MODELING INTERNET-BASED CITIZEN ACTIVISM AND FOREIGN POLICY: The Islands Dispute between China and Japan TOMONOBU KUMAHIRA Primary Thesis Advisor: Professor Jordan Branch Department of Political Science Secondary Thesis Advisor: Professor Kerry Smith Department of History Honors Seminar Instructor: Professor Claudia Elliott The Watson Institute for International Studies SENIOR THESIS Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts with Honors in International Relations BROWN UNIVERSITY PROVIDENCE, RI MAY 2015 © Copyright 2015 by Tomonobu Kumahira ABSTRACT How can citizens utilize the Internet to influence foreign policymaking? Optimists emphasize the Internet’s great potential to empower citizens, while pessimists underscore the persistent dominance of conventional actors in shaping diplomacy. These conceptual debates fail to build analytical models that theorize the mechanisms through which citizen activism impacts foreign policymaking in the Internet era. Focusing on the interactions between “old” institutions and new practices enabled by technology, I argue that Internet-based citizen activists are using multiple and evolving strategies to engage with the conventional media and policymakers. My Hybrid Model provides an analytical framework with which scholars can describe new forms of non-electoral representation by citizen movements, while challenging foreign policy decision making theories established before the social media. My model traces the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute between China and Japan, in which nationalist campaigns online and offline have fueled a series of confrontations since 2005. Presenting practical implications for foreign policymakers and the conventional media to respond to the transformation, this Hybrid Model also helps citizens play a more active role in international relations. In conclusion, I explore the analogy between the Internet and past innovations in communication technologies to shed light on the future of the Internet and politics. Keywords: the Internet and politics, citizen activism, political representation, media, nationalism in East Asia iv To My Grandfather, Hajime Kumahira in gratitude for teaching me the joy of thinking and writing. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my advisors, Professor Jordan Branch and Professor Kerry Smith for their invaluable advice and commitment for my thesis. During their office hours, I not only learned to challenge myself academically but also broaden my perspectives to the world, which enabled me to go far beyond what I could have achieved by myself. I would like to express my special gratitude as well as respect to Dr. Claudia Elliott for her outstanding dedication to the IR Honors Thesis program. She is the true educator who taught me what it is like to become “a producer of knowledge, not a consumer.” It has been my greatest honor to initiate my study under their guidance. I also thank Professor Hammurabi Mendes for his help in Python programming. I owe a great debt of gratitude to my family and friends, who supported me during the most stressful, devastating moments, and helped me explore new possibilities of my research. I cannot thank enough to my grandparents and parents for their constant encouragement. Thank you, Alisa Schubert Yuasa, Nao Shoji, Chishio Furukawa, Shiro Kuriwaki, and Takahisa Uemura for your friendship and brilliant ideas. I am profoundly grateful to Hiroko Kuniya, Harunobu Kato, Daisuke Kanda, and Noriyuki Shikata for sharing their first-class knowledge and experience. I am also obliged to note that there are more of those who kindly shared their insights and whose names remain anonymous. Despite their incredible support, none of these helpful advices should be held in any way accountable for deficiencies of my thesis. I gained inspiration from academic experience outside the thesis seminars. I would like to thank Professor Edward Seinfeld at the Watson Institute and Professor Lyle Goldstein at Naval War College for their amazing courses on Political Science and China, and Professor Arnulf Becker for his two-year long support on my independent research on the intellectual history of Japanese international lawyers. I also express my gratitude for those educators who shaped my academic foundation through their patient teaching: Former Vice President Shiro Ishii at the University of Tokyo, Professor Wendy Schiller at Brown University, and TA in my very first Political Science course, Arron Weinstein. I am profoundly grateful to the individuals and institutions that Brown University offered me to support my academic life. Without regular consultation with Brown Library experts, it would have been impossible to execute my hardly realistic “research plan.” I am profoundly thankful to Carina Cournoyer, Li Wang, Toshiyuki Minami, Bruce Boucek, Elli Mylonas, and Patrick Rashleigh for their advice. I thank my advisor at the Writing Center, Chris Carr, who kindly scheduled weekly appointments throughout the semesters to improve the accuracy of my thesis writing. Finally, I could pursue this incredible academic journey at Brown thanks to my mentors who encouraged me in my previous institution, Keio University. I would like to extend my gratitude to Professor Ryuichi Teshima, Professor Miki Seko, Professor Yohko Nagai, and Professor Hans-Joachim Knaup for giving me the courage to jump out of my comfort zone. vi CONTENTS Abstract iv Acknowledgments vi Tables viii Figures ix Chapter 1: International Relations in the Internet Era 1 Chapter 2: Debates on the Internet and Foreign Policymaking 34 Chapter 3: The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands Dispute 73 Chapter 4: A YouTube Post That Shocked Foreign Policy 119 Chapter 5: Neglected Citizen Grassroots Activism 156 Chapter 6: The Old World: the Conventional Media and Politics 198 Conclusion: Hybrid Approach to Foreign Policymaking 226 Works Cited 246 vii TABLES 1.1: Actors, Variables, and Sources 29 2.1: Models of Public Opinion in Foreign Policy Decision Making 48 5.1: “Senkaku” Search Result Rank on YouTube 169 5.2: “Senkaku” Search Results Rank on Niconico Douga 171 5.3: Protest Record by Ganbare Nippon between July 2010 and June 2011 177 5.4: Protest Records by Zaitoku-Kai between September and December 2010 190 viii FIGURES 1.1: Communication Technologies and Political Transformation Model 8 1.2: Three Bodies of Literature 11 2.1: Three Groups of Literature Relevant for My Research 35 2.2: Flow Chart of Conditions Shaping Public Opinion/Foreign Policy Nexus 41 2.3: Cascading Network Activation 43 3.1: Alleged Borders by China and Japan 76 3.2: Deteriorating Impressions of Each Other in China and Japan 78 4.1: Average Party Alignment Rates in the Japanese National Diet 144 4.2: Shift in the Level of Agreement with the Ruling Parties 145 5.1: SNS Usage in Japan (2014) 160 5.2: Hybrid Strategy of Self-Reinforcing Citizen Activism 192 5.3: Citizens with the Internet as New Watchdogs 194 6.1: Channels to Know about the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands (2014) 200 6.2: Media’s Evaluation of Mass-Protests 210 6.3: The Roles of the Conventional Media and Policymakers 219 6.4: The Hybrid Model of Empowered Citizen Activism 224 6.5: Citizen Activism in the Pre-Internet Era 224 7.1: The Hybrid Model of Empowered Citizen Activism 229 7.2: Two-States Hybrid Model of Empowered Citizen Activism 235 ix CHAPTER ONE: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS IN THE INTERNET ERA Politicians became exposed as corrupt and as liars. Governments were denounced. Media were suspected. Trust vanished…Yet…individuals did come together again to find new forms of being us, the people. — Manuel Castells, Networks of Outrage and Hope To what extent does the rise of the Internet influence politics? Starting from Gutenberg’s printing press, innovations in communication technology have transformed human behaviors, and thus altered the landscapes of domestic and international politics. In Imagined Communities, Benedict Anderson illustrates the process through which the technological innovation of printing press empowered the mass by accelerating low-cost distribution of knowledge in vernacular languages, which eventually created the basis for today’s nation state system.1 While the Internet is expanding at an unprecedented rate, much faster than Anderson’s case of printing press, its actual consequences to politics have yet to be fully analyzed. To what extent and how does the Internet transform citizens’ behaviors and capacity2 to participate in foreign policymaking? Does the Internet really empower people?3 1 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, UK: Verso Books, 2006). 2 By capacity, I refer to the power and ability of an actor to execute certain activities. In other words, if citizens have the capacity to monitor the government, citizens are equipped with skills necessary for the task and also have the sufficient resources to execute the monitoring. 1 Just as the mass printing spread rapidly centuries ago, the Internet continues to expand worldwide. By the end of 2014, the number of Internet users was expected to reach 3 billion people, or roughly 40 percent of the global population.4 The three billion users mark 67 percent growth compared with 2009, seven times larger than the figure in 2000.5 Among global online networks, the user number in developing countries is dramatically increasing, accounting for two-thirds of the total Internet users and half of mobile phone users.6 In Africa, for example, Internet users have doubled to 20 percent over the past four years since 2010, marking the world’s highest compound annual growth.7 China has the largest Internet base, whose 600 million users represent about a fifth of global Internet users.8 As these figures indicate, the expansion of the Internet is prominent all over the world. While the Internet expands its coverage, mobile devices continue to improve its capacity and accessibility. Equipped with built-in cameras and high-speed Internet connections, mobile phones essentially become small computers that allow users to constantly access the Internet. Furthermore, technological innovation also lowers the cost of manufacturing these devices, making them increasingly affordable for many.