Based on thorough research and drawing from primary sources, Jennifer Miller's Cold War Democracy: The United States and Japan provides a comprehensive and critical account of American policymakers’ efforts to transform Japanese attitudes and encourage Japan to adopt democracy in the decades following World War II. Miller highlights how American authorities’ concept of democratic values emerged from the experiences of World War II and evolved over the course of the international mobilization against Communism which followed.

The first chapter examines the United States’ wartime planning and its post-war occupation of Japan in order to analyze how American visions and ideologies of democracy developed through war and its aftermath. The second chapter analyzes the process of rebuilding Japan's military, or National Police Reserve (NPR), in the final years of the US occupation. The NPR became an important site where American and Japanese policymakers sought to infuse Japan with democratic values by, on one hand, fostering Japanese commitment to Cold War security and, on the other hand, preventing the reemergence of a militarist Japanese state. The third chapter examines the creation and reception of the San Francisco Peace Treaty. Americans and Japanese alike exalted this treaty as a site of democratic mobilization, arguing that a reborn Japan, committed to defense of the “free world,” would safeguard peace and democracy at home and throughout Asia. The fourth chapter deals with popular resistance to American Cold War policies, focusing primarily on anti-base protests in Japan and Okinawa. The upheaval surrounding US military bases reflected the constant tensions between government policymaking and everyday democratic activism, tensions which fundamentally influenced the US–Japan alliance throughout the 1950s. The fifth chapter examines the widespread protests against the renewal of the US–Japan security treaty in 1960. American policymakers denied the Japanese left's call for a pacifist and economically egalitarian democratic order and criticized opposition movements as the work of an anti-democratic minority which sought to turn democracy against itself. The sixth chapter analyzes Japan and the US's shared emphasis on apolitical economic growth and prosperity as a new source of political stability, psychological health, and democratic legitimacy throughout the 1950s and 1960s. It also explores how American policymakers sought to disseminate the Japanese “model” as a vital example for the rest of Asia.

Miller's book significantly contributes to the historiography of US–Japanese Cold War relations by focusing on the ideological values expressed by the governments and people. The historiography contains an abundance of work exploring American policy during the US occupation of Japan, much of it by prominent scholars such as Iokibe Makoto, John W. Dower, Michael Schaller, Takemae Eiji, Fukunaga Fumio and Kusunoki Ayako. Miller's work successfully extends this body of scholarship by highlighting the American ideological project which forwarded the establishment and defense of “democracy” as the main rationale for this alliance. Her book's most unique and insightful argument is that the American approach toward Japan was marked by key ideological continuities which extended from wartime planning through the 1960s. Miller persuasively proves this point by defining democratization as not merely a process of establishing formal rights and institutions but as a process of mental and psychological mobilization. She demonstrates that the shift of US occupation policy commonly known as “reverse course” was actually a part of an ongoing effort to stabilize and secure the democratic mind and spirit against a deviant and aggressive communist enemy (p. 28).

This book also contributes to the field by giving readers a fresh perspective on how American authorities promoted democracy during the Cold War. Miller demonstrates that American policymakers expected Japan to model democratic and industrial possibilities for the rest of Asia by analyzing the programs of Third Country Training, the Asian Productivity Organization (APO), and the Ford Foundation. Her argument inspires deep thinking about America's regional approach to its non-democratic allies – including South Korea, South Vietnam, Taiwan, The Philippines and Thailand – and Japan's role in this approach during the Cold War years. In the book's introduction, she claims that in the existing literature, scholars conceptually separate American thinking about Japan from the rest of Asia and deal with the US–Japanese relations as an exceptional or isolated case (pp. 18–19). Thus, this book fills a gap in the existing literature.Footnote ¹

This book also prompts deep thinking about the long-term impacts of this strategy. For example, it raises the question: if the US implemented a comprehensive regional strategy to promote democracy, capitalism, and US-led economic development throughout the 1960s, how did this strategy manifest in policies through the rest of the Cold War and beyond? Moreover, Miller's definition of democratization as a process of mental and psychological transformation helps us surmount the dichotomous scholarly debate over US foreign policy, wherein some scholars see the promotion of democracy as a key and legitimate element of American strategy and others argue that this rhetoric is used to justify American imperialism.

Although it presents a historical study, the work is timely in light of the seeming contrast between the contemporary US and Japan's attitudes toward democratic values. While US President Donald Trump frequently attacks an independent judiciary, the separation of powers, a free press, and the legitimacy of elections at home (and has refused to advocate for free trade and democratic values overseas), Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe emphasizes Japan's ties to its democratic allies and the significance of free trade in an unprecedented manner. Does this signal a departure from the era when the two countries ostensibly shared democratic values? Will President Trump's actions affect this bilateral relationship or impact on American alliances and foreign policy on a broader scale? Miller's book may provide helpful hints for those seeking to answer these questions.

One of the book's greatest strengths is its wealth of primary sources, especially its use of declassified documents from the US National Archives and Record Administration. I found, however, that Miller could also have referred to Japanese-language primary and secondary sources in more detail to examine the Japanese side's responses to American efforts for convergence of ideology. For example, how did Japanese conservative leaders transform their idea and concept of democracy throughout the occupation period? Initially, conservative leaders such as Shidehara Kijuro and Yoshida Shigeru believed that restoring and strengthening Japan's pre-war liberalist and democratic movements was sufficient.Footnote ² As Inoue Toshikazu discusses, Yoshida was convinced that postwar Japan should return to the 1920s, in which he believed Japan had enjoyed advanced constitutional monarchy, the same as Great Britain and three northern European countries.Footnote ³ Even after he accepted the definition of the emperor as the symbol of the state in the new constitution, Yoshida nevertheless retained his belief that democracy in Japan must be based on the idea and spirit that respecting the imperial family has formed the foundation of Japanese social order.Footnote ⁴ By examining the mentality and psychology of Japanese leaders more closely, Miller could have enhanced her argument that “democracy” provided contested, paradoxical and ambiguous meaning for various actors both in Japan and the United States.

Cold War Democracy: The United States and Japan is clearly written, thoroughly researched, well-documented, and a valuable contribution to our understanding of American foreign policy during the Cold War era and beyond. Anyone interested in diplomatic history and current international relations will gain a lot from reading this superb study.