In response to the establishment of the Network of East Asian Think-tanks (NEAT) and the East Asia Forum (EAF) in 2003 at the request of the ASEAN+3(Japan, China and ROK) Summit, the Council on East Asian Community (CEAC) was inaugurated in 2004 in Japan to participate in the activities of these epistemic communities as the representative of Japan. Accordingly, it should be noted that CEAC is not designed to promote an “East Asian community” per se, but to study it.This means that CEAC is not presumptive of any specific definition of an “East Asian community.” There being various views on the geographical scope of “East Asia” and the concrete structure of “community,” CEAC confines itself to the study of the implications of each of these views and to the pursuance of whatever kind of strategic responses Japan should choose.