Japan's international cooperation is conducted in the spirit of the preamble to the Japanese Constitution, which sets out the "determination" of the Japanese people to contribute to the international community

While many studies of contemporary Japan have been concerned primarily with its changing aspects, pointing to the ''traditional" and "modern" elements as representing opposing qualities, Professor Chie Nakane asserts that modern Japan's progress is founded on persistent social patterns which existed centuries ago, almost as if decades of modernization have had little if any effect on the core of society