Japan’s Role in Responding to the Crisis in Southeast Asia and the

Since the economic crisis erupted in Southeast Asia, there has been a tendency towards the revival of East Asian regionalism. Existing regional cooperation, the IMF and other international institutions were not effective in dealing with the crisis. The US also did not pay much attention. Thus crisis-hit countries sought helps from major powers in the region. On the other hand, Japan saw the chance to play an important role in assisting these countries. Despite some difficulty, Japan proposed some significant initiatives in responding to the crisis such as the Asian Monetary Fund and the New Miyazawa Initiative. In general, ASEAN welcomed Japan’s initiatives. This paper analyzes what Japan has done so far to cooperate with the crisis-hit countries cope with the crisis, in spite of its own economic woes. It also analyzes the prospect of East Asian regionalism, what position ASEAN (especially Indonesia) has taken to respond Japan’s initiatives, what would be in the future development of regional cooperation there. Indications will be searched for answering these inquiries. Special focus is paid on ASEAN + 3 since it is now the ‘only ’ representative and could go into further East Asia