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November 02, 2004

  [paper] Editor's view

Genron NPO representative, Yasushi Kudo

Today, Japan making an urgent push for structural reform to pave the way for new future opportunities and establish a new identity in the global community and within Asia.

Japan has been criticized for its lack of initiative and inability to voice its opinions. Compared to its economic power, Japan suffers from a lack of presence in the world. This is because Japan’s political parties and government have failed to engage in truly serious debate regarding Japan’s future.

Genron NPO is an unprecedented network of thought leaders willing to think outside the box about overcoming Japan’s problems by engaging in serious dialogue. Over the last three years, our membership has grown to 500 people representing many different fields. By promoting in-depth discussions, we hope to nurture independent-minded voters who will be able to have a say in deciding Japan’s future strategies and its world status.

Over the last three years, we have conducted wide-ranging discussions on two themes, while making the proceedings available to the public.

First, on assessing to what degree Japan’s political parties have implemented their policy platforms. These platforms are promises made to voters and must be honored as contracts. Over the last three years, several national elections have been held, with political parties declaring their party platforms. However, the parties have failed to live up to their promises to voters. This is because there’s no existing mechanism linking party policy platform definition and campaign promise follow-through. Platforms are nothing but campaign slogans.

It is clearly impossible for Japan to sustain most of the systems established in the postwar era. The time has come for re-architecting.

Without redefining Japan’s vision and its systems, structural reform will come to a standstill. This is why campaign promises end up being mere slogans. This is why the Koizumi administration despite the high expectations placed upon it, has reached the limits of Prime Minister-led structural reform.

What Japan needs now is to form a consensus regarding the nation's future.

This is why our second major theme for the past two years has been facilitating discussions regarding Japan’s future.

How should Japan go about establishing a new identity in order to make its presence felt in Asia and the rest of the world?

We have used a methodology of strategy formation as the basis for dialogue on this crucial question. The entire process has been carried out in the public eye.

The discussion focuses on mid- and long-term developments in the global community, in particular the expectations that are placed upon Japan, the nation's strengths and weaknesses and its aspirations for the future. Through such debate, we hope to clarify the choices confronting Japan: choices that will decide the nation’s future.

This past spring, we offered an "Assessment of Japanese Power" based on the results of the second stage in our discussion. Around 100 people were involved in the project—experts in various fields and Genron NPO members, including journalists, government officials and private business leaders. At the same time we conducted a survey of approximately 5,000 opinion leaders and used this to calibrate our dialogue.

Now we are seeking the participation of people from Asia and other parts of the world to take the discussion still further.

The "Assessment of Japanese Power" is a reflection of how we see ourselves. Obviously, there exists a gap between Japan's self-awareness and how people in other parts of the world see Japan. We believe in the importance of recognizing and closing this gap in order to facilitate further debate on Japan’s future.

As part of this process, we are planning to set up a forum to promote serious dialogue between Japan and China. We believe that there has not been enough effort made to promote communication and fill the perception gap that exists between our two countries.

We look forward to your participation in our discussions.

投稿者 gnpo : 06:04 PM

  [report] A Power Assessment of Japan – Toward Building the Japan of the Future

Intention and objectives of the Genron NPO Asia Symposium

Genron NPO Asian Strategy Committee

Japan is one of the major economic powers of the world, and yet has little international presence, no voice of its own. To the extent that it lacks international presence, Japan’s future remains in doubt. Could it be that we have so little faith in ourselves that we have failed to define our nation’s future? With the resolution of this problem in mind, Genron NPO has arranged debates with the theme “Japan’s Future”. In this symposium, we intend to present a debate with the cooperation of key figures from Japan and overseas.

The world is undergoing a major transformation, and there is a mountain of issues concerning Japan’s future that need to be discussed. Talk about politics almost always is strongly coupled to future plans, and yet with Japan such debate has stagnated domestically. We wanted to objectively analyze the possibilities for Japan and while doing so, to present options for building the kind of nation we truly desire. This is the reason why we made the topic “Japan’s Future”, and why we embarked on a three year plan for a series of debates two years ago.

The debate we began two years ago was established in conformity with a methodology of strategy formation. As the first step, we held debates to assess mid-term and long-term trends in Asia and the world at large that bear on Japan. Here we looked at what questions are being hurled at Japan by this great transformation that has begun all over the world. Step 2 was then for us to advance a debate to reevaluate the strengths and weaknesses of Japan. Having proceeded through these discussions, from April we can now proceed to Step 3, in which we would like to link them to new debates: “What kind of nation do we want to have?”, “When building our ideal Japan, what strengths should be leveraged?”, and finally, “How may we close the gap that remains between the future transformation of Asia and the world at large on the one hand, and the building of the nation we seek on the other?” By advancing these debates, we are presenting choices for Japan’s future.

We believe that in launching the next in this series of debates, the current symposium, “A Power Assessment of Japan – Toward Building the Japan of the Future,” will play a major role. To ensure its success, we asked experts to participate in a qualitative assessment on “Japan’s Strengths and Weaknesses” in 9 fields: Economy, Politics, Pop Culture, Society/Education, Science/Technology, Defence, Military, Resource (Energy/Food), Environment, and Speech/Thought. Based on this work we produced a mapping to “Japan’s Strengths and Weaknesses”, and will present in this symposium our hypothesis, a “Japan Power Assessment,” which we open to debate by key figures in Japan. “Japan Power Assessment” can represent our perception of Japan’s current situation as emerged from Genron NPO Asian Strategy Conference. Naturally, one can imagine there will be some disparity between this perception and the way we are seen from the outside series. Strengthening our own understanding of Japan is a very important step in this series of debates, but this must not fall into self-righteousness. In particular it is important to make efforts to deepen the exchange of views with people of Asia and the world, to close that gap, and to develop a commonly shared understanding. The upcoming symposium serves that purpose as well.

In this symposium, 3 sessions are planned. We have high hopes that we will be able to clarify and begin to close the gap between our own perception and the view from the outside. As coordinator we have invited Mr. Ryosei Kokubun, who heads the Keio Institute of East Asian Studies and serves as a member of our Asian Strategy Conference. In Session 2 we will debate “Japan’s Strengths and Weaknesses” in the light of structural changes called for Japan by leading academics and business executives in Japan and overseas. The last Session will follow up on these debates with a concluding discussion topic, “To what kind of a nation should Japan aspire?”. Representatives of Japan’s intelligentsia will lead this discussion by raising issues on the topic of “Japan’s Future Strategy” which we intend in the future to turn into a genuine debate of its own.

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Now I would like to attempt a simple explanation of the evaluation method we how used in “Japan’s Strengths and Weaknesses”. When national evaluations are normally conducted the basic indices are the relative scale of different items, and quantitative data focusing on growth rates. We too referred to quantitative data for this assessment, but in fact we ended up conducting an assessment on a more qualitative basis. The reason for this approach is that we doubted whether with a solely quantitative approach, it would even be possible to clearly portray Japan’s true strengths and weaknesses. We should remember that quantitative data, which appears objective, is often supported by definitive values. Moreover, even if quantitative logic should in theory be applicable to qualitative arguments and considerations of influence, in reality we cannot quantify these aspects. We decided that what is needed now, is in fact such qualitative assessment.

Standing on that decision, we undertook a qualitative assessment of the relative strengths and weaknesses Japan has when compared with other nations. Specifically these comparisons were made over 9 major fields: (1) Economy, (2) Society and Education, (3) Pop Culture, (4) Science and Technology, (5) Defence and Military, (6) Politics, (7) Resource (Energy and Food), (8) Environment, and (9) Speech and Thought.

We then made an assessment of how Japan compared with other nations in each field, by assigning in each case one of three values: Dominant, Equal/Strong, or Weak. The basis for these judgements follows the points A, B, and C below.

A. “Leading Edge Level” (Degree of Progressiveness): How advanced Japan is in a given field, in view of development stage, level of refinement, diversity, and height and breadth.

B. “Toughness”: Whether Japan exhibits toughness in a given field considering thickness of layers, trial and error experience, self-rejuvenation, cultural mix, and ability to limit the impact of F.M. (Force Majeure, that is large-scale disasters such as caused by earthquakes and terrorism).

C. “Influence”: How much influence Japan has on the global stage when considering its brand power, degree of authority (when seen by the international community), and as a trend setter.

In the following qualitative assessment, we divided A, B, and C into subcategories for each field, and then further divided each of these into its defining characteristics, so that for each field we were able to devise relevant assessment criteria.

Some examples of this process are provided in the following. First, when we look at the “Development Stage” of the “Leading Edge Level” for the Economy field, we see that Japan’s economy clearly does not fit into the regime defined by developing countries’ hopes and works. Such a pattern was seen in many fields in the society of the 80s, but in the mid-90s in Japan after the bubble burst, Japan was seen to have clearly arrived at a defining point. Up until the 70s, Japan was absorbed with its own idea that it could do anything that the U.S. and other advanced countries could do. Now Japan has succeeded to the point that it produces people who meet global standards in many fields. That is, it has arrived at the level where it can afford to be particular when the situation demands it, and otherwise take things with a grain of salt. The Japanese now have abundant potential, and the freedom to go after any of the myriad challenges in virtually any field.

As for the “Thickness of Layer” seen in the “Toughness” subcategory of the field of Culture, one example is manga (Japanese comics) and anime (animated cartoons and films). Japan does not have a national strategy with regard to the field of Pop Culture. Therefore, it does not carry out policies as France or South Korea do, for example to create trade schools that might encourage the development of animated films. The animated film industry in these countries started to see the positive effects of the government support, while the Japanese counterpart increasingly feels anxiety over the future. But not everyone in this industry stays in this business, dreaming to become a millionaire. They derive pleasure directly from engaging in the creative effort and the “layer” (segment) of society that appreciates and supports this is extremely “thick” (broad). This is in part because Japan has ultra-specialized cultural niches populated by a huge number of people called Otaku, who when you stop to consider it are groups of experts with an extremely high level of understanding within their area of specialization.

Therefore if you only compare the peak of the mountain, so to say, Japan may be commensurate with Korea and France in anime. But if you look at the foot of the mountain, one can see that an extremely broad base supports the high point. In fact, that cultural niche represented by the base has sufficient energy to power new revolutions. The worlds of Japan’s manga and anime have such energetic bases. By recognizing both its visible and latent areas, Japan can be seen to be more than simply a nation with a large population, for its layers of creators and consumers are thick. And most of them enjoy abundant benefits of affluence extended to the entire class-free (middle class only) society. This can be said to be a unique Toughness of Japan’s.

If we consider an example of the “Authority” facet of the “Influence” subcategory in the field of Culture, the first market to which popular music groups from Peking go is Japan, and Tokyo in particular. Sales in Hong Kong are based on the success found there, and the next market targeted after that is Shanghai. Tokyo provides them with the official go-ahead. Not only in the field of Pop Culture, but also in consumer goods including cars, home appliances, electronic goods, and high quality fashion brands like Louis Vuitton, success in the Japanese market is starting to be used as a badge of quality. That Japanese consumers are particular about quality, and extremely hard to please, is by now general knowledge all over the world. Foreign manufacturers are sensitive to complaints from Japanese consumers, and in the automotive market there are more and more manufacturers that use their success in Japan when advertising their products. This is thought to be Japan’s “Authority”.

This kind of technique was used in assessments of the 9 major fields, and from the debates that served to fill in the cells in Chart 1, we developed our “Japan Power Assessment”.

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When conducting such an assessment of strengths and weaknesses, one must not forget to conduct an assessment of how important specific elements within each field are to Japan’s future overall strategy. We created a two-dimensional “Japan Strategic Map” which on the vertical axis indicates Japan’s strength in various fields, and on the horizontal axis indicates strategic importance. At the March 16 symposium we presented this as one hypothesis, and now would like to invite debate on it.

By looking at this kind of “Strategic Map”, one becomes aware of where Japan’s strengths are and whether they can truly be used within the framework of Japan’s Asia strategy. From that point, we believe that you will begin to see namely that a solution exists, that is, the solution space in which Japan can realistically aspire to having a “theoretically unlimited, but realistically grounded” identity of its own, will grow visible.

So now the problem we have to solve is, how to decide on the strategic importance of each field using some kind of a common basis. Some fixed value assumption becomes necessary here. To answer this point, we made the assumption that “Japan must become a nation which engages the world, especially Asia, through its attractiveness”.

In the first place, what the nation ultimately seeks is prosperity and security for all. In other words, the individual’s pursuit of happiness (vigor, peace of mind, purpose in life) is common to all countries, and the problem is what path a nation should take to best realize these desires for its citizens. At the symposium last March, we presented potential ideologies including that of a strong U.S.-Japan alliance (English style), a union with China (as with the France-Germany union), and pursuing an independent path (Swiss style), and had a lively debate on this topic. At the following Asian Strategy Conference we also arrived at a common understanding. Regardless of the path Japan is going to take, most important would be for Japan to build a stranger base in Asia, and pursue a more unified Asia, with deeper mutual understanding, with broadened and deepened networking within Asia across the board in order to prosper.

To achieve this, Japan must first truly open up its society and its people’s sense of nation. Then Japan must utilize inflow of resources expanded overseas vested interests in Japan to pursue its prosperity and security. In this context, last March we issued a “New Declaration to Open the Nation to the World”.

In order to realize this path, we think it is important to increase “Japan’s attractiveness.” In other words, people of Asia and the world as a whole must change Japan into “a country where I’d like to go”, “a country where I’d like to succeed”, “a country where I’d like to work”, or “a country where I’d like to set down my roots”. To achieve this, we must contemplate what kind of identity the nation needs to in order to improve “Japan’s attractiveness”. Our study to understand mid-term and long-term world trends and what they demand of Japan, and to ultimately reevaluate of Japan’s real strengths and weaknesses, based on our strategic formation methodology, is the prerequisite for generating this kind of debate on identity formation.

Given the tentative value assumption of the need to generate “an attractive Japan” we obtained the result presented in chart 2, arranged the strategic importance of each field’s (A) “Leading Edge Level”, (B) “Toughness”, and (C) “Influence”, according to the results of the previous strength/weakness assessment.

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What is crucial in building a strategy is to leverage fields and elements which are strategically important, and concurrently evaluate “Strong”. For example even if it is strategically important, a great deal of energy and time is still necessary to boost a weak field and turn it into a strong one. Such activity might even negatively affect the entire the strategy. In this sense, the best strategy would be to further strengthen the fields in the upper right corner of the chart (Dominant / High Strategic Importance) and extend that benefit to the weak fields.

As seen in Chart 2, the results found from our research indicate that “Dominant” fields / facets of great strategic importance for Japan include the following three areas: the “Influence of Pop Culture”, the “Advanced Level of Science and Technology”, and the “Toughness of the Economy”. In addition “Equal/Strong” fields / facets with high strategic importance include: the “Advanced Level of the Economy”, the “Toughness of Science and Technology”, the “Advanced Level of the Military”, and the “Toughness of Speech and Thought”. These are shown to be the areas in which Japan can achieve strategic leverage.

Here our team developed a split opinion as to whether or not to list Military as strategically important. The argument went, “If the Military is given importance, would this not mean an ideology of hegemony, and would this not just cause Asian countries to turn their backs on Japan?” Furthermore, the question arose as to whether Military was then a field that contradicts the stated strategic objective of “making Japan attractive”. On the other hand, if one considers that as far as Asia is concerned Japan is a difficult country to understand, then the question of how to position Japan’s self defense capabilities within the development of a pan-Asian security structure takes on great importance within Japan’s overall strategy. These divergent opinions were reflected in our Assessment, which includes both points of view.

Also “Speech and Thought” mentioned above, covers thought and ideas that are expressed through language. Most of the Pop Culture distributed from Japan is said to be in the non-language area, and some people point out that the Japanese often share and value nonverbal understanding and communication. We opted to include the expressing of such a language of the mind, under the single field of “Speech and Thought”.

Thinking along another direction, “Weak” fields / facets with high strategic importance include: the “Influence of Society and Education”, the “Influence of Science and Technology”, the “Influence of Politics”, the “Toughness of the Military”, the “Advanced Level of Speech and Thought”, and the “Influence of Speech and Thought”.

The “Strategic Map” represents, as discussed earlier, our own perception of Japan, based on a certain value assumption. By strong thewing this perception though, it becomes possible to begin a debate on strategic policy formation. Of course there will be some disparity between our perception and the way others see Japan, but we believe that while making efforts to close this gap, we can open it to a constructive debate.

We are openly presenting the methodology behind this debate, and promoting a debate designed so that the process used to arrive at a certain conclusions will be easily understood. We might have to revise various assumptions and judgements in the course of the debate arising from the “Strategic Map”. We believe that constant feedback is necessary to devise a valid strategy.

The “Strategic Map” we propose this time is merely a starting-point for the discussion. We hope that by presenting it in this open symposium various debates will be called forth, and that this will then initiate a serious debate that will explore the Japanese identity.

投稿者 gnpo : 06:02 PM

  [survey] How Thought Leaders See Japan's Strengths, Weaknesses and Strategic Imperatives

What kind of country should Japan try to become? Genron NPO has been promoting discussion on the topic of Japan's future structure and role in Asia for some time. Now we have conducted a survey of Japanese thought leaders from various sectors of society, asking them to evaluate Japan's strengths and weaknesses and indicate what areas are of the greatest strategic importance for Japan's future.

The survey was carried out simultaneously with the creation of a "strategy map" based on an assessment of Japanese power published by Genron NPO in March. The goal was to have our efforts reflect the perceptions of Japanese thought leaders. Our assessment of Japanese power is a form of introspection, a way for Japan to evaluate its current status and future potential. We hope, in presenting these self-perceptions to the public, that they will serve as catalysts for debate, deepening discussions within Japan and with other Asian thought leaders and eliciting suggestions toward shaping a national strategy that can guide Japan's future development.

Taking into consideration the evaluation of Japan's strengths and weaknesses, this survey focused on nine areas: (1) economy, (2) politics, (3) popular culture, (4) society and education, (5) science and technology, (6) defense and military, (7) natural resources (food, energy), (8) environment, (9) ideas and public discourse. In each area, respondents were asked to assess how Japan compares to other nations in three aspects, selecting in each case whether they considered Japan to be "dominant," "moderately strong" or "weak." Those three aspects are:

A. "Forwardness" - This aspect rates how advanced Japan's stage of development is in each of the nine areas; how sophisticated, diversified, cutting-edge and broad-based the nation's activities are in that area.

B. "Robustness" - This aspect rates the degree to which Japan possesses "depth" in each respective area, such as ample real-world experience, adaptability, diversification and resistance to "force majeur" (disasters like earthquakes or terrorist attacks).

C. "Influence" - This aspect rates how much international influence Japan exerts in a given area, in terms of the nation's degree of initiative in identifying and solving problems, brand power, the weight carried in the international community by Japan's approval, and the ability to set trends in motion.

Respondents were asked to rate the degree of strategic importance of each aspect of each of the nine areas. Two hundred Japanese intellectuals, experts, and opinion leaders responded to the survey.

The results are summarized below.

Japan is dominant in the environment, economy, science and technology, and popular culture—four areas of forwardness.

(1) Respondents indicated that Japan shows forwardness in four areas: environment, economy, science and technology and popular culture. They felt that Japan can be confident of its strength in these areas. And among these they regard the economy and environment as the most strategically important.

(2) In contrast, fields that were considered strategically important to Japan's future but in which Japan is weak relative to other countries include food (in forwardness, robustness, influence), energy (in robustness, influence), politics (in forwardness), ideas and public discourse (in forwardness, robustness), and military (in robustness). As far as the food and energy fields are concerned, respondents did not regard the problem as being Japan's low degree of self-sufficiency in both per se, but rather the lack of strategic attention to these longstanding weaknesses and of clear policies to address them, as well as poor negotiating leverage in food-related trade, and the absence of leadership on resource issues. They expressed hope for a restructured Japanese agricultural sector that is efficient enough to eliminate dependence on imports.

(3) Many respondents asserted that the environment is a strategic area for the future of Japan, and that the nation should use its strengths in this area to exercise leadership by solving global environmental problems and moving toward an ecologically sustainable society.

(4) Japanese politics were regarded as weak in all aspects: forwardness, robustness and influence. But only forwardness was regarded as strategically important. This made clear that there is a deep sense of resignation about politicians and political parties, but also frustration with the underlying lack of political consciousness and political engagement among voters, who are ultimately the only hope for bringing about change.

(5) One striking result was the low strategic importance assigned to Japan's forwardness and influence in the defense and military area, even as robustness in this area was considered of great strategic importance. At the same time, robustness was assessed to be the weakest aspect of defense by many respondents, due to the constraints on Japan's defense activities imposed by the constitution. This reflects an awareness that Japan must make it a strategic priority to revise the constitution and become a "full-fledged country."

(6)The most popular responses in the survey were the assessment of ideas and public discourse as an area of weakness, yet high strategic importance. There was a tremendous sense that dialogue between public officials and citizens about policy is limp and that the news media make little contribution to it. These are the very reasons why Genron NPO was created: to bridge the "discourse deficit." Nearly half of respondents agreed that a wider variety of channels for the flow of information are needed, that the quality of journalism must be improved, and that multiple, overlapping intellectual networks must be formed.

Below is a comparison of two "strategy maps," one reflecting a "self-perception" of Japan in the eyes of the nation's thought leaders, based on the opinion survey, and another addressing the same issues prepared simultaneously by Genron NPO's own internal committee of experts. A number of key points are highlighted.

Here we offer Genron NPO's strategy map and a strategy map based on survey results (pdf:128K)

How Thought Leaders See Japan's Strengths, Weaknesses and Strategic Imperatives

1. What are Japan's most strategic areas?

What's important to focus on in the strategic maps are aspects of areas regarded as strategically important in which Japan is also "dominant." One of the main goals of this project is to spark discussion of what an "ideal but feasible" identity for Japan might be based on these key elements. Genron NPO's in-house analysis identified influence of popular culture, forwardness in science and technology and robustness of the economy as Japan's key elements. On this point, though, the survey of thought leaders chose two different ones: forwardness in both environment and economy.

Other elements were regarded as of great strategic importance but only moderate strength for Japan. Reinforcing these elements to bring them into the category of key strategic factors, like those above, must be a pillar of any Japanese national strategy. In Genron NPO's own analysis, these elements were economic forwardness, robustness of science and technology, military forwardness, and robustness of ideas and public discourse. In contrast, survey respondents identified robustness and influence in the area of the environment and forwardness in energy resources.

Overall, while Genron NPO's analysis emphasized science and technology, the economy and popular culture, many survey respondents considered the environment to be the key field for Japan's national strategy.

Prioritizing global environmental problems

While Genron NPO's in-house analysis did not deny the strategic importance of the environment, it was not assigned a high priority in the context of "creating an appealing Japan." But in the survey, there was much agreement (37% of respondents) with the statement, "Because the world must urgently address global environmental problems, the environment is automatically of great strategic importance. Japan, having tackled its pollution problems at an early stage, is a 'trailblazer' country and must take a corresponding leadership role on behalf of humanity and the earth, making it a key plank of the national strategy." Also winning much approval (22% of respondents) was the statement, "Japan has a particular genius for coexisting harmoniously with nature and developing appreciation for natural beauty, so it is extremely important to make the environment a core element of national identity."

Many thought leaders are convinced that global environmental problems pose a serious threat, and thus attach great strategic importance to Japan putting its strength in environmental matters to work.

In addition to Japan's "forwardness" in the areas of environment and economy cited above, survey results showed a belief that Japan is "dominant" in popular culture and science and technology, but that these two are of only middling strategic importance. The bottom line is that these four areas were widely regarded with self-confidence.

2. Areas of intense concern

The survey results showed nine elements clustered in the lower right portion of the strategy map, indicating strategically important areas where Japan is relatively weak. The thought leaders who responded harbor grave disquiet and dissatisfaction with these elements. They fall under the areas of food and energy resources, ideas and public discourse and politics.

(1) Food (all aspects: forwardness, robustness, and influence)

On the survey, responses clustered around the following two perspectives concerning strategic importance, indicating that they reflect the concerns of many thought leaders.

A stable food supply is the basis of security

The first choice, accounting for 35% of responses, was the statement "It is not just that Japan's food self-sufficiency has fallen to 40%, but the lack of vision with respect to the food self-sufficiency ratio (forwardness), of leverage in food trade negotiating (robustness) and of leadership in food resource issues (influence) that are the essence of Japan's weakness in this area. Japan must grasp that stability of food supply is a prerequisite for national security and give a higher level of strategic importance to the issue."

(2) Energy resources (robustness and influence)

The deep concern felt by Japan's thought leaders about this sector is reflected in the large number of respondents (26%) agreeing with the statement, "The essence of Japan's energy problem is excessive dependence on foreign (especially Middle Eastern) imports for oil and other energy. As long as self-sufficiency in energy remains so abysmally low, this will be a major strategic concern for Japan."

As for robustness in this area, respondents worry about Japan's negotiating leverage for securing resources in the international marketplace; 26% of them selected, "As competition among nations for geological resources intensifies, Japan must strengthen its strategy for securing energy resources by diversifying suppliers, pursuing develop-and-import schemes from the drilling stage forward, offering profit opportunities in Japan to Middle Eastern capital, and improving negotiating tactics."

And with regard to influence, along with strengthening Japan's muscle in global markets, there is a feeling that "Japan's strategy must exploit its strength in world-class energy-saving technologies as demand for conservation grows in the US and other countries."

Japan was assessed to have moderate strength in terms of energy forwardness, but 26% of respondents affirmed its strategic importance, agreeing that "Japan should apply its advanced technology to accelerating the switch toward alternative energy sources. By setting the pace for the world in establishing a sustainable energy basis for society, Japan can establish itself as the world's leading environmental power. To achieve this, Japan must establish public consensus about the country's path that includes a willingness to accept the trade-off of possibly higher energy prices, at least for the time being."

Genron NPO's own analysis, while not denying the strategic importance of energy resources, did not assign a high priority to this field within the framework of "creating an attractive Japan." While the Genron NPO view is reflected in the statement, "While a supply crunch that raised energy prices would make a switch to alternative energy viable from a cost perspective and promote a shift, as long as Japan retains its technological advantage, the market mechanism will have no difficulty meeting energy needs," this statement won the agreement of just 5% of survey respondents.

(3) Ideas and public discourse (forwardness and robustness)

The following response was the choice of almost half (45%) of survey respondents. Clearly, Japan's thought leaders are gravely concerned about the weakness of ideas and public discourse in Japan and see the need for this area to be strengthened.

A need for more constructive and profound public discourse

This was the statement: "Japan, facing an era of change, must pursue reforms that will restructure its entire national system and recover a meaningful role in world affairs. This task demands clearly expressed ideals and concepts, which will not materialize unless public discourse becomes more constructive and profound. Today, the policy debates within and between political parties and between officials and the public lack vibrancy. Think tanks are underdeveloped, NPOs and other citizen groups fail to have much impact on policy formation, and the news media make little contribution to policy dialogue. It was exactly this "discourse deficit" and "inarticulateness"Å@that Genron NPO was formed to address. Japan urgently needs a wider variety of information channels, improvement in the quality of journalism, and the formation of multiple, overlapping intellectual networks.

It can also be said, as 20% of respondents indicated, that "To achieve clear communication and mutual understanding with other Asian countries and the international community as a whole, it is of great strategic importance for Japan to overcome its present weaknesses in effective and persuasive use of language." On the whole, these positions reflect no significant differences with Genron NPO's analysis.

3. Implications of politics assessment

The area of politics received "weak" ratings in all three aspects: forwardness, robustness, and influence. More than half of respondents (51%) pointed to the attitudes of citizens and voters, more than politics itself, as the problem. Many thought leaders took the view that "The effectiveness of politics is decided by the political awareness and engagement and the civic consciousness of citizens and voters more than by politicians or policy. At the current time, when Japan faces its most pressing need for reform since the Meiji Restoration, awareness and readiness on the part of Japan's citizens is desperately needed."

Resignation about politics, frustration with voters

On this point, there is a split between assessments of the forwardness of Japanese politics, an element regarded as strategically important but weak (lower right of the map) and the area's robustness and influence, which are also seen as weak but not strategically important (lower left of the map). These results reflect a focus on citizens as the root of the weakness seen in Japanese politics. While being resigned to the state of affairs with politicians and party politics, Japan's thought leaders are frustrated with the lack of political consciousness among voters to effect change.

4. Implications of society and education assessment

In the area of society and education, Japan is seen as being moderately strong in both forwardness and robustness, but forwardness here is assigned low strategic significance and robustness is not considered all that important either. As for the influence of society and education, it is seen as particularly weak and also strategically unimportant (lower left of the map).

Traditionally the area of society and education has been a Japanese strength. A cooperative spirit within groups, a high level of uniformity, a tendency to emphasize trust-based interpersonal relationships and a very meritocratic educational system has been pillars of the nation's past successes. But as many respondents to the survey see it, globalization is inexorably dismantling the "closed society" that was the basis for these strengths. As income disparities rise, shifting morals threaten values such as the work ethic, and the quality of education deteriorates, what was once an area of strength for Japan is becoming one of weakness. The above results suggest that this transition has left respondents hesitant and perplexed about how to evaluate the status and strategic importance of this area. Responses were all over the map, and no single trend was discernable. The placement of Japan's social and educational influence in the bottom left of the map may reflect a perception that it will be difficult for Japan, amidst all this uncertainty, to build a more appealing image of its society throughout the world.

As for Genron NPO's own analysis, it regards influence in this area as possessing strategic importance. In particular, we place a significant emphasis on restructuring society to enable people with diverse capabilities to flourish. While acknowledging that the great strength of Japan's social legacy still lingers, it does not play a part in our strategic priorities.

5. Differing assessments of science and technolog

Many thought leaders took the position that while Japan enjoys "dominance" in scientific and technological forwardness, the strategic importance of this factor is not all that great. This is a significant difference from Genron NPO's analysis, which regards all aspects of the science and technology area as having great strategic importance.

Genron NPO's analysis asserts that Japan should continue to exploit its strong forwardness and robustness in science and technology, accumulating world-beating experience in solving cutting-edge problems in the process. This will build the influence necessary to attract top researchers from around the world, who will establish the nation's leadership in this area far into the future and secure Japan's place in the world as an alluring "science and technology power." Our analysis rests on a presumption that the new technologies cultivated during the recession of the 1990s will bear fruit around 2010, catapulting Japan from the "catch-up phase" to the "discovery and invention" phase.

On the importance of securing human resources in the science and technology field

In contrast, many Japanese thought leaders focused their attention on the deterioration of the human resources that underpin science and technology and declining motivation among them. Indeed, 34% of respondents agreed that "The strategy Japan really needs is one that takes the country towards a society and education system that nurtures and secures human capital." Another large segment (22%) focused instead on weakness in the management systems that convert technology into profitability, agreeing that "The real strategic question is how to overcome problems with corporate governance and management systems that are outside the science and technology field itself." These perceptions differ from Genron NPO's own conclusions.

6. Assessment of the economy

With respect to Japan's economy, both Genron NPO's analysis and the survey results generally agreed, despite differing emphasis on some points, that this is an area of no small strategic importance, and one in which Japan is fairly strong. But while Genron NPO sees Japan's economy as being "dominant" in terms of robustness and only "moderately strong" in its forwardness, the survey results reversed those evaluations. It is certainly easy to regard the stagnation of the 1990s and the slowness of structural reform despite the Japanese economy's latent strength as indicators of weakness in terms of economic robustness. But in Genron NPO's analysis, "forwardness" is assessed from the perspective of strength or weakness ascribable to policy and corporate management on the basis of their record of problem-solving. By attributing the latent strength of Japan's economy, which is the object of the strategy, to its robustness, we wished to highlight the strategic implications of this latent strength. This accounts for the difference from the survey results.

The necessity for structural reform leading to true openness

The respondents were split on this point, but a slightly larger number of thought leaders (24%) agreed that "As Japan confronts an aging and shrinking population, it must overcome long-term stagnation by ceaseless innovation to raise productivity or attract industrial activities from abroad by increasing the nation's attractiveness. This will require enacting structural reforms that create a more competitive and compelling business environment and a society that is truly open to the world." But almost as many (22%) expressed great reservations about the growing polarization of the economy and the collapse of the exceptionally broad and uniform middle class social system that sustained Japan's economy for decades, as well as fear that these developments will sap the nation's economic strength. This group agreed with the statement, "An overall vision or consensus about what Japanese society should look like is required."

7. Assessment of defense and military

Both the survey and Genron NPO's own analysis concluded that while Japan enjoys moderate strength of forwardness in the defense and military area, it is weak in robustness and influence. Moreover, this lack of robustness is an important strategic problem. What differed between the two reports' conclusions is that while Genron NPO's analysis regarded it as vital to have military forwardness, survey respondents thought the opposite. Genron NPO took the position that Japan needs to become a "known quantity" as a country within the evolving Asian security framework. The survey results, however, revealed that almost 30% of respondents agreed that "The problem with Japan's defense forces is that they are limited in their flexibility of action by being restricted to self-defense. This makes them incapable of responding adequately to threats. It is not in Japan's national interest to be constrained to follow the lead of the US in foreign policy and management of the economy by the framework of the US-Japan Security Treaty. To escape this situation, it is strategically vital for Japan to revise the constitution, which is at the root of the problem, and become a full-fledged nation capable of defending itself." This is the point of contention with respect to robustness in the area of defense.

As in our previous surveys, these results highlight the high degree of interest in the constitutional problem among Japan's thought leaders.

8. Assessment of popular culture

Both the survey results and Genron NPO's analysis reveal roughly the same assessment of the strength of Japan's popular culture, but the survey reveals that many of Japan's thought leaders do not assign this area much strategic weight. This trend was demonstrated by the significant support received by the following two propositions.

Culture is not a matter of strategy

The statement "Rather than popular culture, which evolves naturally, the targets for an ongoing policy supporting preservation and development should be arts (music, fine arts, performing arts, etc.) which have great cultural value but a small market and which lack commercial appeal. The foundation of Japan's strength in the arts is high artistic and technical skills. Japan's strategic emphasis should be placed on these forms of culture." was affirmed by 27% of respondents.

Another 22% agreed that "The strength and influence of Japanese popular culture are a result of natural development. As a matter of principle, culture is not a field which should be part of a national strategy."

Genron NPO's own analysis does not propose to incorporate popular culture into Japan's national strategy either, but it does regard it as having dominant influence and acknowledges its strategic potential in "creating an appealing Japan." Our assignment of strategic importance to popular culture is an attempt to provoke fresh thinking about this area.

By publicizing the two "strategy maps" resulting from our own analysis and our survey of thought leaders, Genron NPO aims to stimulate debate around assessments of Japan's power. We hope that this will lead into a larger dialogue about Japan's identity, which will feed back into our own efforts and push forward a discussion of the choices facing Japan concerning the future.

投稿者 gnpo : 05:52 PM