Study On Abe Cabinet's Foreign Policy Toward Europe And Its Influence On China(2013-2018)

The status of European diplomacy in the external strategy of Abe cabinet has been continuously improved from 2013-2018.The countries of Europe have been regarded by Abe as a country sharing the basic values of freedom,democracy,basic human rights and the rule of law,and have become the focus of Abe's values diplomacy.In the process of implementing foreign policy toward Europe,Abe mainly adopted three paths.The first path is "value diplomacy",relying on universal values such as freedom,democracy,basic human rights,and the rule of law to bring the distance between Japan and European countries closer.The second path is "overlooking the globe diplomacy" by means of the leadership diplomacy,filling the weak areas of Japan's diplomacy toward Europe in the past.The third path is "uniting EU against US",signing Economic Partnership Agreement(EPA)with the EU to hedge Trump's pressure in the economic and trade fields.During the six years of his second term as Prime Minister of Japan,Abe visited many European countries and achieved fruitful results in various fields including politics,security,economy and culture.European countries have different levels of importance in Abe's diplomacy to Europe,according to the order of importance from high to low,they can be roughly divided into three levels.The first level is “the important European countries visited by Abe many times”,the second level is "groups of European regional countries that Abe has serial visited",and the third level is "small European countries that Abe has visited by the way".The EU is an important economic partner of Japan.Therefore,Abe vigorously promotes the development of economic relations between Japan and Europe.Currently,the Japan-EU Economic Partnership Agreement(EPA)has already entered into force.The Japan-EU Strategic Partnership Agreement(SPA)has also been signed to provide a legal basis for Japan-EU strategic partnership in the coming decades and strengthen the comprehensive partnership between Japan and the EU.The Abe cabinet's foreign policy toward Europe has mainly achieved four effects.First,it strengthened political cooperation between Japan and major European countries and enhanced Japan's influence in international and regional affairs.Second,by strengthening cooperation between Japan and European countries in security and defense,the Japanese defense force has been upgraded from software and hardware.Third,it promoted economic and trade cooperation between Japan and European countries,promoted trade liberalization between Japan and the EU,set standards for the 21 st century economic order.Fourth,it has won diplomatic support from European countries in the situation of East Asia and becoming a permanent member of the Security Council,and served Japan's surrounding security and becoming a major political power.Due to the high degree of diplomatic overlap between China and Japan,the Abe cabinet's foreign policy toward Europe has a great impact on China.The Japan-EU EPA will lead to strong import substitutions to China's superior products,and China's exports to Japan and the EU will be greatly reduced.Abe's pull of European countries into the South China Sea issue and the Indo-Pacific situation will make them more complicated and difficult to control,and ultimately worsen China's surrounding security environment.Abe's statements on the East China Sea,South China Sea and North Korea have damaged China's international image in Europe,portraying China as a violator of international law of the sea and an irresponsible country created obstacles for China to develop relations with European countries.