Law and policy for space situational awareness towards Space Traffic Management - A Japanese perspective

It is only in the last couple of years that the concept of Space Traffic Management (STM) has come into the spotlight in the political stage with the United States Trump administration issuing Space Policy Directive 3 (SPD3), creating a national STM policy for the first time in history. SPD3 is a revolutionary step forward, not only because it introduces the STM concept into mainstream space policy, but also because it attracted the attention of the international community to focus on this concept of STM. The purpose of this paper is to illuminate the brief history of STM in international initiatives for sustainable space activities by identifying and linking certain fragmented elements that gave rise to the concept. Based on a conceptual discussion on the reluctant nature of international space law regarding the issue of controlling traffic in outer space, this paper will highlight the importance of the role of spacecraft operators for rule-making toward an international STM regime. This paper will also provide observations from a Japanese perspective to these initiatives by introducing some political and/or industrial movements of the Japanese space community and its contemporary challenges.