1 Chapter Summary

In Chap. 1, we consider the relevance of studying Brazil–Japan relations and cooperation. Any bilateral relationship cannot be understood and explored in isolation without considering interwoven international ties in which each country is involved. We can therefore establish the equation of the reward of Brazil–Japan cooperation as the function of mutual gains based on economic complementarity and shared political values, the global hegemony of the United States, the rise of Chinese influence, and the engagement with neighboring countries, namely, South America for Brazil and East Asia for Japan.

Brazil takes a nuanced approach to balancing its alignment with the United States and its political autonomy as a South American regional power. The approximation of Brazil to Japan in the 1970s through binational joint projects involving natural resources and agricultural development was part of its pursuit of diversified international relations. The recent tightening of economic cooperation with China and the BRICS diplomacy further shifts toward the Global South engagement. However, in the last half decade and since the rise to power of right and extreme right governments, radical changes have been made in Brazilian foreign policy, which has started to emphasize the mercantilist discourse to the detriment of South–South cooperation and the political–developmental approach practiced until then. Brazilian diplomatic ties now face major challenges and may undergo further transformations with the presidential elections at the end of 2022.

Given complex national security concerns, Japan critically depends on its alliance with the United States. As a leading economy and being partly motivated by the rising Chinese influence, Japan seeks a more prominent role in international politics. It promotes a geopolitical campaign in the form of the “Free and Open Indo–Pacific” (FOIP) to structure an alliance for free trade, freedom of navigation, and the rule of law. It also stands against attempts to unilaterally change the status quo. Moreover, Japan actively leads international efforts to create new rules (in international trade and data flow, among other things) and proactively contributes to peacebuilding and other global issues, such as disaster risk reduction, human rights, global health, and environmental protection and climate change.

Given such conditions, Brazil and Japan repositioned their bilateral relations to the level of a global strategic partnership in 2014. Although the Brazil–Japan cooperation has revolved around economic complementarity based on factor endowments (land, labor, capital, and technology), the strategic characteristics in their relation have gained relevance recently as the two countries pursue diplomatic autonomy and prominent positions in the international community.

In Chap. 2, Oliveira and Lessa ask whether the strategic partnership between Brazil and Japan is genuine or an illusion. The authors reaffirm that the economic complementarity between the two countries has decreased since the early 1980s and that there has been financial and commercial distancing because of macroeconomic downturns.

They recall that the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998 triggered the interests of Japan in Latin America while the rise of Chinese influence in Latin America reoriented the Japanese strategy in the region. Brazil and Japan engaged in some epoch-making events, such as the 100th anniversary of Japanese immigration in Brazil, the Japan–Brazil Partnership Program (JBPP) for triangular development cooperation with third countries, the G4 (Brazil, Germany, India, and Japan) campaign for United Nations Security Council reform, and Brazil’s adoption of the Japanese system of digital television broadcasting. The latter developed into the Japanese–Brazilian Digital TV system (ISDB-Tb), which was adopted by 18 other countries. Japan announced a guiding principle for the Latin American strategy, referring to it as “Together (Juntos in Portuguese),” that is, “progress together,” “lead together,” and “inspire together.” Japan also inaugurated the “Japan House” in São Paulo, as well as in Los Angeles and London, as a soft power base to promote Japanese contemporary culture and social values. Chapter 2 concludes that the history and motivations for the bilateral relationship between Brazil and Japan show the reality of a shared mutual interest, which is grounded in a deep “human bond” in economic–financial complementarity, and in bilateral and triangular projects that promote development. It is for all these reasons that this relationship can be called strategic.

In Chap. 3, the trend of official development assistance (ODA) among Japanese diplomatic instruments is analyzed, with a focus on the health sector. Campos and Kawai point out that Japan’s ODA is predominantly aligned with a hegemonic Western effort to maintain its influence and agendas in Asia. They also observe that Japan’s ODA for health does not necessarily reflect developing countries’ needs and demands as it broadly aligns with the agendas of international and multilateral health cooperation initiatives. Japan’s ODA steadily expanded until the 1990s, when Japan became the world’s top donor. However, it has shown a decline since then. Social infrastructure, including health, education, water, and sanitation, made up around 20% of the total ODA until the 1990s. This proportion declined significantly afterward while the share of economic infrastructure rose, thereby implying health as an outcome of economic development.

Japan’s ODA since the 2000s has been characterized by the critical concept of “human security.” ODA is focused on human-centered development and is explicitly linked to the health sector. Japan’s ODA has evidently been strengthened in the health sector, building expertise in addressing infectious diseases and the need for maternal and child healthcare. The Japanese ODA policy emphasizes improving the global health architecture in international and multilateral institutions to promote universal health coverage in recipient countries. In Chap. 3, Japan’s ODA in the context of the current COVID-19 pandemic is predicted to align with the international paradigm of valuing human security and establishing equality in health. The shared recognition of the tremendous global health challenges involved in dealing with emergencies and achieving equity further highlights the importance of Japanese expert contribution to tackling infectious diseases and maternal and child healthcare. Furthermore, the authors suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic has the potential to further affect and even shift Japan’s ODA to the healthcare sector in developing countries. Brazil and Japan, having accumulated rich experiences in international cooperation and foreign aid in the area of health, should be studied more comprehensively to foster their strategic partnership as they deal with the enormous global health challenges that lie ahead.

In Chap. 4, Japan’s ODA in global environmental issues is examined. Brazil and Japan are actors in multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs). The Japanese ODA is oriented to support negotiations and diplomacy around MEAs. Brazil, the host of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development and the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), moved from veto to proposition on sensitive issues in the global environmental debate. As a part of Japan’s ODA to Brazil, The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) implemented a project aimed at utilizing the Advanced Land Observing Satellite images for the surveillance of the Amazonia to protect the rainforest from illegal deforestation. Two cases of agricultural development in Brazil with Japanese cooperation are examined in this chapter: the Japanese–Brazilian Cooperation Program for Cerrados Development (PRODECER) in Paracatu (state of Minas Gerais) and the Agroforestry Systems in Tome-Açú (state of Pará). The authors highlight common issues. As projects thrived with expanding production, the local areas faced environmental challenges. Although PRODECER officially demonstrated compliance with Brazilian environmental legislation, the sustainability of the program, particularly its environmental dimension, was jeopardized by its negative environmental impacts. Meanwhile, the project initiative in Tomé-Açu, supported by JICA, was aimed at promoting social, economic, and environmental sustainability; therefore, it can be considered to be in line with global objectives and MEAs. The Nikkei community’s virtues of ethics, solidarity, and resilience are considered fundamental to the success of the project in Tomé-Açu. At this stage, the associationism of local producers, which mainly consisted of Nikkei Brazilians, came into play in the two cases to remedy problems and coordinate the direction of social sustainable development. It is critical to understand that global environmental governance must interplay with community-level values, such as ethics, solidarity, and resilience. International cooperation, such as ODA, should support the global–local nexus.

In Chap. 5, Koyasu and Ramos report that Japan’s cooperation in African development through the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) and the westward extension of the FOIP strategy to Eastern Africa merged Brazilian cooperation with Africa, particularly Portuguese-speaking Africa (PALOP in Portuguese abbreviation). The authors consider the possibilities for Brazil and Japan to increase innovative triangular cooperation in Africa. The experience of the Tripartite Program for Agricultural Development of the Tropical Savanna in Mozambique is a notable case. The project was inspired by PRODECER and was aimed at transforming Mozambique’s savannas into fertile and food-producing lands with the infrastructure development in the Nacala corridor. It is noteworthy that the Japanese government invited Brazilian representatives to participate in TICAD VII in Yokohama in August 2019. More recently, the trilateral projects maintained between Brazil–Japan, and Portuguese-speaking African countries have suffered setbacks because of not only the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic but also the general distance from Africa imposed by the political choices of the current Brazilian government. Thus, the current belief is that only concerted policies and better governance within countries could lead to policies with greater consideration for African values and needs. Under the JBPP, Brazil and Japan are expected to use available resources and the knowledge obtained from past development cooperation experiences to assist other developing countries, including Africa.

As described in Chap. 2, Oliveira and Lessa point out that the existing financial and economic complementarity between Brazil and Japan facilitates their cooperation toward contributing to each other’s national development agenda. This direction is the focus of Chaps. 6 and 7.

Japan entered the population-declining phase around 2008. The Japanese population is also aging, which exacerbates labor force decline. Meanwhile, the Japanese legal system has yet to officially provide stipulations for migrant foreign labor. Nevertheless, it has already created some special visa statuses for those who come to Japan to provide work. Thus, the existence of foreign workers and the co-living with people with distinct cultural backgrounds are already a reality. The inflow of Nikkei Brazilians following the amendment of the Immigration Control Act in 1990 represents the main case. In Chap. 6, the magnitude of this process is discussed in detail. Although the boom has passed, about 200,000 Nikkei Brazilians remain in Japan as permanent residents, and the number of those belonging to the second generation continues to increase. Bugarin and Yamazaki focus on the struggles of children accompanying their working parents and those born in Japan. They report that those children are in a “double limited” situation, that is, they have limited linguistic capability in Portuguese (native language of the family) and Japanese (required in a school setting). In particular, the children face enormous difficulty in adapting to primary education in Japan and the transition to secondary education (high schools). Hence, the hurdle for social ascension is considerable. As described in Chap. 6, there are several innovative approaches of local governments and private initiatives, but available resources are scarce. The authors propose that the Japanese society should invest in afterschool programs as a less-expensive supplementary educational institution, which would enable Brazilian families in Japan to exploit economic incentives and thereby maximize their lifetime income. With a hybrid system, psychological costs and communication loss are also reduced. The more efficient Brazilian afterschool programs become, the less expensive it will be for the Japanese government. In the medium term, this policy will produce more productive citizens and become financially self-sustaining.

Finally, Chap. 7 reviews the transfer of the Japanese-style total quality control (TQC) method, also known as Kaizen, to Brazil. The Japanese-style TQC is the total company-wide continuous improvement activity that employs the plan–do–check–act cycle as a workhorse model. A company is an organic system where all constituents continue to learn from the top to the end and adapt to external conditions through the rearrangement of its systemic organization. Thus, the Japanese-style TQC is human-based. Its benefit is not limited to firms’ financial gains as it also cultivates enhanced pleasure at work by improving one’s sense of progress in terms of personal capabilities. Hamaguchi and Miyazaki describe the challenge of adapting the Japanese-style TQC method to the Brazilian labor environment where the management overpowered workers and labor relations were confrontational. In the 1990s, the international trade liberalization compelled Brazilian firms to be keen on competitiveness. At that time, Brazilian firms sought machine-based productivity and quality gains instead of the human-based paradigm of the Japanese-style TQC approach. The authors argue that given the social divide in Brazil based on significant income inequalities, which exacerbate as firm profits are distributed unequally among workers, the Brazilian society needs to change directions by valuing quality jobs where workers receive not only decent returns from quality and productivity improvement but also a higher satisfaction from working with dignity and a sense of human capability improvement. Hence, Hamaguchi and Miyazaki consider that the human-centered philosophy of the Japanese-style TQC method has the potential to transform the concept of work. They also notice that the original Japanese model is supported by some cultural peculiarities. Therefore, an adaptation to different countries and sectors other than manufacturing requires careful remodeling.

2 Concluding Remarks on Structuring Brazil–Japan Cooperation from Complementarity to Shared Value

Brazil and Japan intensified cooperation in the 1960s and 1970s. It was mainly motivated by economic interests. On the one hand, Japan looked for natural resources to sustain its high economic growth and growing foreign market for manufactured products. On the other hand, Brazil needed capital and technology to develop the natural resource potential and upgrade industrialization to produce machinery and industrial input. There was also a politically-motivated interest in both countries to reduce dependence on the United States. Hence, the Brazil–Japan partnership had economic and political relevance based on complementarity.

However, the bilateral complementarity decreased because of transformations of both countries’ economic structures and international relations in the past decades. The Japanese economy has matured into a low and stable growth stage. Japan established natural resource sourcing in Asia and Oceania, reducing dependence on long-haul sourcing from Latin America. Trade liberalization transformed Brazil into deindustrialization to some extent, limiting Japanese investment scope. China emerged boldly as a new complementary-based partner for Brazil in a context similar to Japan in the past on a much grander scale.

The analyses presented in this volume showed that the Brazil–Japan relationship could be structured to turn around the doomed outlook. We found a vast array of areas of cooperation for both countries to engage in a deeper strategic partnership. The strategic partnership does not rest on existing complementarities, but it is a forward-looking joint engagement to create mutually rewarding future values. The partnership will require mutual trust. In this regard, as pointed out in Chap. 2, Brazil and Japan can exploit the human bond cultivated based on the largest Nikkei community outside Japan in Brazil. Chapter 4 found that the Nikkei communities’ associationism was fundamental for the success of environmentally sustainable agricultural development and played a crucial role in associating the global environmental governance and the local values in ethics and solidarity.

Besides agricultural development, Brazil and Japan also have shared experiences in tackling infectious diseases and promoting maternal and child healthcare in poorer tropical areas, as mentioned in Chap. 3. Thus, the two countries can lead together in critical global challenges studied in this book, such as food security, environmental governance, and healthcare. They can also extend triangular cooperation in third-party countries, as discussed in Chap. 5, targeting countries where two counties’ interests overlap, such as FOIP and PALOP.

Brazil–Japan, and the United States launched a new cooperation initiative Japan–US-Brazil Exchange (JUSBE) in November 2020. The areas of interest of this alliance include cooperation in the global governance of an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure internet.

The strategic partnership can also be devised to contribute to each country’s national development agenda. Chapter 6 sheds light on Japan’s challenge to a multicultural co-living society. It has become clear that the existing social system based on a homogeneous society is not adequate for changing reality. In particular, education for children requires an immediate fix. The solution to this problem is essential for the well-being of Brazilian families residing in Japan, and may also contribute to reducing the population deficit in Japan. It is also vital to protect the shared value of the Nikkei community as the cornerstone of the Brazil–Japan partnership.

Brazil is inherently a heterogeneous society. One of its significant challenges is to dissolve the social divide rooted in persisting inequalities. The conclusion of Chap. 7 implied that the adaptation of the Japanese-style TQC may enhance the value of human-centered quality jobs.

Along with global and bilateral agendas studied in this book, Brazil and Japan should continue to cooperate for peacebuilding, including the reform of the United Nations Security Council. Russian military invasion in Ukraine has provoked severe doubt on the legitimacy and effectiveness of the Council with permanent members’ veto power. The G4 will be tested their seriousness on the reform in the next few years.