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Japan’s power in Asia remains steady, but leadership churn in Tokyo has seen it lose altitude as an Indo-Pacific player.
Susannah Patton
Susannah Patton is Director, Asia Engagement at RMIT and a Nonresident fellow at the Lowy Institute.
Jack Sato
Jack Sato is a Data Analyst for the Asia Power Index at the Lowy Institute.
Topics
Japan’s power in Asia remained steady in 2025, ranking in fourth place behind the United States, China, and India, and slightly below the threshold of 40 points defined by the Index for a “major power”.
Japan recorded negative results for all resources measures except military capability, reflecting its modest economic growth trajectory and the long-term demographic challenge it faces from an ageing population and declining birthrates. These factors place a structural limit on Japan’s ability to increase its power in Asia as part of efforts to counterbalance China.
Despite this, Japan’s military capability has continued a trend of modest growth since 2021. Tokyo’s increased investment over the past decade in defence technologies and counter-strike capabilities to respond to a more challenging regional security environment has started to yield results. Experts appraise Japan’s military capabilities much more positively than they did five years ago, especially in terms of its posture to respond to a conflict in Asia. Japan’s defence networks, an area in which the country has improved greatly since the inception of the Asia Power Index in 2018, were flat in 2025, both in terms of the deepening of Japan’s alliance relationship with the United States, and in terms of Japan’s defence diplomacy with regional countries. Taken together, Japan’s performance in these two measures suggests that it is consolidating, rather than accelerating, the implementation of the Shinzo Abe-era policies that have made it a more important regional security actor.
However, Tokyo has also experienced leadership churn, with three relatively short-term prime ministers since Shinzo Abe left office in 2020 and a fourth prime minister newly instated in October 2025. Japan’s score for foreign policy declined in 2025, falling behind India and Singapore and reflecting negative expert appraisals of its strategic ambition, as well as its regional and global leadership. Japan was also less active in its high-level diplomacy, with political change affecting the cadence of meetings held at the foreign minister or leader level.
Japan’s “smart power” performance in terms of economic relationships and cultural influence is undiminished in the 2025 edition of the Asia Power Index, the latter due to much higher pulling power as a migration and tourism destination from countries in Asia. With these scores remaining healthy despite the weakening of Japan’s underlying resources, the country’s strong positive Power Gap score continued to improve.
Japan is not alone in facing political churn, constraining its regional diplomatic role at an uncertain time. Following former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s declaration of martial law in December 2024, South Korea had acting presidents for six months until Lee Jae Myung was inaugurated in June 2025. Uncertainty about the trajectory of South Korean foreign policy is likely one reason why experts appraised Seoul’s regional influence more negatively in 2025. Expert appraisals of Taiwan’s new leader Lai Ching-te, who took office in May 2024, were also sharply more negative in terms of regional and global leadership than for his predecessor Tsai Ing-wen, despite policy continuity, again reflecting the greater ability of well-known leaders to prosecute their country’s interests as compared to newer leaders who are yet to establish themselves.
