In January 2024, the Japanese Cabinet Mansion announced the "Foreign Opinion Survey" from September to October 2023.The results showed that the Japanese people's "affectionate" answers to China dropped significantly from 17.8%in 2022 to 12.7%, and the answer to "not affectionate" from 81.8%to 86.7%.Since 1978, the ratio of "feel cordial" is a record low, and the ratio of "not affectionate" has a record high.
From the perspective of different ages, people aged 50 to 59 answered the most (90.3%), followed by 60 to 69 (89.8%), 70 to 79 years (87.4%To.After that, the younger the younger generation, the better the impression of China. 20.4%of people aged 18 to 29 expressed "feel kind".In other words, the younger the younger generation, the more affirmation of China.However, in the previous year's survey, 43%of people from 18 to 29 years old expressed "feel kind", and this year's value decreased from 43%to 20.4%, which was significantly deteriorated in China.In Japan's understanding of South Korea, there is also the same tendency.
In response to how to look at Japanese -China relations, the ratio of "considers good" has decreased from 11%last year to 5.6%, and the ratio of "considers not good" has increased from 84.4%to 90.1%.It can be seen that more and more people are not optimistic about the relationship between Japan and China.
Why does Japan's impression of China worsen to this point?The reasons that can be considered are that, first, the Chinese army's activities around Japan are becoming more frequent. In various senses, China has brought tremendous pressure on Japan.Second, on the "dealing with water" in August 2023, China said protesting and stopped importing water products from Japan. The media repeatedly reported on this.In view of the survey was done from September to October, the negative effects of these reports cannot be denied.Third, as of November 2023, Japan and China failed to hold a summit talks with improvement of the relationship.
On the contrary, 68.2%of people answered "important" about whether Japan -China relations are important to the two countries and the Asia -Pacific region, which greatly exceeds 27.8%of people who answered "unimportant".Compared with the previous year, the "important" answer decreased by 5 percentage points from 73.5%, and "unimportant" also increased by more than 5 percentage points from 22.1%.However, compared with 78.7%of the "important" in 2021, it reduced by more than 10 percentage points.Even so, most people recognize the importance of Japanese -China relations.From the perspective of different ages, the older the younger thinks of "important", the more 79.6%of people from 18 to 29 years old answered important.
Japan's feelings about China are "not kind", but they think that Japan -China relations are "important".This is a recent trend.In addition, the younger the younger generation, the more positive the understanding of China and the recent feature.However, when the ratio of "not affectionate" has increased significantly, the ratio of "important" is gradually declining.This state of public opinion will also affect the Japanese government.It tends to formulate policies to China based on the "not feel kind" but "important" public opinion, that is, a tough posture on military security and territorial issues, but it will not destroy the dialogue and try to improve bilateral relations.However, if the "important" part decreases, the Japanese government's good motivation for China will be reduced.If you are afraid of being criticized by the domestic conservative forces as "pro -China" like the Kishida regime, it will become more cautious about improving relations with China.How China thinks of the results of such Japanese public opinion surveys, and the two parties will continue to discuss dialogue in the future.
(the author is a professor at the University of Tokyo)
