The sea between the Korean Peninsula and the Japanese Archipelago is mainly called “Sea of Japan” in the international society. Concerning this, two Koreas have raised complaint under the rationale of the historical background and the international norms. The complaint of the Korean people concerning the naming issue most deeply lies in the fact that the name “Sea of Japan” which is “favorable” to Japan has been used as the (sole) official international name, whereas the name “East Sea” which is “favorable” to Korea has not been adopted even as the second official international name, regardless of its exact historical background. In the naming dispute like this, the best solution is to create a neutral single name through negotiations by the countries concerned. In case the countries concerned fail to create a neutral single name, the second-best solution is to use multiple names. From this kind of viewpoint, concerning the naming dispute, this article requests three countries, Japan, South Korea and North Korea, to negotiate to create a neutral single name.

This article aims to find the answer to the question whether it is possible for the international society to denuclearize North Korea or not in the situation that North Korea is fast developing nuclear weapons and missiles in defiance of economic sanctions. For this aim, I approached this issue in the following steps. Firstly, I reviewed some basic points related to this issue. 1) I constructed the model for relationships between two countries. The types are confrontation, war and normal relationship. 2) I classified strategies for survival of a country. The types are self-reliance, forming alliance, collective security and world government. 3) I classified statuses of nuclearized countries. The statuses are being recognized, having declared and not having declared. Secondly, I checked the characteristics of the strategies of North Korea for its survival. Even though they are seeking the strategies of self-reliance, forming alliance and collective security, they are laying emphasis on self-reliance. This might be deeply related to their persistent seeking of nuclear weapons. Thirdly, I reviewed the development of North Korean nuclear issue focusing on the movements for nuclearization and denuclearization. Fourthly, I checked the opinions of some experts about the question whether its nuclearization is North Korea’s real goal or not. Fifthly, I constructed the dynamics of the North Korean nuclear issue focusing on the goals and means of the key players (North Korea, the U.S. and China). Sixthly, I checked the possibility of denuclearizing North Korea based on the analysis. Seventhly, I raised the task of preparing for the possibility that denuclearizing North Korea is hard to be attained.

Territorial Disputes proceed basically based on the “power”, and in the process various “logics” are mobilized by both sides. By the way, those logics are “political”, in the sense that their conclusions are not drawn out through sound reasoning, but decided in advance and then necessary logics are mobilized. People showing this kind of attitude most vividly are politicians representing their country. By the way, ordinary people living in each country engaged in a territorial dispute usually, consciously or unconsciously, adopt the patriotic logics that their politicians and intelligentsia offer. It seems that two factors are influential in this phenomenon. One is the “ontological” aspect, that is, each person is a component of the nation engaged in the win-or-lose territorial dispute. The other is the “epistemological” aspect, that is, he is situated in the limited information. We need to pay attention that logics offered in the process of territorial disputes by this kind of patriotic politicians and intelligentsia are not constructed from the fair viewpoint, but “edited” intending to lead to the conclusion favorable to their country. So the people of the relevant country who live in the situation where they are exposed to and accept the patriotic logics often think that the position of his own country is “vividly” right. Then, they easily think the opponent is a “bad” country which purports unreasonable logics. In the territorial dispute, if both countries try to secure momentum by uniting each people to be prepared to fight to the death, the dispute is easily escalated to the limit. Of course, this kind of phenomenon works towards the direction of worsening their mutual relationship. The position each country takes in a territorial dispute, from the viewpoint of each country, is “patriotic”. But from a wider viewpoint, we can say that it is based on “national egotism”. The alternative to this kind of vicious cycle is that more and more people will escape from the “political” viewpoint and take the “critical” viewpoint and then try to dissuade the government and the ordinary people of each country from behaving excessively obsessed with its national egotism respectively.