trade policymaking. But, the shifting coalitions that occur, occur within the pattern of accommodation and conflict between the Executive Branch and Congress, with substantial input from other actors in the trade policymaking process.
At the international level, the United States has agreed to have certain constraints placed on its trade policymaking as part of the mutual trade agreements that it has entered into with other contracting parties to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). At the same time, the GATT and the WTO have served the United States as an instrument for regime creation, for institutionalizing dispute settlement procedures, for managing protectionist pressures, and for legitimating foreign policy objectives. 22 At the regional level, the United States has entered into similar obligations with Canada and Mexico under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). During the postwar period, the United States has often acted as a hegemon in the international trade regime. 23 The United States' desire to cooperate with other countries, the number of countries involved in a negotiation, and negotiating strategies can affect American trade policymaking.
The individual or individuals that negotiate for the United States occupy a role that is between the American government and the other country's negotiator(s). An American negotiator must negotiate in two directions at the same time - with the Executive Branch, and, if necessary, Congress, and other actors in American trade policymaking, as well as with the negotiators and sometimes other actors from the other country or countries involved in the negotiation.
In order to answer the question, To what extent does domestic politics affect the agreement the United States reaches in a negotiation?, it is necessary first to ask, To what extent does domestic politics affect American trade policymaking during a particular trade negotiation? This question can be addressed by assessing the validity of the following hypotheses:
Similarly, using the comparative framework of trade policymaking, the domestic level of Japanese trade policymaking can be conceptualized using three variables -- the bureaucracy (including the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) and the other ministries involved), the Diet (including the major parties, such as the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)), and other actors in the Japanese trade policymaking process (including importing and exporting companies and other interest groups). The bureaucracy generally plays the central role in Japanese trade policymaking. The Diet's role in Japanese trade policymaking is influenced by the configuration of political parties within the Diet. Interest groups often play a less visible role in the Japanese trade policymaking process than in the American trade policymaking process. Many diverse actors, whose alliances may shift, participate in Japanese trade policymaking. But, the shifting coalitions that occur, occur as the bureaucracy responds to tensions within it and pressures exerted on it by the Prime Minister, Japanese Diet members, and interest groups.
At the international level, Japan has agreed to have certain constraints placed on its trade policymaking, as part of the mutual trade agreements that it has entered into with other GATT and WTO contracting parties. Since Japan has emerged as the second largest economy in the world, Japan has had to cope with increased calls for Japan to comply with its obligations under the GATT and the WTO, as various countries' trade deficits with Japan have escalated. Japan's desire to cooperate, the number of countries involved in a negotiation, and negotiating strategies 24 affect Japanese trade policymaking.
The individual or individuals that negotiate for Japan occupy a role that is between the Japanese government and the other country's negotiator(s). A Japanese negotiator must negotiate in two directions at the same time - both with the bureaucracy, and, if necessary, Diet members, and other actors in Japanese trade policymaking, and with negotiators and sometimes other actors from the other country or countries involved in the negotiation.
In order to answer the question, To what extent does domestic politics affect the agreement Japan reaches in a negotiation?, it is necessary first to ask: To what extent does domestic politics affect Japanese trade policymaking during a particular trade negotiation? This question can be answered by assessing the validity of the following hypotheses:
Using these conceptualizations of American trade policymaking and Japanese trade policymaking, a U.S.-Japan trade negotiation can be very simply conceptualized as follows:
In such a negotiation, the American and Japanese governments are negotiating between themselves concerning some trade matter. Transnational coalitions can form. The legislature and/or other actors in either country may exert pressure on the negotiators within their own country, or may exert pressure on negotiators or other actors in the other country.
A multilateral negotiation (for example, a quadrilateral negotiation) involving the United States and Japan and other countries can also be similarly conceptualized as follows:
Diagram 2
A Quadrilateral Trade Negotiation Involving the United States and Japan
Building upon the hypotheses set forth earlier, the question To what extent does domestic politics affect the agreement the United States and Japan reach in a particular trade negotiation? can be examined by testing the following hypotheses:
III. Using the Contextual Two-Level Game Approach to Analyze a Particular Case Study - The United States and Japan in the GATT Uruguay Round Agriculture Negotiations
It is logical to develop the contextual two-level game approach by focusing on a case study involving the GATT and the WTO, because from 1948, when the GATT came into effect, until January 1995 when the WTO was created, the agreements that resulted from the various postwar GATT negotiating rounds -- including the Kennedy Round (1963-1967), the Tokyo Round (1974-1979), and the Uruguay Round (1987-1994) --, involved a large number of signatories whose domestic politics came to affect and be affected by their relationship to the GATT.
It is also logical to focus on a case study involving agriculture, because throughout the evolution of the GATT and the WTO, agriculture has been one of the issues that has been most influenced by the domestic politics of the major signatories. 25
Third, it is logical to focus on the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations because it was not possible to conclude the Uruguay Round without gathering sufficient domestic political support for the provisions in the Uruguay Round Agriculture Agreement. Some of the most contested provisions of the Agriculture Agreement, the agreement to tariffy agricultural products and to provide minimum access to agricultural markets, are the focus of the case study examined in this dissertation.
Fourth, in order to develop the contextual two-level game approach, it is logical to focus on the roles of the United States and Japan, because they are the two largest single-state 26 economies among the signatories of the GATT, and a central issue between them in the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations was the achievement of an agreement concerning tariffication of agricultural products and a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets. 27
The sections that follow use the contextual two-level game approach to analyze the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in American trade policymaking, Japanese trade policymaking, and U.S.-Japan trade negotiations during a particular case study -- the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. In order to make the discussion that follows a little clearer, it is helpful to briefly summarize the evolution of the negotiations:
IV. American Trade Policymaking during the Uruguay Round Agriculture Negotiations
During the early 1980s, the Reagan Administration supported the insertion of agriculture into the negotiating agenda of what eventually become the Uruguay Round negotiations as part of the Administration's response to America's declining market share in world agricultural trade. Although American agricultural policy was relatively market-oriented and the United States during the postwar period had always had a large agricultural trade surplus, Section 22 of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 authorized "the President to impose import quotas or fees that [the President] determine[d were] necessary to ensure that imports of a product [did] not undermine a domestic, agricultural-commodity price-support program or other agricultural program." "The United States received a waiver [from the GATT contracting parties] of its GATT obligations for section 22 in 1955." This waiver remedied "the inconsistency between section 22 and ... Articles II and XI [of the GATT]. 28 Without this waiver, Section 22 programs would have been in violation of Article XI of the GATT treaty, which called for a "General Prohibition on Import Quotas." 29 Thus, American agricultural trade policy came to protect "threatened but politically powerful producers of a few commodities such as sugar and dairy products," while leaving agricultural producers more or less on their own to compete for export markets. As world markets quickly expanded during the 1960s, American agriculture profited by exporting basic commodities. But, from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, the United States confronted increased competition in the world grains, citrus, and rice markets. 30
During the first few years of the Reagan administration, the gradual but steady appreciation of the dollar versus other major currencies made U.S. agricultural exports more expensive, and a contraction in world agricultural trade occurred. 31 As American agriculture was "squeezed by the worst collapse in farm-asset values in a half century," 32 the 1985 farm bill was designed "to maintain farm income, to expand American agricultural exports, and to contain or reduce federal budget expenditures on farm price and income supports." 33
The Reagan Administration considered that the GATT was the only "action-oriented" multilateral forum that the Administration had to confront the decline in America's agricultural exports. 34 Agricultural exports had peaked at $43.78 billion in 1981, but had decreased to what was projected, in July 1986, to be $28 billion for 1986. 35 The United States criticized subsidized agricultural exporters, such as the EC, as unfair traders, while aggressively seeking access to foreign agricultural markets, and promoting the incorporation of agriculture into the negotiating agenda of the upcoming Round of GATT negotiations. 36 As the American trade deficit grew dramatically, interest groups pressured the American government for protection at home and liberalization abroad, U.S.-Japan trade friction increased, and various Japanese agricultural sectors, including Japan's closed rice market, became a target for American agricultural producers.
In September 1986, the Rice Millers' Association (RMA) filed a Section 301 petition with the USTR, requesting that the U.S. government take measures to pressure the Japanese government to remove its virtual ban on rice imports, which had existed since 1961. USTR Yeutter rejected the petition in October 1986, noting that Japan had made commitments concerning agricultural liberalization a few weeks earlier in the Punta del Este Declaration which had set the negotiating agenda for what was to become the GATT Uruguay Round negotiations. The Punta del Este Declaration included a commitment "to achieve greater liberalization of trade in agriculture and bring all measures affecting import access and export competition under strengthened and more operationally effective GATT rules and disciplines, taking into account the general principles governing the negotiations, by: (i) improving market access through, inter alia, the reduction of import barriers." 37
During March 1987 House Agriculture Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry hearings, a USTR official "stated that modifications to the existing waiver under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade for section 22 of the Agricultural Adjustment Act would be under consideration at the new round of multilateral trade negotiations." But, during the hearing, Subcommittee members "expressed concern about any relaxation of section 22 quotas on imported dairy products." A National Milk Producers Federation representative warned that because "unlimited dairy imports would soon destroy the dairy price support program," import quotas had been "applied to most imported dairy products under section 22." 38
But, an April 1987 House Committee on Agriculture report stated that it was a "common understanding that all trade practices used by countries to enhance exports of their agricultural commodities and provide protections to their farmers [would] be open for discussion during the Uruguay Round." The report noted that the USTR had stated that section 22 of the Agricultural Adjustment Act would be among "the items for discussion." According to the report, "[d]airy economists around the country insist[ed] that the elimination or a substantial reduction in section 22 protection [would] have a devastating effect on U.S. dairy farmers. Yet, no one ha[d] done a complete analysis of the potential effect of this change." 39
Shortly after the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture began to meet regularly in Geneva, the Congressional Budget Office released a study in July 1987 that showed that falling exports and rising imports had caused the U.S. agricultural trade surplus to peak at $26.6 billion in 1981, and to decline to $5.0 billion by 1986. The study noted that between 1981 and 1986, U.S. agricultural exports to Japan, which had been the "largest single purchaser of U.S. agricultural exports," had fallen 24 percent, from $6.7 billion to $5.1 billion. The report argued that in order to induce other countries to make concessions during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, the United States would "have to consider overhauling many of its farm support programs," including rescinding the 1955 GATT waiver on import quotas for agricultural products, lowering price and income supports, and terminating export subsidies. 40
During July 1987, the United States presented its first major negotiating proposal to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture. The proposal called for "a ten-year phase-out of all agricultural subsidies (including export subsidies) and import barriers, and action on health and sanitary regulations." 41 This proposal was followed later in the year by proposals from the EC, the Cairns Group of agricultural exporting nations 42 , and Japan.
The August 1988 Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act gave the President until June 1991 to sign a Uruguay Round agreement with a two-year extension possible. The law also included provisions that required the President to inform Congress by mid-February 1990 of the Executive Branch's progress in the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. The law stated that, in the event that the President did not sign a Uruguay Round agreement by 1990, the President could implement a marketing loan program for wheat, feed grains, and soybeans producers, and could instruct the Secretary of Agriculture "to make agricultural commodities and products acquired by the Commodity Credit Corporation equaling at least $2,000,000,000 in value available during the 1990 through 1992 fiscal years to United States exporters of domestically produced agricultural commodities and products." 43
In September 1988, the RMA filed a second Section 301 petition with USTR, once again calling upon the U.S. government to pressure Japan to open up its rice market. During October 1988, USTR Yeutter once more rejected the RMA's petition, arguing that "rice farmers had a much better chance of getting positive results by seeking liberalization [of the Japanese rice market] under the Uruguay Round than by engaging in confrontation with Japan." 44
During an April 1989 International Trade Commission hearing concerning the potential impact of the proposed Uruguay Round Mid-Term Review Agreement on American agriculture, most of the large U.S. farm groups, such as the American Farm Bureau Federation and the U.S. Feed Grains Council, expressed their support for U.S. negotiating stances at the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture. But, the National Farmers Union, the National Corn Growers Association, and the Coalition to Save the Family Farm expressed concern about the extent to which provisions in the Uruguay Round Mid-Term Review Agreement would reduce American import barriers, and adversely affect them. The National Farmers Union stated that "the removal of Section 22 of the Agricultural Adjustment Act could result in a flood of imports which could devastate" certain industries. 45
In spite of these concerns, in April 1989, the United States agreed to the Uruguay Round Mid-Term Review Agreement. The Agreement stated that "Ministers agree that the long-term objective is to provide for substantial progressive reductions in agricultural support and protection, sustained over an agreed portion of time, resulting in correcting and preventing restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets." In realizing this long-term objective, the Agreement called for "strengthened and more operationally effective GATT rules and disciplines, which would be equally applicable to all contracting parties," stating that "the commitments to be negotiated, should encompass all measures affecting directly or indirectly import access and export competition." The import access provisions covered by the Agreement included "quantitative and other non-tariff access restrictions, whether maintained under waivers, protocols of accession or other derogations and exceptions." The provisions also covered the matter of conversion of the import access measures just listed into tariffs. 46 The Mid-Term Review Agreement stated that by October 1989, ministers would "provide specifics on their intended reductions in support and protection levels for 1990." By December 1989, participants were to set forth detailed proposals, and the goal was to agree on a long-term reform program by 1990. 47
During May 1989, Bush administration officials stated that they did "not foresee any change in the operation of U.S. programs" as a result of the short-term agricultural provisions in the Uruguay Round Mid-Term Review Agreement. But, officials noted that the Mid-Term Review Agreement made "it clear that all policies affecting trade [were] on the negotiating table." They also noted that the U.S. had proposed that "in order to provide greater transparency to import access barriers, all nontariff barriers be converted to tariffs which [could] then be negotiated down in the traditional GATT manner." 48
In its October 1989 and July 1990 proposals to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture, the United States called for the comprehensive tariffication of agriculture, which meant that "all non-tariff obstacles such as quotas, variable levies, voluntary restraint agreements, minimum import prices etc., [should] be converted into tariffs and bound." After tariffication had been completed, "[a]ll tariffs, including those resulting from such a conversion [would] be progressively reduced to zero or low levels over a ten-year period." 49
Most of the agricultural industry representatives that testified at a fall 1989 Senate Committee on Finance Subcommittee on International Trade hearing endorsed the United States' negotiating stance at the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. 50
When Aart de Zeeuw, Chairman of the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture, released a draft framework agreement for agriculture in July 1990, it became more likely that the United States might have to adjust its agricultural programs in order to comply with a mutually agreed upon reduction in agricultural import barriers as part of the Uruguay Round negotiations. De Zeeuw's draft agreement borrowed several concepts from U.S. negotiating proposals to the Group, and stated that "all nontariff measures [should] be converted to tariffs" and that minimum access levels should be established. The draft agreement also stated that "All tariffs would be reduced and access levels increased over a transition period which would be negotiated." 51 The draft agreement noted that import restrictions "would be covered by a separate commitment based on tariffication, taking account of non-trade concerns and the particular needs of developing countries." 52
Meanwhile, pressure was mounting on the United States to remove some of its own quantitative restrictions on agricultural imports. In September 1990, President Bush authorized the conversion of a U.S. "sugar import quota program into a tariff-rate quota system" after a June 1989 GATT dispute panel brought by Australia found that U.S. quantitative import restrictions on sugar were inconsistent with U.S. obligations under the GATT. 53 The U.S. Sugar Alliance responded one month later by officially withdrawing its support for the U.S. negotiating stance at the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. 54
After the GATT contracting parties were unable to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations on schedule at the December 1990 Brussels Ministerial meeting, a USTR official informed the House Agriculture Committee, in February 1991, about the implications for American agriculture of the minimum access commitment for agricultural products that had been included in the United States' October 1990 negotiating proposal to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture. The official stated that the United States had proposed "that nontariff trade barriers such as the quotas that [the United States] maintain[ed] under Section 22 would be converted to tariffs," and "that minimum access levels [would] be established at 3 percent of domestic consumption." For products [such as peanuts] that were subject to section 22 quotas, this would mean that the United States "would have to increase imports so that the United States would be providing [no more than] 97 percent of [its] self-sufficiency rather than greater than 97 [percent] as [was presently occurring] in some commodities." 55 During the same hearing, a GAO official noted that American "sugar, dairy products, peanuts, and cotton" commodity groups were among the "most fearful of the impact of trade liberalization," because their domestic production had been significantly protected by import quotas. 56
During Spring 1991 debates concerning Congress' approval of the two-year extension of the President's fast-track negotiating authority that was included in the 1988 Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act, 57 the American Farm Bureau Federation, the Rice Millers Association 58 , and other interest groups were supportive of granting such an extension of negotiating authority. 59 However, certain protected agricultural sectors expressed concern about the domestic implications of the United States' negotiating stance at the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture and opposed the extension of such negotiating authority. The American Agriculture Movement stated that were Section 22 removed as a result of commitments made during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, "We would lose several of our most successful farm programs," including "[q]uotas on peanuts, dairy, sugar, tobacco, and beef, among others." 60 The Farmers Union Milk Marketing Cooperative stated that the loss of the Section 22 quota posed "an extremely serious threat to the nation's dairy industry." 61 The National Farmers Union stated that "a more positive U.S. GATT position" concerning market access would "recognize the right of sovereign countries to develop their own domestic food policies, using tools such as [the United States'] Section 22." 62
During May 1991 Senate Agriculture Committee hearings, USTR Hills stated that the government would "make no changes in section 22 unless ... other countries ma[d]e substantial changes in their variable levies, their bans on imports, and their various restrictions." 63 Shortly thereafter, the U.S. Congress voted to extend the administration's fast-track negotiating authority until March 2, 1993.
As GATT Director-General Arthur Dunkel was preparing the Draft Final Act of the Uruguay Round negotiations in early 1991, the National Family Farm Coalition complained to the House Agriculture Committee that Section 22 was on the "chopping block" because of the Japanese rice issue. 64 Furthermore, the National Peanut Growers Group stated that "Producers, the USDA, the [U]STR and university analysts all agree the prepared GATT agreement will result in peanuts being the big loser." 65
The Draft Final Act of the Uruguay Round agreement that GATT Director-General Dunkel released in December 1991 included market access provisions which stated that tariff equivalents, or "tariffication" should occur for "all border measures other than ordinary customs duties" and would affect "quantitative import restrictions, variable import levies, minimum import prices, discretionary import licensing, non-tariff measures maintained through state trading enterprises, [and] voluntary export restraints." 66
The Act stated that Ordinary customs duties, including those resulting from tariffication, shall be reduced, from the year 1993 to the year 1999, on a simple average basis by 36 per cent with a minimum rate of reduction of 15 per cent for each tariff line. Where there are no significant imports, minimum access opportunities shall be established. They shall represent in the first year of the implementation period not less than 3 percent of corresponding domestic consumption ... and shall be expanded to reach 5 percent of that base figure by the end of the implementation period. 67
Shortly after the December 1991 Draft Final Act was released, the American Farm Bureau Federation informed the House Agriculture Committee that the Federation supported the Draft Final Act, but expressed concern about what the Draft Final Act "would mean to our import-sensitive commodities." 68 During the same hearings, a U.S. Agriculture Department official stated that if the United States agreed to the minimum access commitment that was included in the Draft Final Act, the United States would have to remove all of its import restrictions that prevented less than 3 percent of 1986-88 domestic consumption of agricultural commodities to be imported. The official noted that in order to comply with this provision, Japan would have to allow imports of rice. Korea and other countries would also have to initially allow at least 3 percent of certain agricultural commodities to be imported, and then gradually allow imports of 5 percent by the end of an agreed-upon period. 69
During June 1992, Agriculture Secretary Madigan announced that the United States and the EC were "'at the point' of agreeing on minimum access of 3 percent growing to 5 percent over six years, as called for" in the Draft Final Act. 70
As the negotiations between the United States and the EC over the agricultural provisions in the Draft Final Act dragged on through the summer and fall of 1992, the president of the Rice Millers Association (RMA), threatened to file a third Section 301 petition with the USTR. The RMA was worried that the Uruguay Round negotiations might not be successfully concluded, would not result in a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets, and therefore might not increase access to Japan's rice market. 71
In late February 1993, incoming Clinton administration Agriculture Secretary Espy cautioned that "a 301 action against Japan would be 'really extreme,'" and pledged to resolve the issue of the Japanese rice market issue through the Uruguay Round negotiations, although he acknowledged that some bilateral meetings might be necessary. 72
During Spring 1993, the Clinton administration received an additional extension of fast-track authority. The President was required to notify Congress by December 15, 1993 of the President's intention to enter into a new GATT agreement, and gave Congress 120 days until April 16, 1994, to ratify the proposed accord. 73
During July 1993 House Ways and Means Subcommittee hearings, newly appointed USTR Kantor acknowledged that agriculture was "one of the more difficult areas we have to address," with remaining topics including "current access, minimum access, disaggregation, and tariffication schedules." 74
Following the conclusion in the early morning of December 14, 1993 of negotiations between USTR Kantor and EC Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan, last minute market access negotiations took place 75 , and delegates to the GATT approved a 400-page version of the Final Act which included the Agreement on Agriculture.
The Agreement on Agriculture that was included in the December 15, 1993 Final Act stated that non-tariff border measures [were to be] replaced by tariffs that provide substantially the same level of protection. Tariffs resulting from this 'tariffication' process, as well as other tariffs on agricultural products, [were] to be reduced by an average 36 per cent in the case of developed countries and 24 per cent in the case of developing countries.
The tariffication package also provide[d] for the maintenance of current access opportunities and the establishment of minimum access tariff quotas (at reduced-tariff rates) where current access is less than 3 percent of domestic consumption. These minimum access tariff quotas [were] to be expanded to 5 per cent over the implementation period. 76
Part of the domestic impact of these provisions, according to Agriculture Secretary Espy, was that the United States had agreed:
After a 400-page draft of the Uruguay Round agreements had been approved by delegates to the GATT, President Clinton notified the Congress of his intent to ratify the Uruguay Round Agreements and pass implementing legislation.
On April 15, 1994, the United States and Japan and over 100 other nations signed the agreements that resulted from the Uruguay Round negotiations, including the Agreement on Agriculture.
As a result of signing the agreement, the United States had to tariffy agricultural products and to establish a minimum level of access for imports where imports of a product during the 1986-88 base period were less than three percent of domestic consumption, except under certain conditions.
During March 1994 House Agriculture Committee hearings concerning the Uruguay Round implementing legislation, Agriculture Secretary Espy stated that, as a result of the tariffication and minimum access to agricultural markets provisions in the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, the U.S. would "no longer be able to use the section 22 mechanism," and the tariffication of peanuts would be required. 78 The Statement of Administrative Action for the Uruguay Round Agreements Act noted that the United States would benefit as other countries converted to tariff-rate quotas and adjusted to specific guaranteed access levels. U.S. agricultural exporters might benefit from the removal of "the European Union's variable levy on poultry (access of 29,000 tons), the Philippines' import ban on pork (access of 54,000 tons), Korea's restrictive licensing of corn (access of 6,102,100 tons), and Poland's state trading enterprise's limitations on prunes (access of 1,000 tons)." As well, the Statement of Administrative Action noted that Japan and Korea had agreed to special treatment for rice under Annex 5 of the Agreement on Agriculture. During April 1994 hearings, Agriculture Secretary Espy noted that, as a result of this minimum access commitment, American rice sales to Japan had already reached "400,000 metric tons." 79
Agricultural groups generally expressed widespread support for many of the provisions in the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture. In April 1994, an RMA representative told the House Agriculture Committee that "While the [Uruguay Round] agreement [fell] short of the original U.S. objectives, the industry fully support[ed] the agricultural provisions because of the progress they [made] in providing greater access to rice markets of GATT member countries." 80 However, other groups, such as the National Farmers Union were less content with the minimum access provisions. As an American Corn Growers Association representative stated, for "dairy, peanuts, soybeans and some other commodities" where the United States imported "less than 5 percent," this agreement "is going to mean we will be competing for our own domestic market in addition to going to trying to go ahead and penetrate into the world market." 81
Because the negative domestic economic impact of these concerns was small in relation to the perceived economic benefits that would result from the United States' increased access to other countries' markets as a result of the minimum access agreement and other elements of the Uruguay Round agreements, the Uruguay Round agreements, along with their implementing legislation, were ratified by the House in late November 1994 by a 288-146 bipartisan vote. On December 1, 1994, the Senate ratified the Uruguay Round Agreements Act and implementing legislation by a 76-24 vote. 82
Based on the preceding discussion of American trade policymaking during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, the validity of the hypotheses set forth earlier concerning the extent to which domestic politics affects American trade policymaking in a particular trade negotiation can be assessed.
First, since the distribution of institutional powers within the United States favored the United States agreeing to a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets, United States' negotiating stances concerning minimum access to agricultural markets did not reflect protectionist preferences. The negotiating proposals that the United States set before the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture were mostly developed within the Executive Branch, but were formed in response to ongoing pressure from Congress and interest groups. The domestic coalition that supported inserting agriculture into the agenda of the Uruguay Round negotiations included elements of the Executive Branch, Congress, and agricultural interest groups who were concerned about the recent decline in American agricultural exports. A widely shared goal of this coalition was to achieve an agreement that would increase American agricultural exports' access to foreign markets. 83
Second, the lack of division in the American government concerning seeking an agreement on minimum access to agricultural markets reduced Congressional influence on the terms of the negotiated agreement. While potentially adversely affected interest groups, such as peanut growers, raised objections to a minimum access commitment, they could not generate enough support within Congress to cause Congress to pressure the Executive Branch to change its negotiating stances.
Third, since the demands of interest groups like the Rice Millers' Association and a majority of other agricultural interest groups, such as the American Farm Bureau, were satisfied by the minimum access provisions that were included in United States' negotiating proposals to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture, Congress was more likely to endorse the results of the negotiations. Although some agricultural groups - such as peanut growers and sugar producers --, complained that the US government was giving too much away, exporters, like the RMA, were able to exert greater pressure on U.S. trade officials and gain support for efforts to increase American exports and open foreign markets. In the end, the concessions that the United States finally made in terms of market access had been openly discussed throughout the negotiations, and did not meet with much protest during the debates concerning the ratification of the Uruguay Round agreements.
V. Japanese Trade Policymaking during the Uruguay Round Agriculture Negotiations
Agricultural policy reform emerged as an important issue in Japan in the late 1970s and early 1980s, becoming one of the administrative reforms espoused by Yasuhiro Nakasone. During the postwar period, Japan had become increasingly less self-sufficient in agriculture, Japan had become the world's largest net importer of food, and Japanese agricultural policy emphasized the production of specific commodities.
Just after World War II, the principal objectives of Japanese agricultural policy were to provide staple food supplies through the implementation of the 1942 Food Control Law, and to "alleviate hunger, to carry out national land reform, and to create employment opportunities, as well as to democratize rural society." As the Japanese economy grew, the Japanese government continued to support farmers' incomes, attempted to preserve Japan's self-sufficiency in consumer commodities, such as rice, but came to rely heavily on foreign sources for many agricultural products. 84 One of the foundations of the one-party dominance that emerged during the 1960s under the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was a rice price policy that adhered to self-sufficiency in rice, virtually forbid rice imports, and supported the income of farm households to such an extent that the government's purchase price for rice rose to several times the world price. 85 During the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, efforts were made to create a more full-time system of commercial farming that would more closely match domestic production with consumption. At the same time, partially as a result of pressure for access to Japanese markets by the United States and other countries, gradual structural adjustments, such as the beginning of the liberalization of imports of beef and oranges, occurred.
The Second Provisional Commission on Administrative Reform, which met between 1981 and 1983, asserted that government expenditures for rice, along with expenditures for Japan's National Railway and National Health Insurance, were one of the three main sources of the Japanese budget deficit. However, during the Summer of 1984, both Houses of the Diet adopted resolutions calling for the Government to continue "to adhere to its policy of full self-sufficiency of rice," after 150,000 tons of rice were imported from South Korea in order to compensate for a temporary rice shortage. 86
In 1986 and 1987, a series of government studies, including the First and Second Maekawa Reports and an Agricultural Policy Council report, emphasized agricultural policy reform, advocating easing import restrictions, supporting core farmers, and reviewing pricing policies so as to make greater use of market mechanisms. 87 As one scholar later noted, agricultural policy reform was popular among business circles and was intended to scale down "the deficit-ridden food control system," making it possible "to lower prices of farm produce at a single stroke, provide an alleviative against wage hikes, save the food industry which [was] losing its competitiveness," "and mitigate the discontent of U.S. and other farm produce exporters." 88
In August 1986, the political difficulty of altering the government's longstanding rice support program became apparent when a proposal that was backed by the Ministry of Finance to reduce the producer price of rice for the first time in thirty years was rejected and Prime Minister Nakasone, whose LDP had won a resounding victory in the July 1986 Lower House elections, had to intervene and side with fellow LDP members.
During a November 1986 Lower House Budget Committee session, Prime Minister Nakasone reportedly "stressed the necessity for a flexible response to changes since pressure concerning the rice issue ha[d] become too strong to ignore both at home and overseas." Nakasone reportedly stated that "both the domestic producer prices and consumer prices should be brought closer to international prices, emphasizing that domestic issues related to rice should be solved by voluntary reforms and should produce social harmony." 89
In November 1986, the Agricultural Policy Council, an advisory committee to Prime Minister Nakasone issued a report entitled The Basic Direction of Agricultural Policy toward the 21st Century that stated that the Japanese government, in the Uruguay Round negotiations, should make efforts concerning import access "to establish reliable and operationally effective rules that particularly provide fairer and clearer conditions for quantitative restrictions as exceptional measures." 90
During an early July 1987 policy speech to the Diet, Prime Minister Nakasone stated that "When pondering the agricultural problem, ... it is essential to consider the importance of stable food supplies; the role that agriculture plays in environmental, employment, and spiritual and cultural aspects; and that balanced, multifaceted agricultural policies should be flexibly and appropriately implemented in each country in keeping with individual circumstances." 91
At the first meetings of the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture, Japan's representatives stated that, although they supported further liberalization of agricultural trade, import restrictions should be allowed under specific conditions, and that the special characteristics of agriculture should be considered. 92
In October 1987, a GATT dispute panel that the United States had requested found that Japanese import restrictions on twelve agricultural products were inconsistent with Japan's obligations to comply with Article XI of the GATT which prohibited quantitative restrictions on imports. The panel decided that the Japanese government's restrictions on the imports of twelve agricultural products could not be justified, on the grounds that the products in question were the result of state-trading operations. The Japanese Central Union of Agricultural Cooperatives (Zenchu), and various LDP members from farming areas opposed the government removing the contested import restrictions in order to comply with the panel decision. 93
While Japan debated how to respond to the GATT panel decision, during late December 1987, Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries submitted Japan's first major proposal to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture. Japan's proposal, the last proposal to the Group to be presented by an industrialized country, originally had been written during the Nakasone administration, but had been revised by the Takeshita administration that came to power in November 1987. The proposal acknowledged "the international consensus on the need to reduce trade-distorting effects and improve the competitive environment." 94 However, the proposal stressed "the need to establish stability for trade in agricultural products and to ensure food security for all countries." 95 The proposal called for amendments to GATT provisions concerning quantitative restrictions on imports and stated that consideration should be given "to the positions of countries [like Japan] with low self-sufficiency rates." 96
In early February 1988, the LDP and the government agreed to accept the GATT panel decision on twelve agricultural products, but refused to abolish quantitative import restrictions on two of the twelve products -- dairy products and starch. 97 Because the GATT panel on Japan's import restrictions on twelve agricultural products had found Japan's restrictions to be inconsistent with Japan's obligations to the GATT under Article XI regardless "of whether they were made effective through quotas or through import monopoly operations," 98 it became quite likely that the similar arguments concerning Japan's import restrictions on rice, if challenged, would be found to be inconsistent with Japan's obligations under the GATT.
As a result, Japan increasingly feared that its virtual ban on rice imports might become the subject of a GATT panel that would be decided against Japan, and that Japan would be forced to remove its virtual ban on rice imports in order to quickly comply with a GATT panel decision. Thus, the Japanese government continued to insist that the liberalization of the rice market be discussed only at the multilateral level in the ongoing Uruguay Round negotiations, and refused to discuss rice liberalization at the bilateral level with the United States.
After the GATT Council decided, in early May 1988, at the request of the United States, to establish another dispute panel to examine whether Japanese import restrictions on beef, fresh oranges, and orange juice were inconsistent with Japan's obligations under Article XI of the GATT, Japan and the United States concluded a new beef and citrus agreement in June 1988, which replaced the 1984 beef and citrus agreement which had just expired. Japan agreed to end its beef import quota by April 1991, significantly reduce its import restrictions on fresh oranges by April 1991, and reduce its import restrictions on orange juice by April 1992. This agreement occurred even though, the Japan Socialist Party, Komeito, the Democratic Socialist Party, the Japan Communist Party, and the Social Democratic Federation had jointly passed a resolution in April 1988 opposing the liberalization of beef and oranges. During Fall 1988, the Diet approved a supplemental budget that included compensation measures for farmers that might be affected by the liberalization of beef and citrus.
During the July 1988 Toronto G-7 summit, Japan continued to argue for recognizing the special characteristics of agriculture in international agricultural agreements, expressing concerns about self-sufficiency, and advocating a Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture that promoted agricultural reform, but at a slower pace then the United States had proposed.
Between April 1988 and early September 1988, according to one poll, among "those involved in agriculture," there was a fall in the level of support for the LDP, and increased support for the Japan Socialist Party (from 6% to 11%), for Komeito (from 1% to 3%), for the Democratic Socialist party (from 2% to 3%), and for the Japan Communist party (from 1% to 2%). 99
During September 1988, after the RMA filed its second Section 301 petition with the USTR, the Diet passed a resolution opposing the liberalization of the Japanese rice market. A Mainichi Shimbun survey a few months later found that about 25% of those polled believed that the price of rice was too high, and about 24% believed that the rice market should be opened. But, almost 80% of those involved in agriculture opposed a rice market opening. 100
In April 1989, when Japan approved the Uruguay Round Mid-Term Review Agreement, neither the Japanese government nor the Central Union of Agricultural Cooperatives (Zenchu) believed that Japan had committed itself to make any specific concessions concerning increased access to the Japanese rice market. A number of concerned LDP committees issued a statement that the Agreement had "enabled the creation of a general framework for the incorporation of long- and short-term goals; that negotiations [could] now be targeted at a wide range of measures, such as waivers (exemptions from the obligation to liberalize products); that consideration of food security ha[d] been clarified, which [gave] Japan a foothold in its claims about rice; and that Japan, which [had] made efforts in reform, [could] deal with the short-term measures." Mitsugu Horiuchi, president of the Central Union of Agricultural Cooperatives (Zenchu) stated that he was "'confident that this agreement [would] have no impact' on the existing policy of the government that Japan be completely self-sufficient in rice." 101
In early July 1989, incoming Prime Minister Uno stated that Japan would continue to "not discuss the liberalization of rice on a bilateral basis," but was "prepared to discuss the [rice] issue on a multilateral basis at the Uruguay Round if each country brings its own particular issues on agriculture to the table." Prime Minister Uno noted that "Rice is Japan's basic food. In view of the special importance of rice and rice cultivation and in view of the nation's food security, our basic policy is to maintain Japan's self-sufficiency." 102
As a result of the late July 1989 Upper House election, the LDP lost its majority in the Upper House, acquiring only 111 seats in the Upper House, falling "far short of [receiving] the 127 seats needed for a simple majority." 103 One reason for the fall in support of the LDP was that individual farmers began to rebel against reductions in government support for agriculture. The farmers' confidence in the LDP had been shaken as a result of the agricultural trade concessions that Japan had recently made as it complied with the GATT panel concerning Japanese import restrictions on twelve agricultural products and the concessions that the Japanese government had made in the renegotiated beef and citrus agreement. Furthermore, farmers feared that more agricultural concessions were likely to result from the ongoing Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. In the wake of the LDP's loss, concerns were raised among business groups about the impact of agricultural reform on farmers' support for the LDP, and the future of LDP dominance. 104
In late September 1989, Japan informed the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture that "the complete abolition of agricultural protection [was], in Japan's view, unacceptable considering the special characteristics of agriculture and the important role it plays in society." Japan expressed "serious concerns about food security," stating that "for countries highly dependent on other countries for a great deal of their food, it would be necessary to maintain the required domestic production level for basic foodstuffs." 105
During the February 1990 Lower House election, the LDP and the opposition parties pledged "to protect rice growers by opposing the import of even a single grain of rice." Partially as a result of this more protectionist stance, the LDP managed to attain a stable majority of 275 Lower House seats in the Lower House. 106 The Japan Socialist Party, which had released a national plan for agriculture during the fall of 1989 in an effort to increase rural support for the party, gained 53 seats to attain 136 seats, while the other opposition parties, Komeito, the Japan Communist Party, and the Democratic Socialist Party, lost seats.
The anti-rice-market liberalization campaign pledges that various parties had resorted to during the February 1990 election campaign in order to gather rural support reduced the Japanese government's ability to make compromises in the discussions concerning tariffication and a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets that were taking place in the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture in Geneva. As one journalist put it, Prime Minister Kaifu's administration and the LDP had to either "renege on its campaign pledge or risk retribution from the US while being held responsible for any failure" in the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. 107
During July 1990, the same month that Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture Chairman de Zeeuw's draft framework Agreement on Agriculture was released, Takenori Kanzaki, chief policy-maker for Komeito, a party whose power base was in urban areas and which had not fared so well in the February 1990 elections, announced that Komeito was in favor of partially opening Japan's rice market. 108 This ended the opposition parties' previous longstanding united support of Japan's virtual ban on rice imports.
About the same time, various LDP members began to publicly discuss how to minimize the effects of the Uruguay Round on the agricultural sector, outlining policy options ranging from total opposition to any form of liberalization to acceptance of some form of partial liberalization of the Japanese rice market in order to conclude the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations.
During Fall 1990, the largest reform in the history of Japan's staple food control system since the introduction of semicontrolled rice trading occurred, as a non-government exchange for semicontrolled rice was established, weakening the previous virtual monopoly of the National Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Associations (Zennoh) over the distribution of semicontrolled rice. 109
During Fall 1990, Komeito made its plan for the partial liberalization of rice imports more specific, calling for an initial "annual [import] quota of 200,000 tons in 1992" which would be "increas[ed] by 10% every year until [the import quota reached] 500,000 tons in 10 years." 110
Meanwhile in Geneva, the Japanese government continued to assert its right to maintain a virtual ban on rice imports "based on a policy of self-sufficiency in rice production" 111 as MAFF submitted its list of agricultural concessions to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture in time for an October 15, 1990 deadline.
During the December 1990 Brussels ministerial meeting, that was supposed to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations, Japan joined Korea and the EC in rejecting a last-minute compromise proposal to resolve the agricultural negotiations. The rejected proposal included a minimum access provision that would have required Japan to open its rice market to imports.
During the Spring of 1991, it became apparent that the full implementation of the pledges that Japan had made in the 1988 U.S.-Japan beef and citrus agreement, which had been accomplished by April 1991, had resulted in much less drastic effects on Japanese agriculture then some had originally predicted. 112 Also, some top LDP officials, including former MITI Minister Muto, LDP Policy Affairs Research Council Chairman Takeo Nishioka, Takeshita faction leader Shin Kanemaru, and former Prime Minister Takeshita, publicly endorsed the opening of the rice market in order to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations.
During October 1991, Prime Minister Kaifu decided he would not seek re-election in October 1991, and Kiichi Miyazawa was elected Prime Minister. A major concern throughout the Miyazawa administration was how to work out the particular compromises that might be necessary in the event that Japan had to agree to some form of minimum access commitment to agricultural markets in order to bring about the conclusion of the Uruguay Round negotiations.
In early November 1991, Japan's Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Tanabu stated that Japan was opposed to the tariffication of agricultural products under discussion in the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, because it would lead eventually to the liberalization of rice imports. Tanabu stated that "If we accept tariffication, we would have to amend the Staple Food Control Law. Such a bill might pass the House of Representatives (the Lower House), but it would not pass the Opposition-controlled House of Councilors (the Upper House), making it impossible to enact." Tanabu also noted that "Liberalization cannot be accepted from the perspective of farmers' sentiments when rice farmers are already cutting their production." 113
But, the Draft Final Act of the Uruguay Round agreement that GATT Director-General Dunkel had prepared and released in December 1991 included market access provisions that included the tariffication of agricultural products and a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets.
Key officials in the Japanese bureaucracy, as well as LDP leaders agreed that the Draft Final Act should be regarded as "a 'basis' for further negotiations." However, they also agreed that the prospect of reaching a final Agreement on Agriculture in the short run was "still uncertain because of remaining differences between the United States and European [C]ommunity." 114 Therefore, they were not certain if and when Japan might have to agree to change its longstanding virtual ban on rice imports, and if certain relief measures might be necessary in the event that Japan agreed to some form of liberalization of Japan's rice market in order to conclude the negotiations. 115
During March 1992, the Japanese government once more left rice off the list of concessions that it presented to the GATT in accord with the Draft Final Act. 116 Furthermore, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries vowed to "continue trying to prevent imposition of tariffs on rice in future negotiations." 117
Just before the July 1992 Upper House election, a newly founded political party, the New Japan Party, announced that it advocated "an open economic system by partially liberalizing the domestic rice market." This policy was similar to that announced earlier by Komeito. 118
In the July 1992 Upper House election, the LDP failed to regain a majority in the Upper House, winning only 69 of the 127 seats that were contested, in an election with a very low voter turnout.
A year later, the LDP's incapacity to resolve various tensions within the Diet led to a no-confidence vote in Prime Minister Miyazawa, and the LDP was forced to dissolve the Diet. In the July 1993 Lower House elections, the LDP won only 223 seats, failing to maintain its parliamentary majority. Prime Minister Miyazawa indicated that he would resign, and the LDP was forced to try to form alliances with other parties in order to try to remain in power.
This made it possible for dissident LDP elements and former opposition parties to gather strength and build a majority coalition that elected Morihiro Hosokawa, a former Governor of Kumamoto, as Prime Minister, in August 1993. Since Hosokawa helped found the New Japan Party in May 1992, he had advocated some form of liberalization of Japan's rice market. The governing coalition behind Hosokawa included elements of the Japan Socialist Party, Ozawa's Renewal Party, Komeito, and a number of smaller parties, including the Japan New Party.
In late September 1983, because of a poor rice harvest, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries Minister Eijiro Hata announced that Japan would import 200,000 tons of rice by the end of 1993 in order "to ease temporarily tight domestic supplies." But, he stated that he was determined "to reject any pressure to make [such] imports permanent." 119
At a December 7, 1993 meeting of the Cabinet and leaders of the ruling parties, Prime Minister Hosokawa asked the leaders of various parties to consult with their respective parties concerning a rice liberalization proposal so that the Prime Minister could make an announcement by December 10. Prime Minister Hosokawa told the Cabinet members that the agreement that had been worked out in Geneva could "not be amended or renegotiated." The same day, Chief Cabinet Secretary Masayoshi Takemura "publicly announced that Japan had acceded to - but not yet signed - a 'minimum access' proposal that would allow some foreign-grown rice imports into the Japanese market." 120
On December 8, 1993, Social Democratic Party Chairman Tomiichi Murayama remained "'opposed to foreign rice imports,'" but reportedly felt that "Japan should not rush its decision, and, instead, should await the progress of the U.S.-European Community negotiations in Geneva before making its own offer." 121
On December 8, 1993, it was revealed that if tariffication were postponed more than six years, then additional concessions would be required. While this revelation made it more difficult for Japan to accept the agreement, all of the political parties in Hosokawa's coalition ended up accepting the agreement, although the Social Democratic Party waited until the very last moment to decide. 122 Some members of the opposition LDP accused Hosokawa of not having given adequate consideration to the various Diet resolutions that opposed the opening of Japan's rice market. 123
On December 14, 1993, Prime Minister Hosokawa announced Japan's agreement to partially liberalize the Japanese rice market in order to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations.
The GATT press summary concerning the December 1993 version of the Final Act stated that the Agreement on Agriculture that was included in the December 15, 1993 Final Act established minimum access opportunities for agriculture, and stated that "In order to facilitate the implementation of tariffication in particularly sensitive situations, a 'special treatment' clause [had been] introduced into the Agreement on Agriculture." This special treatment clause, which applied to the Japanese rice market, allowed "under certain carefully and strictly defined conditions, a country to maintain import restrictions up to the end of [the six-year] implementation period." The clause required "minimum access opportunities [that] represent four per cent of domestic consumption of the designated products in the first year of the implementation period [which would] increase annually to reach 8 per cent in the sixth year. However, the final figure [would be] lower if the designated products [were] tariffied before the end of the implementation period." 124
In announcing Japan's decision, Prime Minister Hosokawa stressed that the Government had managed to postpone tariffication for six years, and stated that the agreement did not contradict earlier Diet resolutions that opposed liberalization of the Japanese rice market.
A month later, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries announced that effective fiscal 1995, "Japan [would] partially open its rice market, setting the import quota for that fiscal year at 379,000 tons, or 4 percent of its annual consumption. The quota [would] be expanded by an 0.8 percentage point annual increment over the next six years; in 2000, it [would] be raised to 8 percent of annual consumption, or 758,000 tons." 125 During the six years, no tariff would "be imposed on foreign-grown rice." Also, the importation of about twenty other farm products would be deregulated by tariffication or by quotas. 126
In mid-April 1994, towards the end of the Hosokawa administration, Japan signed the Agreement on Agriculture and the other Uruguay Round agreements in Marrakesh, Morocco. 127
After Prime Minister Hosokawa resigned in April 1994, the coalition around Hosokawa "held together just long enough to elect the Japan Renewal Party's Tsutomu Hata to replace him." 128 But, the Japan Socialist Party soon abandoned this coalition, because of tensions between Ozawa, who had left the LDP with Tsutomu Hata, and the Japan Socialist Party.
On June 24, 1994, the LDP submitted a motion of no confidence in Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata, and an election was scheduled for late June 1994. 129 As alliances and parties within the Diet continued to rapidly change, a parliamentary coalition led by Social Democratic Party Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama, but which included the LDP, came to power in late June 1994, and remained in power until the Japanese Diet ratified the Uruguay Round agreement in early December 1994.
As one scholar notes, when the Cabinet submitted the Uruguay Round agreements to the Diet for approval in late 1994, "most of the opposition parties were not in a position to criticize the Government for proposing ratification" of the agreements. This was because these opposition parties had formed part of the coalition that had supported Prime Minister Hosokawa, and were therefore responsible for Japan having accepted the Uruguay Round agreements in December 1993. "Given such circumstances, only the JCP [Japan Communist Party]" could oppose the ratification of the Uruguay Round agreements. 130
Based on the preceding discussion, the validity of the three hypotheses concerning the extent to which domestic politics affects Japanese trade policymaking in a particular trade negotiation can be assessed.
First, since the distribution of institutional powers within Japan favored the Japanese government adopting a protectionist stance, Japan opposed the tariffication of agricultural products and a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets during the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture meetings. Initially, key elements of the bureaucracy and a large number of Diet members opposed the liberalization of Japan's rice market that would result from Japan agreeing to tariffication and minimum access. Prime Minister Nakasone had advocated the inclusion of agriculture into the Uruguay Round negotiating agenda. However, when the discussions turned to the tariffication of agricultural products and increasing market access, it became apparent that the results of such negotiations might force the Japanese bureaucracy, particularly the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, as well as the LDP, to commit themselves more to agricultural policy reform than they originally intended to at the beginning of the Uruguay Round. The previous consensus between business and agriculture, and between the agricultural cooperatives and farmers concerning rice support programs and LDP rule was shattered. As the negotiations wore on, the more internationally-oriented bureaucracies - the Foreign Ministry and MITI --, as well as certain factions within the LDP began to advocate some form of rice liberalization in order to conclude the negotiations. In the end, the Foreign Ministry skillfully scored the end of the Uruguay Round without giving up too much in terms of agricultural concessions. Reform-minded MAFF and Ministry of Finance bureaucrats made some progress in the conducting of a difficult agricultural reform, and MITI lost out somewhat because the slow conclusion of the Uruguay Round impeded Japan's economic growth in the early 1990s, although the timing of the conclusion of the Uruguay Round was far from within Japan's control.
Second, the more divided the Japanese government became concerning the negotiating stances that should be taken at the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture, the more influence the Japanese Diet had over the terms of the negotiated agreement. Throughout the negotiations, as a result of various Diet resolutions opposing the liberalization of the rice market, Japanese negotiators were concerned about the extent to which the Japanese Diet would ratify an agreement that included the liberalization of the rice market. Agricultural-vote-oriented LDP Diet members allied with elements of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries in order to oppose the liberalization of the Japanese rice market, while certain factions within the LDP allied with the internationally-oriented bureaucracies -- the Foreign Ministry and Ministry of International Trade and Industry - and advocated the liberalization of the Japanese rice market in order to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations. Within the Diet, Komeito and the Japan New Party and individual Diet members openly advocated some form of rice liberalization. This division within the Japanese government increased the Japanese Diet's influence over the terms of the negotiated agreement, and led to not only Japan's original negotiating stances that reflected opposition to the liberalization of the Japanese rice market, but also resulted in a final agreement that included a limited exception to tariffication for products such as Japanese rice. Third, because there were informed domestic groups in Japan who not only opposed, but also supported, the Japanese government opposing rice liberalization, the possibility existed that the Japanese Diet might ratify a Uruguay Round agreement that required Japan to liberalize its rice market. Already, by November 1987, 48% of those polled in a Mainichi Shimbun poll approved of imports of rice, while 46% opposed imports of rice. 131 An anti-liberalization coalition and a pro-liberalization coalition emerged. While farmers generally opposed liberalization, some business groups supported some form of liberalization of the rice market in order to conclude the Uruguay Round. The consensus that existed at the beginning of the Uruguay Round among Ministry of Finance and MITI bureaucrats, business- and consumer-oriented LDP Diet members, and businessmen in support of agricultural reform weakened after the LDP lost its majority in the Upper House after the July 1989 election. But, as the Uruguay Round negotiations wore on, the pro-liberalization coalition within Japan became stronger, and the final concessions that Japan made, were not that significant, and had been debated for long enough that even those in Japan's anti-liberalization coalition could see the importance of making some form of compromise in order to conclude the Uruguay Round.
VI. U.S.-Japan Trade Negotiations during the Uruguay Round Agriculture Negotiations
After the November 1982 GATT Ministerial Meeting, a Committee on Trade in Agriculture was established, which examined "trade measures affecting market access and supplies," [and] "the operation of the [GATT] with respect to agricultural subsidies and trade measures affecting agriculture maintained under exceptions or derogations" from the GATT. 132
The United States and Japan were among the principal early proponents of what eventually became the Uruguay Round, believing that further progress with the work programme set forth in the November 1982 Ministerial Declaration "would only be possible in the context of a comprehensive round." 133
Long before the Uruguay Round began, the United States sought to include agriculture in the GATT, in order to establish a multilateral framework that could be used to encourage agricultural trade liberalization, and to negotiate a reduction in EC agricultural export subsidies.
Because of the mounting fiscal difficulties resulting from the Common Agricultural Program in the EC and from agricultural subsidies in Japan, both the EC and Japan were more willing in the Uruguay Round than they had been in the Kennedy and Tokyo Rounds to place comprehensive fundamental agricultural trade reform on the negotiating agenda. 134
After the Uruguay Round negotiating agenda was established in the September 1986 Punta del Este Declaration, in late January 1987, fourteen separate negotiating groups were established, one of which was the Negotiating Group on Agriculture, which was to be chaired by Aart de Zeeuw, who had chaired the GATT Committee on Trade in Agriculture.
As mentioned earlier, the United States' July 1987 first major negotiating proposal to the Uruguay Round Negotiating Group on Agriculture called for "a ten-year phase-out of all agricultural subsidies (including export subsidies) and import barriers, and action on health and sanitary regulations." 135
In October 1987, the EC proposed a slower, "phased reduction of the negative effects of agricultural support policies," and the Cairns Group of agricultural exporting nations produced a proposal that represented somewhat of a compromise between the United States' and the EC's proposals. 136
Japan's late December 1987 proposal "stressed the need to establish stability for trade in agricultural products and to ensure food security for all countries." Japan "considered that improved market access should be sought by reducing customs tariffs through a request-and-offer procedure, and also by allowing waivers from the general principles of quantitative restrictions." Japan "called for new rules [for basic foodstuffs] that would ensure stability of supply and allow the maintenance of domestic production." 137
During the February 1988 Negotiating Group on Agriculture meeting, "most participants considered that Japan's proposal was over-cautious and in some respects fell short of the Punta del Este undertakings." 138
The United States countered the Japanese proposal at the June 1988 Negotiating Group on Agriculture meeting by arguing that "a liberalized trading system would effectively contribute to food security; [and] the elimination of restrictions on trade in food products would allow better supply, better allocation of resources and more stable prices." 139
During the September 1988 Negotiating Group on Agriculture meeting, Japan suggested that Article XI should be reformed so that it would include "an exception to the general elimination of quantitative restrictions for 'basic foodstuffs.'" Japan hoped that GATT would "recognize that a stable supply of basic foodstuffs was essential for every country from the point of view of food security, and especially for those [countries] with a low self-sufficiency rate." 140
The April 1989 Uruguay Round Midterm Review Agreement stated that the provisions in the final agreement concerning import access should concern "quantitative and other non-tariff access restrictions, whether maintained under waivers, protocols of accession or other derogations and exceptions, and all measures not explicitly provided for in the General Agreement, and the matter of conversion of the measures listed above into tariffs." 141
During the July 1989 Negotiating Group on Agriculture meeting, the United States "explained the role of tariffication in negotiations relating to market access barriers, and the methodology and mathematical formula that could be used in order to calculate the ad valorem equivalent of a non-tariff barrier." The United States stated that "tariffication would be the logical first step in an on-going process of liberalizing market access." 142
In October 1989, the United States further suggested that "all non-tariff obstacles such as quotas, variable levies, voluntary restraint agreements, minimum import prices etc., [should] be converted into tariffs and bound. All tariffs, including those resulting from such a conversion, [should] be progressively reduced to zero or low levels over a ten-year period." 143
Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries officials opposed this tariffication without exception plan, claiming that it would be "impossible to replace non-tariff barriers such as quotas and other trade-distorting measures with tariffs." 144
In early 1990, the six members of ASEAN, Colombia, and Peru distanced themselves from Japan's negotiating stance concerning access to agricultural markets, in order to support the Cairns Group's proposal which called "for preferential treatment for net importers that [were] developing nations." The Cairns Group maintained that countries like Japan and South Korea, "due to the maturity of their economies," "should not be permitted to preserve substantive farm supports." 145
Switzerland and the Nordic countries, however, remained closer to supporting Japan's position concerning market access because they, like Japan, were industrialized. 146
During July 1990, the United States refined its proposal concerning tariffication and submitted it to the Negotiating Group on Agriculture. "The United States suggested that all tariffs, whether original or resulting from tariffication, [c]ould be bound and progressively reduced to zero or low levels over a ten-year period. All forms of derogation from existing GATT rules would be eliminated, and Article XI:2(c ) authorizing quantitative restrictions under certain conditions would be eliminated too."
Shortly thereafter, during July 1990, Negotiating Group on Agriculture Chairman Aart de Zeeuw produced a draft framework agreement that included many ideas concerning market access from U.S. proposals. De Zeeuw's draft agreement proposed that the "reduction of border protection would be covered by a separate commitment based on tariffication, taking account of non-trade concerns and the particular needs of developing countries." 148
When Japan submitted an "offer list" of agricultural concessions in time for an October 15, 1990 GATT deadline, Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries announced that it would maintain Japan's "right to keep [its] rice market closed." MAFF also refused to go along with proposals that "would eliminate farm subsidies over time in favor of a tariffication system." 149
In contrast, the United States' October 1990 proposal included provisions that stated that "countries with import restrictions should start to import at least 3 percent of their annual domestic consumption of any import-restricted items with no or few tariffs; that tariffs on the remaining 97 percent should be lowered in 10 years to 50 percent, and that the 3 percent free-import ceiling should be gradually raised to 5.25 percent in 10 years, after which all imports of the item should be conducted with tariffs under 50 percent." The proposal meant that Japan, which currently consumed 10 million tons of rice annually would be required to initially import 300,000 tons of rice. 150
During the December 1990 Brussels ministerial meeting that was supposed to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations, a last-minute compromise proposal was tabled, but rejected by Japan and South Korea, as well as the EC, pushed by France and Ireland. The proposal, often called the Hellstrom proposal, "called for minimum access of at least 3 percent to overseas markets in widely-traded commodities such as rice." 151
During April 1991, in order to hasten the conclusion of the negotiations, the structure of the negotiations was reorganized and four new negotiating groups were formed which focused on market access, textiles and clothing, agriculture, and rule-making.
In early December 1991, the United States, according to Deputy USTR Katz, had reached general agreement with the EC and the Cairns Group that "there should be the opportunity for access of at least 3 percent of domestic consumption initially, and then this minimum access commitment should grow in subsequent years." Katz also stated that there was agreement "to ensure minimum access opportunities where no access ha[d] existed in the past." 152
In December 1991, Arthur Dunkel, as Chairman of the Trade Negotiations Committee, released the Draft Final Act, the relevant provisions of which were discussed earlier in this paper.
At the January 1992 Trade Negotiations Committee meeting, "there was an overwhelming view that the Draft Final Act provided the best, indeed the only, basis on which to secure a speedy conclusion of the Round." 153
By the end of March 1992, both the United States and Japan submitted schedules of concessions in accord with the Draft Final Act. But, the Japanese government once more left rice off its list of concessions, 154 and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries vowed that it would continue trying to prevent tariffs from being imposed on rice in future negotiations. 155
After several months of impasse, the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations neared completion when the United States and the European Community concluded the November 1992 Blair House accord, which included "jointly-presented proposals to amend elements of the Draft Final Act with respect to agriculture." 156
During an early July 1993 quadrilateral meeting, the United States, Japan, Canada, and the EC reached some form of agreement concerning market access.
On October 15, the Asahi Shimbun reported from Geneva that the United States and Japan were discussing a compromise plan that involved "a six-year period in which Japan [would] establish a 'minimum access' of 4.5 percent of its domestic consumption, totaling about 450,000 tons annually. In the sixth year, that quota [would] rise to 7.5 percent." "Japanese negotiators reportedly want[ed] to maintain the absolute ban on imports beyond these levels, while their U.S. counterparts want[ed] further imports allowed, though subject to high tariffs." 157
The market access proposal that Japan submitted just before a November 1993 GATT deadline, "did not address the question of rice," although GATT officials stated that "rice remained on the agenda." 158
After the United States and the EC concluded their negotiations in December 1993, Japan announced that, in order to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations, it would partially liberalize its rice market in accord with the minimum access provisions that were included in the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture.
On December 15, 1993, delegates to the GATT approved a 400-page version of the Final Act, which included the Agreement on Agriculture.
On April 15, 1994, the United States and Japan and over 100 other nations signed the agreements resulting from the Uruguay Round negotiations, including the Agreement on Agriculture, whose provisions were discussed earlier in this paper.
Based on the preceding discussion, the validity of the three hypotheses set forth earlier concerning the extent to which domestic politics affects the agreement the United States and Japan reach in a particular trade negotiation can be assessed.
First, because Japan adopted a protectionist negotiating stance, it was difficult for Japan to cooperate with the United States and other countries in achieving a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets in the context of the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. Japan was unable to find much support for such a stance among other GATT members, but eventually agreed to a limited exception that allowed for the delayed tariffication of rice and limited access to the Japanese rice market. The Japanese government maintained its protectionist stance, and did not compromise on the liberalization of the rice market until the end of the negotiations, even though the domestic coalition within Japan in support of such a protectionist stance gradually eroded away during the negotiations.
Second, because there was little division in the American government concerning the negotiating stance that the United States should take, the United States did not significantly alter its negotiating stance concerning tariffication and minimum access during the negotiations, except for agreeing at the end to a limited exception. In contrast, there was much more division in the Japanese government concerning the negotiating stance that Japan should take towards a minimum access commitment to agricultural markets. This division within the Japanese government made it possible for Japan to eventually change its negotiating stance in order to cooperate in achieving such an agreement, although the Japanese government delayed in making any compromises concerning the liberalization of the Japanese rice market until the last minute.
Third, since there were one or more informed domestic groups in the United States and Japan who endorsed the negotiating stances of their governments, it was possible for the United States and Japan to reach an agreement on minimum access to agricultural markets. Because the negotiations over market access involved relatively minor concessions without significant impact on America's relatively open agricultural markets, there was little domestic opposition to America's negotiating stance or the ratification of the resulting agreements concerning tariffication and minimum market access. As the domestic support for Japan's initial stance wore away during the course of the negotiations, it became possible for the Japanese government to enter into an agreement including some form of liberalization of the Japanese rice market with some reasonable assurance that the Diet would ratify such an agreement.
VII. Conclusion: Assessing the Effectiveness of the Contextual Two-Level Game Approach to Analyzing Trade Policymaking
In comparison to Putnam's two-level game approach, the contextual two-level game approach to analyzing trade policymaking developed in this paper attempts to more clearly define, with reference to the existing literature, the nature of and relationship between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking.
The domestic level of the contextual two-level game approach allows for more complex analyses of the subtleties of the domestic level than Putnam's two-level game approach, which just mentions that domestic preferences and coalitions and institutions are involved in policymaking, without providing many clues how to analyze them. The domestic level of the contextual two-level game approach also emphasizes the role of more than just one or two of the domestic actors in the trade policymaking process, incorporating the concepts of preferences, the distribution of institutional powers, divisions within a government, legislative approval, and informed interest groups, thereby creating an alternative to state-centered 159 , society-centered 160 , ideas-oriented 161 , rational choice 162 and other domestic-oriented approaches to explaining foreign economic and trade policymaking. The analyses in this paper contribute to earlier efforts to explain the role of domestic politics in the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. 163
While, in this paper, emphasis has been placed on the concept of cooperation at the international level, other concepts could be used at the international level, other than the bargaining and agreement literature that Putnam focuses on, and the cooperation literature that Milner focuses on, such as concepts from regime theory 164 and other theories. 165
While the focal point of interaction between domestic politics and international relations in Putnam's two-level game approach is ratification 166 , in the contextual two-level game approach, more emphasis is placed on the relationship between domestic politics and the evolution of negotiating stances during a negotiation. This focus permits more effective analyses of events such as the Uruguay Round, where the bargaining process between the negotiators is not that separate from the constituents involved, and the evolving relationship between domestic politics and negotiating stances is more important than the final ratification process in determining the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking. 167
As the fourth section of this paper demonstrates, the contextual two-level game approach can be used to conduct complex analyses of the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in American trade policymaking.
The domestic level of the contextual two-level game approach to American trade policymaking allow for more subtle analyses of the domestic level of American trade policymaking, creating an alternative to state-centered 168 , society-centered 169 , ideas-oriented 170 , rational choice and other domestic-oriented approaches to explaining American trade policymaking.
Paarlberg, publishing in 1993, uses Putnam's two-level game approach to analyze American trade policymaking during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, 171 but Paarlberg's analysis uses little of the terminology - such as coalitions, institutions, preferences - that Putnam suggests should be used to analyze the domestic level of American trade policymaking during the negotiations. Paarlberg, who focuses on the negotiations over agricultural export subsidies, describes a split that occurred at the beginning of the Uruguay Round between the Reagan administration's agricultural trade policymakers and agricultural interest groups dependent on subsidies. Paarlberg states that frustrated by Congress' lack of desire to engage in "deep, unilateral domestic farm support cuts," the Reagan administration sought progress "through an internationalization of the problem" by negotiating agriculture in the Uruguay Round negotiations. 172 Paarlberg states that the plan of U.S. policymakers initially "was to use an international negotiation, conducted with like-minded officials abroad, as a device both to weaken and then to finesse the domestic farm lobby opponents of reform at home." Paarlberg argues that "almost from the moment that U.S. officials chose to describe agricultural reform as the make-or-break element in the larger GATT negotiations," U.S. domestic agricultural interests "began their own maneuvers to protect themselves from this internationalization." 173 Paarlberg argues that a deadlock emerged as a result of this strategy.
In future studies, hypotheses could be devised that focused on other international factors at the international level, such as regimes, interdependence, and the United States' position in the international system. Cohn, for example, focuses on the impact of the international trade regime on American trade policymaking during the negotiations, viewing agricultural trade "as a specific regime nested within the more diffuse international trade regime." 174
The analysis of the relationship between American domestic politics and the evolution of the United States' negotiating stances during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations in this paper provides an alternative to Paarlberg's use of Putnam's two-level game approach. 175 Paarlberg seeks to evaluate "What was the payoff (or the penalty) for this decision to internationalize the domestic reform issue?," and concludes that "internationalizing a domestic policy reform" "can produce either positive either positive or negative synergistic linkage." 176 Paarlberg concludes that "the Uruguay Round was on balance a hindrance to unilateral agricultural policy reform," and "added nothing to the pace or content of a domestic farm policy reform in the United States (it may have actually delayed and weakened reform.)" 177
As the fifth section of this paper demonstrates, the contextual two-level game approach can also be used to conduct complex analyses of the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in Japanese trade policymaking.
This paper provides an alternative to Rapkin and George's analyses of the domestic level of Japanese trade policymaking during the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations. 178 While Rapkin and George effectively describe a status quo coalition and a market-opening coalition using Putnam's two-level game approach, they are less able to analyze the evolution of these coalitions.
The contextual two-level game approach also provides an alternative at the international level to Calder's efforts to use "the character of the international system" in his "reactive-state theory" 179
and Pempel's list of four constraints on Japanese foreign economic policy. 180The paper, by focusing on the relationship between domestic politics and the evolution of Japanese negotiating stance throughout the negotiations, also presents an alternative to earlier analyses of the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in Japanese trade policymaking during the negotiations. 181
Leitch, Kato, and Weinstein, publishing in 1995, after examining the same case study, argue that "Japan's decision to open the rice market, however slight" "is an indication that Japan's leadership [was] serious about their nation's responsibility as a member of the international community." 182
Rapkin and George, publishing in 1993, "analyze the intersecting domestic and international games of liberalization, with emphasis on factors affecting the range of potential bargains Japan would be able to strike" in the negotiations. But Rapkin and George find that "ratification procedures are somewhat ambiguous." 183
Yoichiro Sato, argues that the negotiations leading up to Japan's December 1993 announcement of the partial liberalization of the rice market are an example of how "complex domestic politics" "may prevent state negotiators from taking a rational negotiating stance in the international arena." Sato argues that "Japan's adamant insistence on 'food security' [can be] explained in terms of Japan's political inability to define 'national interests' over sectoral cooperative interests of the bureaucracy and various private sectors." 184
As the sixth section of this paper demonstrates, the contextual two-level game approach can also be used to improve analyses of U.S.-Japan trade negotiations.
The domestic level of the contextual two-level game approach can be used to analyze the role of more than just one or two of the domestic actors in U.S.-Japan trade negotiations, creating an alternative to state-centered, society-centered, ideas-oriented, rational choice and other domestic-oriented approaches to explaining U.S.-Japan trade negotiations. 185
At the international level, the approach attempts to address Naka's concern that "[A]lthough most studies on U.S.-Japan trade negotiations [have] brought about important insights which potentially [have] significant policy implications, the state of the art essentially remain[s] compilations of case studies without systematically tested propositions based on clearly defined international relations theories." 186
By focusing on the relationship between domestic politics and the evolution of negotiating stance throughout the negotiations, the contextual two-level game approach attempts to pave the way for more complex analyses of the interaction between domestic politics and international trade cooperation in U.S.-Japan trade negotiations, adding to the efforts of Krauss 187 and Schoppa 188 and others to use Putnam's two-level game approach to analyze U.S.-Japan trade negotiations, as well as others' efforts to explain U.S.-Japan trade negotiations. 189
Using Putnam's two-level game approach to analyze the same case study, Rapkin and George analyze various countries' negotiating strategies in the Uruguay Round, focusing "on Japan's articulation of the food security doctrine; on its interaction with the radically liberal strategy pursued by the United States; and on two key episodes in the negotiating process." Rapkin and George conclude that "domestic constraints" "limited the Japanese government to reactive tactics and strategy, an abortive approach" that "placed Japan in an isolated position" and "prevented initiatives that would allow self-definition of agricultural reform." 190
Yoichiro Sato notes that Japan's "divided bureaucracy prevented flexible bargaining, allowing the U.S. negotiators to take advantage of the division." 191
In concluding, it is important to highlight several issues that should be addressed in future research.
First, the universality of the conceptualization of the domestic level of trade policymaking used in the contextual two-level game approach should be questioned, and its application to the analyses of the domestic politics of other countries should be carefully undertaken.
Second, the development of hypotheses based on the relatively vague international relations theory of cooperation should be evaluated. Hypotheses should be developed that can be used to more accurately assess the extent to which cooperation is achieved in a particular trade negotiation. Criteria that could be used in such hypotheses include the speed at which cooperation is achieved; the extent to which the initial objectives are accomplished; and the relationship between the desired results and the actual effect of the negotiations.
While such research fills a gap in the literature concerning the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking, and represents an essential step towards increasing the understanding of American and Japanese trade policymaking and U.S.-Japan trade negotiations, the contextual two-level game approach needs to be further developed by applying it to other countries and time periods, as well as to case studies in other economic sectors. An effective starting point for future development of the contextual two-level game approach might be the examination of a series of case studies that would illuminate the relationship between domestic politics and international relations in trade policymaking in several important countries during the postwar period.
Endnotes
Note 1: Caporaso identifies three different ways of exploring the relationship between domestic politics and international relations: two-level games, as exemplified by Putnam, "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of Two-Level Games," International Organization 42 (Summer 1988), pp. 427-460; the second image reversed, as exemplified by Ronald Rogowski, Commerce and Coalitions: How Trade Affects Domestic Political Alignments (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1989); and Caporaso's domestification of international politics approach. (James A. Caporaso, "Across the Great Divide: Integrating Comparative and International Politics," International Studies Quarterly 41 (December 1997), pp. 563-592.) Back.
Note 2: The two-level game approach has been developed in Putnam, "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics"; Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson, and Robert P. Putnam, eds., Double-Edged Diplomacy: International Bargaining and Domestic Politics (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1993); Leonard J. Schoppa, Bargaining with Japan: What American Pressure Can and Cannot Do (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1997); and Helen V. Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information: Domestic Politics and International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997). Back.
Note 3: See Schoppa, Bargaining with Japan, pp. 29-32; Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, p. 5. Back.
Note 4: This synthetic strategy is set forth in Charles Ragin, The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Strategies (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1987), pp. iv, 71. Back.
Note 5: These variables are derived from the neo-pluralist model of democracy set forth in David Held, Models of Democracy, Second Edition (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996), pp. 217-218. Back.
Note 6: Concerning the role of the state[bureaucracy] in foreign policy, see Putnam, "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics," pp. 431-433; Graham Allison, The Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, and Co, 1971); Peter Katzenstein, Between Power and Plenty: Foreign Economic Policies of Advanced Industrial States (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1978); Stephen D. Krasner, Defending the National Interest: Raw Materials Investments and U.S. Foreign Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton U. Press, 1978). Back.
Note 7: See, in general, Held, pp. 217-218. Back.
Note 9: See Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, p. 11. However, this conceptualization is different than that developed in Milner's Interests, Institutions, and Information, because in the contextual two-level game approach, it is not assumed that political actors (executive and legislature) and societal actors (interest groups) are "unitary and rational." (Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, pp. 33-34.) Back.
Note 10: See John Gerard Ruggie, "International Regimes, Transactions, and Change: Embedded Liberalism in the Postwar Economic Order," International Organization 36 (Spring 1982), pp. 379-415, p. 399; John H. Jackson, Restructuring the GATT System (London: Pinter Publishers, 1990); Peter M. Haas, "Introduction: Epistemic Communities and International Policy Coordination," International Organization 46 (Winter 1992), pp. 1-35. Back.
Note 11: G. John Ikenberry, "Introduction: Approaches to Explaining American Foreign Economic Policy," International Organization 42 (Winter 1988), pp. 1-26, p. 4; Robert Gilpin, The Political Economy of International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987), pp. 85-92. Back.
Note 12: In order to realize gains, in order to maintain friendly relations, and in recognition of power asymmetries. (See Helen V. Milner, "International Theories of Cooperation among Nations: Strengths and Weaknesses," World Politics 44 (April 1992), pp. 496-496, pp. 470-473.) Back.
Note 13: See Ibid., pp. 473-474. Back.
Note 14: See Fen Hampson with Michael Hart, Multilateral Negotiations: Lessons from Arms Control, Trade, and the Environment (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), pp. 3-51; I. William Zartman, ed., International Multilateral Negotiations: Approaches to the Management of Complexity (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1994); I.M. Destler and Hideo Sato, "Coping with Economic Conflicts" in Coping with U.S.-Japanese Economic Conflicts, eds., Destler and Sato (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1982), pp. 271-293, pp. 279-287. Back.
Note 15: By studying the correlation between these variables in particular countries and comparing correlation across countries, empirical generalizations can be made about trade policymaking in and among countries, and a typology of various forms of trade policymaking can be developed. Although the full elaboration of such a typology is beyond the scope of this paper, some of the specific differences between American trade policymaking and Japanese trade policymaking in the context of U.S.-Japan trade negotiations are made apparent in this paper. Back.
Note 16: These first two questions are drawn from Robert R. Mnookin., Scott R. Peppet, and Andrew S. Tulumello, The Lawyer as Negotiator: How Lawyers and Clients Can Create Value in Legal Negotiations (Printed exclusively for the Exclusive Use of Students at the Columbia University School of Law, August 1988), pp. 115-116. (permission granted to cite.) Back.
Note 17: This question is related to Milner's efforts to answer the question "Why nations cooperate with each other?" Milner examines when and why advanced Western industrial countries were unable to cooperate in the post-World War II period in trade, monetary policy, and fiscal policy. (Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, pp. 5-6.) Back.
Note 18: These hypotheses are derived from Milner's Interests, Institutions, and Information, and therefore focus more on cooperation. However, similar inquiries could be made using other hypotheses that focus on other variables. Back.
Note 19: This is derived from Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, p. 242. Back.
Note 20: This is derived from Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, p. 98. Back.
Note 21: This is derived from Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information, p. 239. Back.
Note 22: Margaret P. Karns, "Multilateral Diplomacy and Trade Policy: The United States and the GATT" in The United States and Multilateral Institutions: Patterns of Changing Instrumentality and Influence, eds., Margaret P. Karns and Karen A. Mingst. (London: Routledge, 1992), pp. 141-175, pp. 142-155. Back.
Note 23: See Gilpin, The Political Economy of International Relations, pp. 343-360. Back.
Note 24: Some authors have attempted to identify particular characteristics of Japanese negotiating style. (See Michael K. Blaker, "Probe, Push, and Panic: The Japanese Tactical Style in International Negotiations," in The Foreign Policy of Modern Japan, ed., Robert Scalapino (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1977); John L. Graham, "The Japanese Negotiation Style: Characteristics of a Distinct Approach," Negotiation Journal (April 1993), pp. 123-140.) Back.
Note 25: This is as a result of "constituency representation, strong government machinery, and effective political pressure." (Gilbert R. Winham, International Trade and the Tokyo Round Negotiation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986), p. 148.) Back.
Note 26: The European Community (EC) which became the European Union (EU) during the Uruguay Round of the GATT is a union of states, rather than a single state. Back.
Note 27: By focusing on the United States and Japan, however, this paper is in no way advocating a U.S.-Japan relationship to the exclusion of the interests of other countries, such as developing countries. Back.
Note 28: House Ways and Means Committee, Uruguay Round Agreements Act, 103rd Cong., 1st sess., 1994, H. Rept. 826, p. 150. Back.
Note 29: U.S. Congress, Congressional Budget Office, The GATT Negotiations and U.S. Trade Policy (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, June 1987), p. 79. Back.
Note 30: Michael R. Reich, Yasuo Endo, and C. Peter Timmer, "Agriculture: The Political Economy of Structural Change," in America versus Japan: A Comparative Study of Business-Government Relations conducted at the Harvard Business School, ed., Thomas McCraw (Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1986), pp. 151-192, pp. 158-160. Back.
Note 31: Terence P. Stewart, ed., The GATT Uruguay Round: A Negotiating History (1986-1992), Volume I: Commentary, (Boston: Kluwer Law and Taxation Publishers, 1993), p. 172. Back.
Note 32: Reich, Endo, and Timmer, p.159. Back.
Note 33: Dale E. Hathaway, Agriculture and the GATT: Rewriting the Rules (Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics, September 1987), p. 83. Back.
Note 34: Daniel Amstutz, Agriculture Undersecretary, House Committee on Foreign Affairs, United States-European Community Trade Relations: Problems and Prospects for Resolution: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East, 99th Cong., 2nd sess., 24 July 1986, p. 81. Back.
Note 35: "CRS Brief Entitled 'Tensions in United States-European Community Agricultural Trade,'" in House Committee on Foreign Affairs, United States-European Community Trade Relations, p. 190. Back.
Note 36: Reich, Endo, and Timmer, p. 151. Back.
Note 37: GATT Activities 1986, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1987), p. 21. Back.
Note 38: House Committee on Agriculture, Trade and International Economic Policy Reform Act of 1987, 100th Cong., 1st sess., April 7, 1987, H. Rept. 100-40, Part 6, p. 119. Back.
Note 39: Ibid., pp. 64-65. Back.
Note 40: Congressional Budget Office, The GATT Negotiations and U.S. Trade Policy, pp. 74, 77, 93. Back.
Note 41: GATT Activities 1987, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1988), pp. 30-31. Back.
Note 42: The Cairns Group included Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Brazil, Hungary, Indonesia, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Fiji, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Uruguay. Back.
Note 43: Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988, Public Law 418, 100th Cong. 1988, pp. 1395-6; House Conference. Rept., 100th Cong., 1988, H. Rept. 576, pp. 1907-1910. Back.
Note 44: Clyde H. Farnsworth, "U.S. Rejects Action on Japan's Rice Imports," The New York Times, 29 October 1988, p. 35. Back.
Note 45: "Dunkel Plan Would Prevent Use of AD/CVD Laws Against Unfair Traders, NFU Charges," International Trade Reporter, 5 April 1989, p. 417. Back.
Note 46: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 026 (12 April 1989), p. 1. Back.
Note 47: "Annex I: Trade Negotiations Committee Mid-Term Review Agreements," GATT Activities 1988, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1989), pp. 138-167, pp. 144-145. Back.
Note 48: "Responses by Ann Veneman, Associate Administrator, Foreign Agricultural Service, and Suzanne Early, Assistant U.S. Trade Representative, to Questions Submitted by Senator Kent Conrad," Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade Proceedings in Geneva as They Relate to Agriculture: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Domestic and Foreign Marketing and Product Promotion, 101st Cong., 1st sess., 12 April 1989, p. 24. Back.
Note 49: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Negotiations, NUR 032 (21 November 1989), p. 6; GATT Activities 1989, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1990), p. 50. Back.
Note 50: Senate Committee on Finance, Extending International Trading Rules to Agriculture, Hearing before the Subcommittee on International Trade, 101st Cong., 1st sess., 3 November 1989, p. 34. Back.
Note 51: "Statement of Suzanne Early, Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Agriculture" in House Committee on Agriculture, Review of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Department Operations, Research, and Foreign Agriculture, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 28 February 1991, p. 6. Back.
Note 52: GATT Activities 1990, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1990), p. 34. Back.
Note 53: "Bush Converts U.S. Sugar Quota Program to GATT-legal Tariff-Rate Quotas Scheme," International Trade Reporter, 19 September 1990, p. 1431. Back.
Note 54: "Sugar Alliance Says it Can No Longer Support 'Weakened' U.S. Position in GATT Negotiations," International Trade Reporter, 24 October 1990, p. 1620. Back.
Note 55: "Statement of Suzanne Early, Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Agriculture" in House Committee on Agriculture, Review of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, pp. 7-8. Back.
Note 56: "Statement of Allan I. Mendelowitz, Director, International Trade, Energy, and Finance Issues, National Security and International Affairs Division, U.S. General Accounting Office" in House Committee on Agriculture, Review of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, p. 54. Back.
Note 57: "Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Talks Tops U.S. Trade Agenda for 1991 as Administration, Congress Also Prepares to Deal with Range of Other Issues," International Trade Reporter, 9 January 1991, p. 60. Back.
Note 58: "International Economic, Political Conditions Seen Having Major Impact on U.S. Farm Exports," International Trade Reporter, 23 January 1991, p. 107. Back.
Note 59: "President Bush Set to Ask Congress to Extend 'Fast-Track' Authority as GATT Talks Resume," International Trade Reporter, 27 February 1991, p. 295. Back.
Note 60: "Statement of David Senter, National Director, American Agriculture Movement, Inc.," in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of Fast-Track Extension Request Submitted by the Administration, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 13 March 1991, pp. 213-214. Back.
Note 61: "Statement of Stewart G. Huber, President, Farmers Union Milk Marketing Cooperative," in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of Fast-Track Extension Request Submitted by the Administration, p. 206. Back.
Note 62: "Appendix B, NFU 1991 Policy Statement on International Trade Pacts," in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of Fast-Track Extension Request Submitted by the Administration, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 13 March 1991, p. 185. Back.
Note 63: "Response of Ambassador Hills" in Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, Hearing on Fast Track Procedures for Agricultural Trade Negotiations, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 8 May 1991, p. 50. Back.
Note 64: "Statement of Randolph Nodland, Past President, on Behalf of the National Family Farm Coalition" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of International Trade Negotiations Affecting U.S. Agricultural Policy under the GATT, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 10 December 1991, pp. 70-71. Back.
Note 65: "Statement of Harvey Schneider, President, Southeast Peanut Growers Association, on Behalf of James Earl Mobley, Chairman, National Peanut Growers Group, accompanied by Billy Bain," in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of International Trade Negotiations Affecting U.S. Agricultural Policy under the GATT, p. 54. Back.
Note 66: "Section A: The calculation of tariff equivalents and related provisions" in "Annex 3: Market Access: Agricultural Products subject to Border Measures Other than Ordinary Customs Duties," of Part A: Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, of L. Text on Agriculture" of the Draft Final Act Embodying the Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations (Geneva: GATT Secretariat, Trade Negotiations Committee, MTN.TNC/W/FA, 20 December 1991), p. L.25 as reprinted in The Institute for International Legal Information, "The Dunkel Draft" from the GATT Secretariat (Buffalo, NY: William S. Hein & Co., Inc., 1992). Back.
Note 67: "Paragraph 5 of Part B, Agreement on Modalities for the Establishment of Specific Binding Commitments under the Reform Programme," of Annex 2 of Part A: Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, of L. Text on Agriculture" of the Draft Final Act, p. L.19 as reprinted in "The Dunkel Draft" from the GATT Secretariat. Back.
Note 68: "Statement of Dean R. Kleckner, President, American Farm Bureau Federation" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of International Trade Negotiations Affecting U.S. Agricultural Policy under the GATT, 102nd Cong., 1st sess., 9 January 1992, p. 442. Back.
Note 69: "Response of Mr. Crowder [Richard Crowder, Agriculture Deputy Undersecretary for International Affairs and Commodity Programs]" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of International Trade Negotiations Affecting U.S. Agricultural Policy under the GATT, p. 277. Back.
Note 70: "U.S., Allies to Seek New 'Glue' for Alliance at First G-7 Summit Since End of Cold War," International Trade Reporter, 1 July 1992, p. 1156. Back.
Note 71: "President Bush, Other G-7 Leaders Expect GATT Trade Agreement by End of this Year," International Trade Reporter, 8 July 1992, p. 1193; "U.S. Rice Industry Prepares Section 301 Petition Against Japan," International Trade Reporter, 18 November 1992, p. 1961. Back.
Note 72: "U.S. Will Push for End to Rice Bans in Japan and Korea, USDA's Espy Says," International Trade Reporter, 3 March 1993, p. 365. Back.
Note 73: "House Votes to Extend President's Authority to Conclude GATT Trade Talks by December," International Trade Reporter, 23 June 1993, p. 1019. Back.
Note 74: "Kantor Expresses Optimism on Completion of Global Trade Talks," International Trade Reporter, 14 July 1993, p. 1166. Back.
Note 75: GATT Activities 1993, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1994), p. 24. Back.
Note 76: "The Final Act of the Uruguay Round: Press Summary," News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 080 (14 December 1993), pp. 8-9. Back.
Note 77: "Uruguay Round Agreement is Reached," International Trade Reporter, 15 December 1993, p. 2103. Back.
Note 78: "Response of Secretary Espy" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of the Uruguay Round GATT Agreement Implications for Agricultural Trade, 103rd Cong., 2nd sess., 16 March 1994, p. 87. Back.
Note 79: "Statement of Hon. Mike Espy, Secretary of Agriculture, United States Department of Agriculture" in Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, , 103rd Cong., 2nd sess., 20 April 1994, p. 19. Back.
Note 80: "Statement of Robert Watts, Vice President, Commodity and International, Riviana Foods, on Behalf of the Rice Millers' Association and U.S. Rice Producers' Group" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of the Uruguay Round GATT Agreement Implications for Agricultural Trade, pp. 169-170. Back.
Note 81: "Statement of David Senter, Director, Congressional Affairs, American Corn Growers Association" in House Committee on Agriculture, Hearing on Review of the Uruguay Round GATT Agreement Implications for Agricultural Trade, p. 173. Back.
Note 82: As a result of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, American "[n]ontariff import barriers [became] subject to comprehensive tariffication and minimum or current access commitments; [and] all agricultural tariffs [were] bound and reduced." (House, Uruguay Round Agreements Act, p. 12.) Section 111 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act provided "the general authority for (1) the conversion of U.S. quantitative import restrictions to tariff-rate quotas; and (2) the staged reductions of tariffs on imported agricultural products." Market access related provisions made changes to Federal law to "reflect the conversion of quantitative restrictions, authorized under section 22 of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 and the Meat Import Act of 1979, to tariff-rate quotas; (2) authorize[d] the President to take certain actions in administering tariff-rate quotas; and (3) establish[ed] a special safeguard for agricultural imports pursuant to Article 5 of the Agreement on Agriculture and provide[d] the President with the authority to administer this safeguard with the advice of the Secretary of Agriculture." (Ibid., pp. 7-8.) Back.
Note 83: U.S. Congress, Joint Report of the Committee on Finance, Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee on Governmental Affairs of the United States Senate to Accompany S. 2467, "Uruguay Round Agreements Act," 103rd Congress., 2nd Session, 22 November 1994. Back.
Note 84: Reich, Endo, and Timmer, pp. 153-158. Back.
Note 85: Hideo Sato and Gunther Schmitt, "The Political Management of Agriculture in Japan and Germany." In The Politics of Economic Change in Postwar Japan and West Germany, Volume 1: Macroeconomic Conditions and Policy Responses, eds., Haruhiro Fukui, Peter H. Merkl, Hubertus Muller-Groeling, and Akio Watanabe, pp. 233-280. Back.
Note 86: "Both Houses Adopt Resolution for Rice Self-Sufficiency," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 2, no. 1 (August 1984), p. 3. Back.
Note 87: Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Japanese Agricultural Policies: A Time of Change (Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service Policy Monograph No. 3, 1988), p. 25. Back.
Note 88: Tsutomu Ouchi, "Agricultural Policy Reform; Why Now?" Report of Study Group on International Issues (SGII), No. 2 (Tokyo, Japan: Food and Agricultural Policy Research Center (FAPRC), October 1989), pp. 16-17. Back.
Note 89: "Prime Minister Shows Strong Intentions on Farm Reform," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 4, no. 5 (December 1986), p. 4. Back.
Note 90: "Agricultural Policy for the 21st Century Announced," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 4, no. 6 (January 1987), pp. 2-3. Back.
Note 91: "Policy Speech by Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, "Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 5, no. 1 (August 1987), p. 2. Back.
Note 92: "Japan Stresses Special Characteristics of Agriculture," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 5, no. 1 (August 1987), p. 7. Back.
Note 93: "Senior Agricultural Official Sent to U.S. for Talks on GATT Report on Farm Products," International Trade Reporter, 11 November 1987, p. 1382. Back.
Note 94: "MAFF Submits Proposal to GATT," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 5, no. 6 (January 1988), pp. 5-6, p. 5. Back.
Note 95: GATT Activities 1987, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1988), p. 32. Back.
Note 96: "MAFF Submits Proposal to GATT," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 5, no. 6 (January 1988), pp. 5-6, p. 5. Back.
Note 97: The import restrictions on these two products were finally removed in late 1993 by the Japanese government in Japan's offer to conclude the Uruguay Round negotiations. (GATT Activities 1993, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1994), p. 53.) Back.
Note 98: 1988 Panel Report on "Japan — Restrictions on Imports of Certain Agricultural Products," L/6253, adopted on 22 March 1988, 35S/163, 229, paras. 5.2.2.1-5.2.2.2, as quoted in Guide to GATT Law and Practice: Analytical Index (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1994), p. 450. Back.
Note 99: "Cabinet Approves Rice Price Cut, Defers New Calculation Method," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 5, no. 12 (July 1988), pp. 6-7, p. 6. Back.
Note 100: "Some LDP Candidates Lose Support of Agricultural Cooperatives," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 6, no. 7 (March 1989), p. 4. Back.
Note 101: "Trade Negotiations Committee Continues Discussion," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 6, no. 10 (June 1989), pp. 6-7. Back.
Note 102: "Newly Elected Prime Minister, Sousuke Uno, Delivers Policy Speech," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 6, no. 12 (August 1989), p. 2. Back.
Note 103: "LDP Suffers Crushing Defeat in Upper House Elections," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 7, no. 1 (September 1989), p. 2. Back.
Note 104: Akiko Kusaoi, "Business Groups Worry Amid Fading LDP Support, Federations Fear Wave of Prosperity May Ebb with Loss of Ruling Party Ally," The Japan Times, 8 July 1989, p. 3. Back.
Note 105: "Japan Presents its Views to GATT," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 7, no. 4 (December 1989), p. 6. Back.
Note 106: "LDP Retains Power with 275 Seats: Japan Socialists Advance to 136 as Smaller Parties Lose in Chamber," The Japan Times, 20 February 1990, p. 1. Back.
Note 107: Hisane Masaki, Staff Writer, "Kaifu Now Faces Host of Foreign Policy Concerns," The Japan Times, 20 February 1990, pp. 1 and 3, p. 3. Back.
Note 108: "Kaifu Finds no Government Consensus on Rice Import Ban in Wake of Summit," International Trade Reporter, 18 July 1990, p. 1104. Back.
Note 109: "New Rice Exchange to Be Set Up," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 7, no. 11 (July 1990), pp. 10-11, translated from Mainichi Shimbun, 30 April 1990. Back.
Note 110: "Komeito Calls for Radical Reform of Staple Food Control System," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 8, no. 3 (November 1990), p. 3. Back.
Note 111: "Japan Will Offer 30 Percent Subsidy Cuts over 10 Years at Uruguay Round Negotiations," International Trade Reporter, 3 October 1990, p. 1499. Back.
Note 112: "Beef and Orange Liberalization Subdued," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 8, no. 10 (June 1991), p. 11, translation of Sankei Shimbun, 31 March 1991. Back.
Note 113: "Interview with new MAFF Minister," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 9, no. 5 (January 1992), pp. 8-9, translated from Nihon Keizai Shimbun, 9 November 1991. Back.
Note 114: "Rice Import Ban Will Stay, Officials Insist," The Japan Times, 23 December 1991, p. 2, and "Prime Minister Hints at Concessions to U.S.," The Japan Times, 1 January 1992, p. 7. Back.
Note 115: "End to Rice Ban Reportedly Backed by Prime Minister," The Japan Times, 26 January 1992, p. 1. Back.
Note 116: "EC Wrapping Up Work on Agricultural Tariff Schedules for Presentation to GATT," International Trade Reporter, 11 March 1992, p. 448. Back.
Note 117: "Rice Fight to Continue, " The Japan Times, 6 March 1992, p. 13. Back.
Note 118: "Reform Party to Seek 10 Seats in July Election," The Japan Times, 8 May 1992, p. 1. Back.
Note 119: "Government Announces It Will Import 200,000 Tons of Rice this Year," International Trade Reporter, 6 October 1993, p. 1690. Back.
Note 120: "Hosokawa Says Formal Announcement on Rice Imports Will be Made this Week," International Trade Reporter, 8 December 1993, p. 2055. Back.
Note 122: Yuji Iwasawa, "Constitutional Problems Involved in Implementing the Uruguay Round in Japan," in Implementing the Uruguay Round, eds., John H. Jackson and Alan Sykes (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 137-174, p. 166. Back.
Note 123: "Hosokawa Says Formal Announcement on Rice Imports Will be Made this Week," International Trade Reporter, 8 December 1993, p. 2055. Back.
Note 124: "Negotiations among trading partners on the possibility and terms of any continuation of special treatment beyond the implementation period [would have to] be completed by the end of the sixth year following the entry into force of the Agreement on Agriculture." "In the case of any continuation beyond the sixth year, additional commitments have to be taken." ("The Final Act of the Uruguay Round: Press Summary," News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 080 (14 December 1993), p. 9.) Back.
Note 125: "Japanese Offer to GATT May Open Agricultural Markets, Reduce Tariffs," International Trade Reporter, 5 January 1994, p. 12. These figures can be found in the Schedule for Japan which is in Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, Legal Instruments Embodying the Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations Done at Marrakesh on 15 April 1994, Vol. 11, p. 9370. Back.
Note 126: "Japanese Offer to GATT May Open Agricultural Markets, Reduce Tariffs," International Trade Reporter, 5 January 1994, p. 12. Back.
Note 127: Article 5(2) of the final April 1994 Agreement on Agriculture provided an exception to Article 4, paragraph 2 of the Agreement on Agriculture, stating that where "imports of the designated products comprised less than 3 percent of corresponding domestic consumption in the base period 1986-1988," and certain conditions existed, minimum access opportunities in respect of the designated products [would] correspond, as specified in Section I-B of Part I of the Schedule of the Member concerned, to 4 per cent of base period domestic consumption of the designated products from the beginning of the first year of the implementation period and, thereafter, [be] increased by 0.8 per cent of corresponding domestic consumption in the base period per year for the remainder of the implementation period. (Annex 5, Section b, Paragraph 7(a) of "Special Treatment with Respect to Paragraph 2 of Article 4" Agreement on Agriculture, Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (Washington, DC: Office of the United States Trade Representative, 1994), p. 66.) Back.
Note 128: Gerald L. Curtis, The Logic of Japanese Politics: Leaders, Institutions, and the Limits of Change (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1999), p. 172. Back.
Note 129: See Ibid., pp. 190-191. Back.
Note 130: Iwasawa, p. 173. The Uruguay Round Agreements, including the Agreement on Agriculture and seven related bills including the New Food Management Law (which replaced the 1942 Food Control Law), were passed into law by the Upper House on December 8, 1994. Included in the Uruguay Round implementing legislation, among other measures, was a six year 6.01 trillion yen ($60.7 billion) package of domestic farm measures. ("WTO Agreement Receives Diet Approval," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter, no. 12, no. 6 (February 1995), p. 2.) Concerning the effects of implementation of the Agriculture Agreement on Japanese agricultural policy, see Imamura Raomi, Hattori Shinji, Yaguchi Yoshio, Kagatsume Masaru, and Suganuma Keisuke, WTO Taiseika no Shokuryo Nogyo Senryaku (Amerika, Yoropa, Ostraria, Chuugoku, to Nihon) [Agricultural Food Policy under the WTO System - America, Europe, Australia, China, and Japan], (Tokyo: Nosangyoson Bunka Kyokai, 1997); Nihon Keizai Hyouronsha, WTO Taiseika no Kome to Shokuryo [Rice and Food under the WTO System] (Tokyo: Shokuryo Seisaku Kenkyukai Hen, 1999).) Back.
Note 131: "Opinions Split on Rice Liberalization," Japan Agrinfo Newsletter 4, no. 6 (January 1987), p. 8. Back.
Note 132: GATT Activities in 1983 (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1984), p. 11. Back.
Note 133: GATT Activities 1985 (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1986), p. 7. Back.
Note 134: The Kennedy Round of GATT negotiations (1963-1967) included the first systematic discussion of nontariff trade barriers and their possible negotiation within the GATT. The Tokyo Round of GATT negotiations (1974-1979) led to not only "specific tariff and import quota concessions," but also to the establishment of "behavioral codes" and "international consultative agreements for dairy products, beef, and general agricultural policy." (James P. Houck, "Agreements and Policy in U.S.-Japanese Agricultural Trade," in U.S.-Japanese Agricultural Trade Relations, eds., Emery N. Castle and Kenzo Hemmi with Sally A. Skillings (Washington, DC: Resources for the Future, 1982), pp. 68-70, 75.) Back.
Note 135: GATT Activities 1987, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1988), pp. 30-31. Back.
Note 138: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 014 (26 February 1988), pp. 5-6. Back.
Note 139: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 017 (30 June 1988), p. 7. Back.
Note 140: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 019 (5 October 1988), pp. 2/3-4. Back.
Note 141: "Annex I: Trade Negotiations Committee Mid-Term Review Agreements," GATT Activities 1988, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1989), pp. 138-167, p. 143. Back.
Note 142: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 030 (3 August 1989), p. 8. Back.
Note 143: News of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, NUR 032 (21 November 1989), p. 6. Back.
Note 144: "Japan Criticizes U.S. GATT Proposal, Vows to Maintain Rice Self-Sufficiency," International Trade Reporter, 1 November 1989, p. 1406. Back.
Note 145: "Japanese Agriculture Official Says Election will not Affect Position on Food Security," International Trade Reporter, 10 January 1990, p. 49. Back.
Note 147: GATT Activities 1989, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1990), p. 50. Back.
Note 148: GATT Activities 1990, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1990), p. 34. Back.
Note 149: "Japan Will Offer 30 Percent Subsidy Cuts over 10 Years at Uruguay Round Negotiations," International Trade Reporter, 3 October 1990, p. 1499. Back.
Note 150: "U.S. Advances Final Farm Proposal Calling for 90 Percent Cuts in Export Subsidy Levels," International Trade Reporter, 17 October 1990, p. 1564. See also "U.S. Proposal for Agricultural Negotiations in the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Talks with Accompanying Fact Sheet Released by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative Oct. 15, 1990," International Trade Reporter, 17 October 1990, p. 1594. Back.
Note 151: Asahi Shimbun, 16 January 1991, p. 2. See also Kyodo, "Government Prepared to Negotiate Opening Rice Market, Minister Says," The Japan Times, 16 January 1991, p. 2. Back.
Note 152: "Statement of Julius L. Katz, Deputy United States Trade Representative, Office of the United States Trade Representative," House Committee on Agriculture, Review of International Trade Negotiations affecting U.S. Agricultural Policy under the GATT, pp. 14-15. Back.
Note 153: GATT Activities 1992, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1993), p. 15. Back.
Note 154: "EC Wrapping Up Work on Agricultural Tariff Schedules for Presentation to GATT," International Trade Reporter, 11 March 1992, p. 448. Back.
Note 155: "Rice Fight to Continue," The Japan Times, 6 March 1992, p. 13. Back.
Note 156: GATT Activities 1992, An Annual Review of the Work of the GATT (Geneva: General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1993), p. 18. Back.
Note 157: "Japanese Officials said to Discuss Possible Rice Liberalization Policy," International Trade Reporter, 20 October 1993, p. 1750. Back.
Note 158: "Officials See Uruguay Round Nearing Completion by Dec. 15," International Trade Reporter, 24 November 1993, p. 1993. Back.
Note 159: See, for example, Ikenberry, "Introduction," pp. 3-7. Back.
Note 160: See, for example, Ibid., pp. 7-9. Back.
Note 161: See, for example, Judith Goldstein, Ideas, Interests, and American Trade Policy (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993). Back.
Note 162: See, for example, Milner, Interests, Institutions, and Information. Back.
Note 163: See, for example, Nau's efforts to examine "the opportunities and constraints for export interests" in the Uruguay Round (Nau, p. 15), and Hampson's assertion that, at the international level, during the negotiations, "insufficient attention was paid to how to make the ambitious package" "a politically marketable package" at the domestic level. (Hampson, p. 251.) Back.
Note 164: See the focus on the international regime in Robert Wolfe, Farm Wars: The Political Economy of Agriculture and the International Trade Regime (New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 1998). Back.
Note 165: For example, decision theory, game theory, organization theory, small group theory, coalition theory and leadership theory are used to examine the international level of the Uruguay Round in International Multilateral Negotiation, ed. Zartman. Back.
Note 166: Putnam's two-level game approach is specifically designed for particular types of negotiations, those that occur in two simplified stages: (1) "bargaining between the negotiators, leading to a tentative agreement," called Level I; and (2) "separate discussions within each group of constituents about whether to ratify the agreement," called Level II. (Putnam, "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics," p. 436.) Back.
Note 167: For an earlier attempt to use Putnam's two-level game approach to analyze the Uruguay Round agriculture negotiations, see International Political Economy Yearbook, Volume 7: World Agriculture and the GATT (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1993). Back.
Note 168: Among state-centered theorists, the general consensus "exists that the United States possesses a weak state" and that Congress serves to weaken the power of the American state because "the political needs and constituencies of Congressmen are different from those of the President." (Stephen Krasner, Defending the National Interest, p. 63.) See, for example, Ikenberry, Lake, and Mastanduno, "Introduction," pp. 9-14; Katzenstein, "Conclusion," in Katzenstein, Between Power and Plenty, pp. 308-313. Back.
Note 169: See, for example, Pastor, Congress and the Politics of U.S. Foreign Economic Policy, p. 61, pp. 43-49; Jeff Frieden, "Sectoral Conflict and U.S. Foreign Economic Policy, 1914-1940," International Organization 42 (Winter 1988), pp. 59-90. Back.
Note 170: See, for example, Goldstein, Ideas, Interests, and American Trade Policy. Back.
Note 171: Robert L. Paarlberg, "Why Agriculture Blocked the Uruguay Round: Evolving Strategies in a Two-Level Game," in Avery, pp. 39-54; See also Robert Paarlberg, "Agricultural Policy Reform and the Uruguay Round: Synergistic Linkage in a Two-Level Game?" International Organization 51 (Spring 1997), pp. 413-444. Back.
Note 172: Paarlberg, "Agricultural Policy Reform and the Uruguay Round," p. 419. Back.
Note 173: Paarlberg, "Why Agriculture Blocked the Uruguay Round," pp. 44-45. Back.
Note 174: Theodore H. Cohn, "The Changing Role of the United States in the Global Agricultural Regime," in Avery, pp. 17-38, p. 37. Back.
Note 175: See Robert L. Paarlberg, "Why Agriculture Blocked the Uruguay Round"; Paarlberg, "Agricultural Policy Reform and the Uruguay Round," pp. 413-414. Back.
Note 176: Paarlberg, "Agricultural Policy Reform and the Uruguay Round," pp. 415, 427, 441. The concept of synergistic linkage is discussed in Schoppa, Bargaining with Japan, p. 28, pp. 36-40. Back.
Note 177: Paarlberg, "Agricultural Policy Reform and the Uruguay Round," pp. 434, 439. Back.
Note 178: David P. Rapkin and Aurelia George, "Rice Liberalization and Japan's Role in the Uruguay Round: A Two-Level Game Approach," in Avery, pp. 55-94. Back.
Note 179: See Kent E. Calder, "Japanese Foreign Economic Policy Formation: Explaining the Reactive State," World Politics 40 (1988), pp. 517-541, pp. 526-527. Back.
Note 180: T.J. Pempel, "Japanese Foreign Economic Policy: The Domestic Bases for International Behavior," in Katzenstein, ed., Between Power and Plenty, pp. 139-190, p. 142. Back.
Note 181: For one analysis focusing on Japan's negotiating behavior, see Michael Blaker, "Japan Negotiates with the United States on Rice: 'No, No, A Thousand Times, No!" in International Negotiation: Actors, Structure/Process, Values, eds., Peter Berton, Hiroshi Kimura, and I. William Zartman (New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 1999), pp. 33-61. Back.
Note 182: Richard D. Leitch, Jr., Akira Kato, and Martin E. Weinstein, Japan's Role in the Post-Cold War World (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1995), pp. 165. Back.
Note 183: Rapkin and George, pp. 91-92. Back.
Note 184: Yoichiro Sato, "Sticky Efforts: Japan's Rice Market Opening and U.S.-Japan Transnational Lobbying," in Japan Engaging the World: A Century of International Encounter, ed., Harumi Befu (Center for Japan Studies at Teikyo Loretto Heights University, 1996), pp. 77-99, p. 96. Back.
Note 185: See, for example, Peter J. Katzenstein and Yutaka Tsujinaka, "'Bullying,' 'buying,' and 'binding': U.S.-Japanese Transnational Relations and Domestic Structures," in Bringing Transnational Relations Back In: Non-State Actors, Domestic Structures, and International Institutions., ed., Thomas Risse-Kappen.(New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 79-111. Back.
Note 186: Norio Naka, Predicting Outcomes in United States-Japan Trade Negotiations: The Political Process of the Structural Impediments Initiative (Westport, CT: Quorum, 1996), p. xii. Back.
Note 187: Krauss, "U.S.-Japan Negotiations on Construction and Semiconductors, 1985-1988: Building Friction and Relation-Chips," in Evans, Jacobson, and Putnam, pp. 265-299. Back.
Note 188: Schoppa, Bargaining with Japan. Back.
Note 189: See I.M. Destler and Hideo Sato, "Coping with U.S.-Japanese Economic Conflicts" in Coping with U.S.-Japanese Economic Conflicts, eds., Destler and Sato, pp. 271-293, pp. 279-287; Michael W. Donnelly, "On Political Negotiation: America Pushes to Open Up Japan," Pacific Affairs 66 (Fall 1993), pp. 329-350. Back.
Note 190: Rapkin and George, pp. 91-92. Back.
Note 191: Yoichiro Sato, p. 97. Back.
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