Le relazioni sino-giapponesi dal secondo dopoguerra ad oggi: tra sicurezza nazionale ed instabilità regionale

The balance of power between China and Japan and their respective perceptions are fundamental determinants for the stability in East Asia. Sino-Japanese interaction is part of a wider political and strategic-military competition in the region, anchored to opposite interpretations about the Sino-Japanese Wars of the nineteenth century. Over the past two decades, most of the international debate refers to the rise of Chinese power as the main threat to the regional order. Chinese assertiveness is described as a strategy aimed to upset the status quo and, therefore, not in compliancewith the conduct of other regional actors. Nevertheless, the analysis of the Sino-Japanese interaction since the Second Postwar up until nowadays proves that China has been in a reactive position, as restricted by the U.S.-Japan military alliance and by the Japanese reluctance to apologize for its imperialist past in China