Free and Open Indo-Pacific

Scholarship has shown that the geopolitical idea of the "Indo-Pacific" originated in Weimar Germany and spread to Japan through the translation of German geopolitical works, especially those of Karl Haushofer. Harvard academic Hansong Li shows in the Modern Intellectual History that Haushofer, who visited Japan as a military observer, aimed to build an "Indo-Pacific" comprising anticolonial powers to rebalance British, American, and Western European domination.[4] In The Paper and the Zhejiang Academic Journal, Li argues that Haushofer's geopolitical thought survived in post-war Japan to the present day.[5][6] In India, one of the first conscious references of the concept was by Indian historian Kalidas Nag in the 1940s in his book titled India and the Pacific World.[7]

According to Katsuyuki Yakushiji of Toyo University, FOIP, draws from the "Arc of Freedom and Prosperity" idea which Japan advanced in 2006–07.[2] In August 2007, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's speech in the Parliament of India included, "We are now at a point at which the Confluence of the Two Seas is coming into being. The Pacific and the Indian Oceans are now bringing about a dynamic coupling as seas of freedom and of prosperity."[8] According to the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe first explained Japan's commitment to the FOIP strategy in Kenya on 27 August 2016.[2][9] However even before this the concept of FOIP also falls in place with Abe's thinking of "diplomacy that takes a panoramic perspective of the world map". In 2012, Prime Minister Abe's first elucidation of FOIP went as follows:[2][10]

Peace, stability, and freedom of navigation in the Pacific Ocean are inseparable from peace, stability, and freedom of navigation in the Indian Ocean. Japan, as one of the oldest sea-faring democracies in Asia, should play a greater role—alongside Australia, India, and the US—in preserving the common good in both regions

In January 2013, Japanese government had prepared a PM Abe's speech on "Five New Principles" to be delivered in Jakarta. However, as PM Abe had to go back to Japan before the scheduled date to respond to In Amenas hostage crisis, the speech was not realized, instead its script was made available.[11]

In 2015, to implement the framework, Japan upgraded "The Guidelines for Japan-U.S. Defense Cooperation" with US,[12] agreed and shared "Japan and India Vision 2025 Special Strategic and Global Partnership" with India,[13] agreed and shared "Next steps of the Special Strategic Partnership: Asia, Pacific and Beyond" with Australia,[14] and the quadrilateral framework was prepared.

In the 2017 US National Security Strategy, Asia-Pacific was exchanged with Indo-Pacific.[2]

South Korea's approach to the Indo-Pacific is based on cooperation and complementarity between its New Southern Policy and the U.S.'s and the Quad's Indo-Pacific policy, but without openly antagonizing China.[15] In this respect, South Korea is balancing the desire for foreign policy autonomy with the need for strategic alliances, above all the United States.[16]

In June 2019, the ASEAN released a Indo-Pacific related document which reiterates and furthers pre-existing mechanisms.[17]

France's territories and EEZ, excluding Antarctic territories. A large proportion of France's overseas territories are located in the Indo-Pacific region.

European union is an Indo-Pacific power because of the several territories of France located there. France released a strategy in 2019 which was subsequently updated in 2021. Germany adopted policy guidelines for the region in September 2020. The German Federal Government considers the characterised by the Indian Ocean and the Pacific. In September 2021, the European Commission released its strategy where it defines the Indo-Pacific as the region from "the East coast of Africa to the Pacific Island states".[17][18]