A Study On National Economic Security Factors Of Japan’s Outward Foreign Direct Investment

Since the implementation of the "going out" strategy in 2000,China’s outward direct investment has shown a rapid development trend,not only the scale of investment has continued to increase,but also the coverage of regions and industries of outward investment has also expanded.However,on the whole,China’s outward direct investment still has obvious deficiencies,and in the process of Chinese enterprises going global,multiple problems have been exposed,such as lack of international experience,high investment failure rate,imbalance in investment industrial structure,and urgent need to improve investment quality.In the second decade of the 21 st century,the intensification of the game of great powers has led to increased uncertainty in the international economic environment,the new crown pneumonia epidemic has accelerated the reconstruction of the global industrial chain and supply chain,and the importance of national economic security has been further highlighted.As an important way to maintain national economic security,maintaining and giving play to comparative advantages through reasonable outward direct investment,striving to continuously enhance international competitiveness while integrating into the global economy,and effectively preventing and responding to economic threats are inevitable requirements for responding to General Secretary Xi Jinping’s call for "overall development and security" under open conditions.At present,China is facing many economic threats such as the continuous intensification of dependence on the international energy market,the low end of the global industrial chain and lack of competitiveness in some industries,the lack of overall scientific and technological strength,and the intensification of China-US trade frictions,while Japan,which is also a catch-up country,has experienced similar economic security problems in the post-war development process.In the early postwar period,ensuring stable energy supply was the primary issue in achieving Japan’s economic recovery and development,and ensuring energy security played a prominent role in maintaining national economic security.At the beginning of the 60 s of the 20 th century,with the improvement of the balance of payments and the significant increase in the level of exports,Japan’s trade frictions continued to emerge and reached their peak in the mid-80 s,and safeguarding trade interests and ensuring trade security became an important consideration for Japan to ensure national economic security during this period.The two oil crises in the 70 s hit the Japanese economy hard,and vigorously developing low-energy-consuming and high-value-added industries and promoting the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure became Japan’s priority choice for maintaining industrial competitiveness and maintaining economic security.After years of introduction and catch-up,Japan’s scientific and technological level has been in the forefront of the world in the 80 s,and continuously improving its independent innovation ability and expanding technological advantages have become the key to ensuring Japan’s economic security since then.Along with the changes in economic security demands at different stages,Japan’s OFDI has shown a continuous development trend and played an important role in safeguarding national economic security.Therefore,it is very necessary to study the mechanism and strategy system of Japan’s outward direct investment in maintaining national economic security after the war,which can not only provide forward-looking theoretical guidance for China to maintain national economic security through OFDI,but also provide practical significance for China to correctly analyze and judge the current situation and process of enterprises "going out" and choose an outward direct investment path suitable for its national conditions.Based on the theory of national economic security,this paper studies the mechanism,investment strategy and investment effect of OFDI in the three economic security subfields of energy security,trade security and industrial security according to the focus of Japan’s economic security demands in different periods,and deeply discusses the development trend and problems of OFDI in the context of the Japanese government’s increasingly strengthening of economic security considerations in the new era.It has gained enlightenment on how to choose the strategy of OFDI to safeguard China’s economic security.The main contents and conclusions are as follows:First,starting from the definition of the connotation of OFDI and national economic security,combined with the theoretical basis of OFDI to safeguard national economic security,the role mechanism of Japan’s OFDI in safeguarding national economic security is analyzed from three sub-fields: energy security,trade security and industrial security.It is found that in the field of energy security,the mechanism of OFDI is mainly reflected in two aspects: reducing external dependence and improving autonomy,Japan reduces its dependence on a single country by enriching energy import channels,increases the diversity of energy structure and reduces its dependence on a single energy source,and promotes investment in upstream energy projects to improve its autonomy to ensure stable energy supply.In the field of trade security,when the deterioration of the foreign trade environment leads to the escalation of trade frictions and damage trade interests,Japan protects trade interests by directly investing in countries where frictions occur,and expanding its international market share by roundabout exports after investing in and setting up factories in third countries.In the field of industrial security,Japan has maintained its industrial competitive advantage by shifting marginal industries to developing countries to enhance its control,enhancing its competitiveness by optimizing its industrial structure,and enhancing its scientific and technological innovation strength by investing in foreign R&D.Second,based on Japan’s postwar economic security demands,the security threats faced by Japan in the energy,trade and industrial fields are analyzed.It is found that the lack of energy endowment,the intensification of supply-demand contradictions,the single import channel,the fragility of transportation channels,and the intensification of competition in the international energy market are the main factors threatening Japan’s energy security.The imbalance of the trade regional structure,the spread of new trade protectionism around the world,and the dissatisfaction of other countries with its trade protection policies and the widening of trade surpluses are the main factors leading to the deterioration of Japan’s foreign trade environment.The constraints on the living environment of domestic industries,the lack of independent innovation strength,the "catch-up" of developing countries and the "squeeze" of developed countries are the main factors threatening Japan’s industrial security.Third,based on the main economic threats facing Japan,the investment strategies and investment effects of Japan’s foreign direct investment to maintain national economic security are analyzed from the three fields of energy security,trade security and industrial security.It is found that in order to ensure energy security,Japan paves the way for energy investment through "energy diplomacy",pays attention to strengthening direct investment in maritime transportation channel node countries,and forms a comprehensive energy development system among governments,institutions and enterprises to promote foreign energy investment in a coordinated manner,which has played a role in enriching energy import channels,improving the level of independent energy development,and increasing the diversity of energy structure.In order to protect trade interests,Japan has maintained trade security by expanding direct investment to avoid trade barriers,increasing localized procurement and production to eliminate dissatisfaction in host countries,expanding the scale of local employment and improving relations with host countries.In order to ensure industrial security,Japan has taken advantage of overseas comparative advantages to continue the competitiveness of traditional industries,maintained competitive advantages by strengthening industrial control over developing countries,timely cultivated emerging industries to fill the gap in industrial transfer,given full play to the advantages of multiple types of investment entities to promote industrial structure upgrading,and carried out foreign R&D investment to enhance innovation strength,which has played a role in enhancing industrial competitiveness.Fourth,combined with the reasons why the Japanese government has continuously emphasized economic security since the 21 st century,especially since2018,the new trends and difficulties faced by Japan’s OFDI are analyzed.The study finds that under the new economic security considerations,Japan’s outward direct investment has shown a trend of diversification,expanding the scale of acquisitions in the semiconductor and information industries,increasing the ratio of local production and procurement,and actively promoting overseas infrastructure investment.However,there is a two-way interaction between OFDI and national economic security,and excessive emphasis on economic security will inevitably lead to a series of problems such as the obstruction of regional supply chain cooperation,the reduction of return on investment,the decline in the competitiveness of multinational enterprises,and the loss of open innovation opportunities,which hinder the smooth development of Japan’s OFDI and ultimately are not conducive to safeguarding its economic interests.Fifth,after comparing the similarities and differences between Chinese and Japanese OFDI,we have obtained enlightenment on China’s OFDI to safeguard national economic security.At present,China’s outward direct investment has shortcomings such as imbalance in the industrial structure of investment,excessive concentration of investment regions,small scale of investment in developed countries and low level of manufacturing investment,etc.,and energy security should be maintained by increasing the scale of investment in energy projects,establishing overseas insurance systems,and strengthening the coordinated layout of OFDI and foreign aid.Maintain trade security by building a group of large multinational enterprises,optimizing the cooperation system between small and medium-sized enterprises and large enterprises,and encouraging the financial sector to expand financial support for multinational enterprises;Maintain industrial security by encouraging enterprises to invest in high-end manufacturing and high-tech fields,expanding investment in technological highlands with intensive scientific and technological resources,and making full use of global scientific and technological intellectual resources.However,in general,China and Japan are facing different international environments and stages of development,and we cannot completely copy Japan’s experience,and should actively coordinate the interests of the host country on the basis of fully considering the relationship between China and the international economic system,take the construction of a new development pattern as the foundation,promote the smooth progress of OFDI to the greatest extent,and safeguard national economic security.The innovation points of this paper are mainly manifested in two aspects: first,combined with the theoretical basis of OFDI to maintain national economic security,it analyzes the role mechanism,investment strategy and investment effect of Japan’s OFDI in safeguarding national economic security after the war,and supplements the shortcomings of Japan’s OFDI research;Second,based on the evolution of Japan’s economic security demands after the war,Japan’s OFDI has been analyzed from the three economic security sub-fields of energy security,trade security,and industrial security,enriching the research perspective of OFDI.