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April 20, 2007
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days
投稿者 gnpo : 10:22 AM
April 19, 2007
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Heizo Takenaka
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By Encouraging Reforms, the Government is not Advocating Socialism.
The situation Japan faces today is very similar to the New Economy phase that took place in the United States ten years ago. New Economy occurred around the mid-nineties. Until then, general consensus held that the US’s productivity growth was about 2%. However, one section of the population argued that the US’s productivity growth should be higher than 3%.
There were two reasons: one was peace dividends, and the other was the revolution taking place in the IT industry- both of which were contributing to the increase in productivity. Those who objected argued that such projections wouldn’t go according to plan, and that productivity growth wouldn’t increase so simply. However, what actually happened was the debate came to an end around 1997 and the US’s official productivity growth rate currently ranges from 3.2% to 3.3%, according to the US government. In other words, the proponents of New Economy were correct.
Turning to Japan, though the present growth potential is said to be somewhat lower than 2%, the same situation that faced the US also seems possible in Japan. There aren’t any peace dividends, but reform dividends could be possible. Another point worth mentioning is the IT revolution; Japan has developed a broadband infrastructure that is not only the lowest priced but also the fastest, giving it an edge over the US. And presently, we see that systems are progressively changing. With such possibilities kept in mind, we should be pursuing that growth potential.
As was the case when debated in the United States, this is a very difficult issue. I don’t think it is something that can be resolved simply. Furthermore, Japan is dealing with public finance issues. However, if, in the future, the nominal productivity growth rate increases to 3, 4%, a natural increase in revenue will clearly result, making it much easier to balance the economy and public finances. Some of that is already apparent, as the natural increase in revenue is exceeding expectations. Under these circumstances, such economic growth will become increasingly possible.
With regards to the disparity issue – I think it’s mainly those with a vested interest in maintaining their current status that are running an opposition campaign against reforms. However, from a political standpoint, I do think there is one thing we must do: examine the poverty issue. Disparity is an issue of higher and lower income brackets, and solving it becomes an issue of how and whether to deal with those in the higher income brackets. However, to do so would be socialism. As Thatcher said, it is no t a question of making the poor rich by making the rich poor. What we need is for hardworking people to do their best.
The issue is poverty. A proper study of poverty should be conducted and the results used to create appropriate measures to tackle the issue. Rather than calling it an issue of disparity, I think we should see it as an issue of poverty. Even the government should just state, “We are not socialistic”. This would be a strategic way to set the agenda.
With the House of Councilors elections approaching, you may be wondering what issues will be focused on. I think one issue will be countermeasures to poverty, and another issue will be the Gateway Initiative plans. Plans for the Gateway Initiative will be released in May, and will be focusing on the House of Councilor elections in July. Therefore, I think it would be wise to produce forward looking policy issues.
In addition, one political measure I would really like to see implemented is reformation of the labor market. Prime Minister Abe’s guidelines in that respect are very relevant, as he is trying to include part-time employees in insurance plans. And he should endeavor to do so. What does including part-time workers in insurance plans entail? It means losing the distinction between formal employment and temporary employment. At the moment, the disparity between formal and temporary employment is quite large. Though the employees may be doing the same work, one is being overpaid for their productivity, while the other, in order to compensate for the overpayment of the first employee, is working at a much lower wage.
We can’t ignore these kinds of disparities. However, labor unions are opposed to changes. On top of that, business managers are opposed to including part-time employees into insurance plans. Business managers should be looking to reform themselves.
Therefore, the Abe administration should take a strict stance towards both the labor unions and the economy. It’s also said that corporation taxes are favorable only on businesses. The government should be stricter with businesses. I believe it is a twofold issue. One issue is insurance, and the other is minimum wage. The minimum wage should be increased. If the government firmly resolves to increase it, the Prime Minister will feel the nation’s support. We needn’t be lenient with businesses; we should make them cry in areas in which they should be crying. We are in the situation we are in today because the only pressures on the government are from those who want relaxed restrictions and those who call for white-collar exemptions. White-collar exemption is both a freedom and responsibility. Management should have freedom. But in exchange, they should also take responsibility in implementing a safety net. White-collar exemption currently refers only to the freedom.
The Abe Administration needs a strategic approach in setting the agenda. With the upcoming House of Councilors election, I am looking forward to constructive policy oriented debate.
Translator: LAURA KUMATAKA
投稿者 gnpo : 05:14 PM
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Heizo Takenaka
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The Political Administration Should be Comprised of Only Those Who Demonstrate Their Abilities.
Another area in the evaluation of Shinzo Abe’s administration I would like to draw attention to is its policy-making process. I think it’s important to evaluate the extent of support given by those surrounding Prime Minister Abe.
As far as the Prime Minister’s aides are concerned, some say that by law these positions do not officially exist and so the system will not function. Although that is one side of the truth, if you look at the United States then you find, that there are no provisions for those positions in the law there either. In the United States they are also called assistants. Americans aren’t hobbled when a legal precedent doesn’t exist. A risk needs to be taken and the role of the aids needs to be made more prominent. Becoming an aid should also be made a more competitive process. They should compete, and only those who produce results should stay. Those who don’t should be replaced. In other words, more than structure competence and competition are more important.
The reason the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy (CEFP) became the control tower during the Koizumi administration was because they set their agenda, decided on their basic stance, debated the organizational design, and finally sent it to be approved by the Prime Minister. It became the control tower because all those stages were processed there. It wouldn’t have become the control tower if it hadn’t carried out all those processes. The CEFP hadn’t initially been delegated such a role, but were able to assume such a role because they took the initiative.
Even before the Koizumi Cabinet there was a CEFP, but it never functioned in such a capacity. The organization surrounding the Prime Minister exists in America as well – the roles of the CEA (President’s Council of Economic Advisors) or the CEA Chairman vastly varies according to the President or the administration at the time. When I asked Michael Boskin, the former CEA chairman, what his job entailed, he replied that his role was completely different according to the relationship between the CEA chairman and the President and the administration at the time. As I expected, that is really what it boils down to. The system will take form from the personalities and capabilities of its leaders and the members and within this environment there should be healthy competition.
If the Prime Minister’s present aides were to stick their necks out and take a risk, I have faith in their abilities. There are obviously some legal limitations. For example, even if they were to try to make a statement at a press conference, the opposition parties would challenge their statements and argue for them to state their opinions in front of the National Diet instead. Because of such tactics used by the opposition parties to prevent aides from accomplishing anything, it hasn’t been possible to make statements at a press conference till now. However, one doesn’t have to listen to them. I think it is fine to stay politically active in the public sphere.
A large number of committees have been created within the current administration. The organization of the government has become incredibly vast, and if it increases through further superfluous committees this will only make things more unwieldy. Without first setting a clear agenda of issues you wish to address, you will always find yourself trying to escape the aforementioned problem.
In truth, we are feeling reverberations of issues remaining from the last year of Koizumi’s administration. The agenda isn’t clearly defined because it wasn’t sufficiently discussed at the CEFP meeting that took place the year before. That is why the Abe Administration didn’t have a clearly defined agenda at the time of transition and also why efforts should have been quickly made to draw up an agenda.
During the Koizumi administration, issues were first discussed in the CEFP, which resulted in a quickly produced agenda as the stoutly framed policies were written. First public projects were decreased, and a large scale agenda to manage both financial restructuring and economic growth was pushed forth. After that, a tax reform agenda was proposed, the Trinity agenda was put forth, and the reform of the postal system agenda was proposed. Agendas were being proposed without interruption.
When I wrote my book ,‘The Realities of Structural Reform’ (Kouzo Kaikaku no Shinjitsu), the thing that shocked me the most from reading my journal was the sheer number of ongoing projects we had simultaneously going on. For that reason reading my journal was very difficult. At a time when financial revitalization was undergoing such turmoil, it’s hard to believe we tackled this Trinity agenda. However, during the last year of the administration, when the management of the CEFP was entrusted to the bureaucracy, no agendas were produced.
Therefore “early small successes” are necessary. First quickly draw up an achievable agenda and then you should go about accomplishing it. “Open and Innovation” is fine, and no one will argue with that. “Assertive diplomacy” is also good, and no one has any qualms with that either. However, debate that reaches beyond these issues is also necessary.
Translator: LAURA KUMATAKA
投稿者 gnpo : 05:03 PM
April 17, 2007
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Heizo Takenaka
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Historic Tasks Being Asked of the Abe Administration.
Next I’d like to point out the historic tasks that are being asked of the Abe administration. The more I ponder it, the more I think that, in many ways, the Abe administration has a rather similar mission to that of the Blair administration in England.
One of these is educational reform. Another is the escape from “British sickness” and creation of a strong economy – in particular, the “rising tide policy”. In addition, Britain has also pushed policies to strengthen soft powers as well. In terms of Japan, this would be equivalent to the Asian Gateway Initiative. This shows that the issues the Abe administration is attempting to deal with overlap greatly with those of the Blair administration.
In this historic role, I would like to see the Abe administration strengthen economic growth, increase soft power, and tackle education, the very power of the people and foundation upon which these developments all depend. This means that since the start of the Abe administration, those buds are all starting to sprout. If you ask whether the path to fruition of these buds has been sufficiently paved though, I would say that happens from here on forward.
We understand that, as Mr. Abe has stated from the beginning, the intent is there to promote strengthened economic growth. The problem, however, is that an agenda to achieve this has not been established. There isn’t anyone opposed to even the idea of “open and innovation” for the sake of economic growth. So, what should be done? Clearly an agenda is being called for.
Also with education reform, a 17-person committee is too large. With such a large committee, eventually it becomes necessary for government officials to step in and bring things to a conclusion. A 5 or 6 member committee would be fine. In addition, as it stands currently, from start to finish the Education Rebuilding Council revolves around discussions of the present situation. I would like to see them discuss from a more long-term perspective what kind of human resources need to be trained and what is needed for the country of Japan to survive as a global player.
Politicians are currently preoccupied with talk of bullying problems, mental issues, and other current matters. Talk of current issues is important and greatly appreciated, but there is no meaning to having the Education Rebuilding Council unless we can look past these things.
As far as the Asia Gateway Initiative is concerned, regardless of what the Prime Minister said in his policy position speech at the end of September last year, there has hardly been any movement whatsoever on the matter. I think it’s good that Mr. Abe stated this plan again in his policy speech the other day, saying that they would form a plan by May. The problem is the strategy lies in the details, so it’s a matter of whether or not we can keep the bureaucrats from taking hold of the open seams so they can’t take over. It is important in a growth strategy that an agenda is firmly established, and that in working out the details to that end all the functions of the control tower are firmly within possession of the administration.
The cabinet reached a decision on a budget plan the day before the National Diet. If you read objectively based on the numbers presented in the plan, there is no need to raise consumption tax in order to restore the primary balance in the beginning of the 2010’s. I think this is something that should be clarified. In reality, however, it seems the government has started to say this and then suddenly clammed up. However, surely by saying this it would demonstrate an effort to avoid arguments in the National Diet.
To put things in economic terms, it is an issue of maximizing earnings or minimizing expenses. What I’d really like to see is for the advisory council to try their best to maximize earnings in their reforms. To reach this end, it will be necessary to haggle and debate. These debates will be of the utmost importance and will have two results.
The first is that the right argument will become clear in the course of the debates and the path to the appropriate policy will become visible. The second thing, depending on the debates, is public support of the reforming administration. The merits of debating are extremely important both politically and economically. As such, it would be great if there were debate about maximizing earnings, but as it stands now, in an attempt to avoid debate, that is to say minimize expenses, they are refraining form making any clear statements.
Recently, the number of proposal papers produced by civilian members of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy and distributed are decreasing. Released proposal papers generate debate, but it looks like there is a movement to avoid that at this time.
Translator: DOUG DURGEE
投稿者 gnpo : 06:18 PM
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Heizo Takenaka
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The Issue of Creating an Agenda.
If we restrict ourselves to the first 100 days of Shinzo Abe’s administration, I believe the biggest demand posed was how to bring about “early small successes”.
The Cabinet has many quite difficult administration issues, with some political issues being easily answerable and others not so. It is, however, essential for the administration to provide some examples of early small successes in the period following inauguration, however small they may be.
Well, as for the results, I think that there have been some more than small, but rather some early medium or even early large successes in foreign policy. These were the first to come after inauguration. However, I believe that because these successes came first, efforts to produce early small successes in economic and domestic policies have been neglected. In other words, I think there were no early small successes in terms of economic policy.
Another issue is whether or not the Abe administration is continuing political reformation. I believe it is. The media severely criticized Abe’s budget, but I believe his budget for the 2007 fiscal year was rather good. Thus Abe is not straying from the most important of his main points. This is one thing I think we must give him proper credit for. They are making a budget following a stricter scenario than that created in the days of policy chief Nakakawa which cuts annual expenditure in order to create a smaller government. This in particular should be commended.
In addition to these comments, in order that political policies reach fruition, one must go through 4 specific processes. The first of these is the formation of a well-organized agenda. It is absolutely imperative to know what will be carried out both economically and politically, and, on top of this, it is also essential to know when it will happen. The second is to have a basic outline on how to put this agenda into practice, and the third is an actual system plan. This includes writing up the legislative bills themselves. The fourth is the reaching of consensus at various instances. Assessment must occur while looking at these four points.
As is depicted in the opinion poll conducted by Genron NPO, the reason we don’t know what the Abe administration wants to do is because they actually have not formed a sufficiently organized agenda. I may be repeating myself, but the Abe administration is not straying from their main points. However, in a way this is a problem that is connected with the issue of early small successes. As to whose role it was to form an agenda, it has to be the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy (CEFP).
Besides that, the Prime Minister’s passion in heading towards political reform is sufficiently felt. That is to say, there will be constitutional reform. I think the impact of this will be sizeable. They are also making changes in foreign policy. Of course Koizumi and Abe both have different ways of showing their passion, and there is no real need for them to be the same. They exhibit different points of interest as well, which is also a given.
The problem is, the strategy lies in the details. Policies are made of many finer points stacked one upon the other, meaning that if you don’t pay close attention to these finer points you won’t be able to determine the efficacy of the policy itself. Because bureaucrats are the ones who know the ins and outs of these finer points best, they always look to water down the policies. We try not to let them do this. This is one point.
During the period I was trying to deal with the issue of defaulted loans, I received help from a number of different people and developed an extreme attention for details. It’s because of this that the bad loans went away. The postal privatization period was also a situation in which we manipulated the bureaucrats’ methods by means of some of the finer details in order to implement the reforms. To give one example, the opponents of privatization continuously demanded to keep the post offices across the board, nationwide. They were quite particular about the wording of “across the board, nationwide.” However, wording it like that would maintain the status-quo, meaning new managers wouldn’t be able to exhibit their own discretion in matters. In the end, what is written in the bill is “being able to make use of post offices across the board, nationwide will be a central focus.” “Kept across the board nationwide” is not written. It says people will be able to “make use of” the post offices across the board, nationwide, and moreover this will be “a central focus.” This is actually our ideal strategy – taking what bureaucrats do and turning the tables on them.
Unfortunately, our control in these situations under current circumstances isn’t always adequate. The important people are the aides and responsible cabinet ministers, as the Prime Minister can’t take such detailed looks into such matters. So the Abe administration isn’t straying from its main points, but there are slightly open seams. On top of that, the current assessment is that the advisory council wasn’t able to establish an agenda.
One final assessment by the public is that the only ones capable of continuing the reformation process are the Abe administration. While this is an unspoken opinion, I do think it exists among the public. If looked at from another angle, the fact that the Abe administration is looked upon harshly is also an assertion of expectation. Since the economy itself is acceptable, even if there are open seams it won’t fall apart immediately. If these open seams are allowed to accumulate over the course of three or five years however, the potential for growth will begin to fall off. The question of how exactly to grasp these open seams is an important issue to address from here on after the 100-day period.
Translator: DOUG DURGEE
投稿者 gnpo : 10:36 AM
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Sasaki Takeshi
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The Duality in the Relationship With Koizumi’s Government.
It is said that the team currently leading Shinzo Abe’s government is inviting a lot of confusion. I also think that things will not go well the way they are. However, since I haven’t seen things first hand, I do not know what the situation is really like. This may be out of place, but, the Prime Minister included, none of the main members of the leadership team for the government have ever been ministers. That is to say, they have no experience of how the Japanese government mechanism functions. This is very worrying.
Shinzo Abe, who has only been the chief cabinet secretary, the finance minister and the minister of public affairs, so to speak, a group of people, who have never headed a governmental office responsible for carrying out political policy, constitute the core of the government in the Prime Minister’s office. It is not possible to view this fact itself as either a bad thing or a good thing. However, I think it will be a tremendous task for such a team to really get this country’s government moving.
Moreover, the fact that the government is yet to be elected by the people is becoming a handicap. It will be essentially very difficult to compensate for this.
Also, since there was no strong command post to begin with, whenever the question, “what should be done?” arises, there is a difficult problem of keeping resistance and other reactions from the ministries in check. In Koizumi’s government there was a Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, and with this the government managed to make a breakthrough. Indeed, there were many debates concerning that approach, but one could say that, during the transition period it acted as a mechanism to help the cabinet become functional.
A decision was made there, then an agreement was reached on it in a cabinet meeting, and finally the policy was implemented. So in a certain sense, one could say, in order to bring about this weakening of the cabinet’s functions, a section of the ministers were put in this council, along with citizens, although there were various discussions about how much authority they had, and they contributed to enlivening the activities of the cabinet.
It became very clear that, as a command post, the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy functioned well, so, after a certain period, it was possible to use that council to focus on all issues.
When Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet was inaugurated, I at first thought that, “This is going to be a ‘cabinet, that wears itself out quickly.’ The government is creating various councils and committees within the cabinet and appointing aids for the people in charge of them. Yet, within each ministry similar kinds of bodies already exist. There are committees and councils for educational reform, Revitalization Committee and Central Education Council on Educational Reform, but whatever the government ministry or office, similar bodies already exist. This sort of heavily stratified structure is complicating the matter.
Who has authority and where does that authority end? Who is assigned to what and to what extent? Nobody knows the answer. Although work is being done, the issues that have been decided on are not being followed through with. Compared to how hard they are working it is proving not to be very enjoyable, and therefore it has reached a stage where several signs of dissatisfaction and irregular comments have been allowed to slip out.
There are five government aids and each wants to work, but for some reason things aren’t functioning well and the decision making system is becoming extremely scattered.
Whether it is an individual’s abilities or their authority, there are limits to both. When there are limits then you must conduct yourself accordingly or else you will tire yourself out. First, you have to judge whether you can manage something directly by yourself and what your limits are. Even though the foundations have been laid, whether you can really complete the job with care could ultimately depend on the number of jobs you are dealing with. If numbers increase too high then you may not be able to achieve anything. So, in this sense, as far as the decision making system was concerned, Shinzo Abe’s government was lacking in preparation.
Moreover, rather than solving the problem, Shinzo Abe’s government has made various comments about the issues and then simply created more committees. This pattern seems to be repeating itself. People who speak bad of the government say it is simply creating committees for the sake of it. Other people view the situation in an extremely cold manner and say that, rather than thinking about the results of the committees, the government wants to create an image so that in a glance it looks as though things are happening. Therefore, the moment the committee is set-up nobody has any interest in it any more. I think this is an extremely exhausting and bad situation that the government is starting to fall into.
I also have my doubts whether a single Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy is a good thing or not. However, if you really want to implement policies, then in effect you have to focus power in one place. You also have to prioritize various things. Monitoring is also important. If you are dealing with just one discussion then everyone has to focus attention on that and if it turns out to be inappropriate, state so. However, if you try to carry out four or five discussions simultaneously then no-one will pay attention at all.
The Committee for Educational Revitalization will act as a test, since it has been saying it will convert the various proposals that it has been making into a bill in March. If they cannot keep this promise what will happen? If a bill is not drawn up by the deadline then what will they do? In a certain sense it will become an issue of responsibility taking. For example the minister for science and education has been speaking as if he is not necessarily going to adopt each and every one of the suggestions that the Committee for Educational Revitalization has been making.
It cannot be claimed that aids have been assigned politicians. The point at issue is what is hoped by appointing these politicians? The desire to deal directly with the various problems that surround the Prime Minister is understandable, but it is unknown whether they have thought about what they will do after they have dealt with these problems.
To a certain degree I do not wish to say that I can’t understand how the government can fall into such a situation. I think the matters, that Koizumi’s government did not deal with during its time have caught the eye of Shinzo Abe’s government. I think it wants to continue to distinguish itself from Koizumi’s government and deal with the various issues that Mr. Koizumi did not deal with. In order to get the government aids involved, it has set up various committees. I understand well the government’s intention.
However, it is not good that it appears to be a group of friends gathered together. It is necessary to create a team that can do the job. That is to say a team is different from a group of friends and so far the team has not functioned effectively and with results.
Observing this state of affairs I feel that in many respects, Shinzo Abe’s government has Koizumi’s government on its mind. The government wants to distinguish itself from Koizumi’s government but it is concerned with people saying, “Koizumi did this, but I thought you were different from Koizumi’s government.” If Koizumi’s government had not existed then perhaps it would not have been necessary for the present government to deal with so many issues.
Therefore, in that sense, I think either directly or indirectly the government is being overshadowed by Koizumi’s cabinet’s image.
In that sense, Koizumi’s influence is a great one.
This government is a closely-knit one, or in other words a democratic group, however, since last year talk has been of a personnel change that needs to be made in that team. The view is that the team needs to be changed into a group that can more effectively perform the job at hand.
This year the problems have amplified and irregular comments have been made and I think that if things continue this way it will be difficult to reverse the negative tendency in the government’s rate of support.
投稿者 gnpo : 10:15 AM
April 12, 2007
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Sasaki Takeshi
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Shinzo Abe’s Government Needs to Deal with the Design of a New Way of Working and a New Way of Life for the Japanese People.
The situation that I mentioned from the very beginning and one, which Japan has to “overcome”, is the fact that the citizens of Japan are beginning to feel a big change in their way of life. This also includes the increase in social inequalities. The reason why I raised this issue is, because no answers seem to have been provided to directly address it. The issue of social inequalities is, in a certain sense, a result of other factors and so it can not be solved by simple emergency policies.
In order to keep citizens’ sacrifices as low as possible, one idea is that the government should devise a system to provide necessary minimum support for the people. There after, the citizens should look out for themselves. A real discussion has materialized whereby, for example, the government should offer support for a certain area of social problems but not for all. In making this firm promise, the government would be allowing a sort of exit to take form, through which people could escape social difficulty. Shinzo Abe’s government is yet to provide such an explanation.
Perhaps, what will become a core issue is whether the present economic system will be able to cope with changes in how people work and the way in which people live their lives, or whether it will have to be drawn up afresh if it is not compatible with these changes. How will people’s lives change? How will people’s working trends change? What should people study? How should education be changed? These questions are all part of a connected debate.
So in a sense it is not possible to return to how things used to be. We must say good-bye to those times and move on to the next stage.
So how should we go about creating this “Beautiful Country, Japan”? We have no reason to oppose the idea of a “Beautiful Country” itself, but it must not be one of a past era. Instead the pressing question is how to create a “Beautiful Country” from now on.
If Shinzo Abe wants to positively forge a new role for the government, then besides obviously dealing with social inequalities, he should make the intention to tackle this issue clear. If he does not wish to deal with any other issues then that is fine, but I think a trend of dealing with whatever comes along is not a good one.
It is important that the successor to Koizumi’s government makes efforts to become the cause of stability within society. Therefore it should use taxes to address certain areas of social security. Whilst doing this on the one hand, it should steadily demand individuals to make their own efforts too. I think it is important that the government create this sort of device to help individuals free themselves from the prevailing social situations.
In other words, what I mean when I say “the situation Japan has to overcome” is nothing more than the fact that the government has to start a debate face to face with the people about the broader infrastructural design of their lives.
There is talk of a society that can spur itself on to make fresh challenges but if there is no plan for how this will take shape as a whole, then talk of it will just seem banal and repetitive. I think that the most difficult problem in Japan at the moment is ultimately,
How people will live their lives? How working trends will change and, how to create a system to support this?
Koizumi was destructive in his approach. No matter how long it lasted he did it with the same ethos that saw the way things were in the past as being rosy. However, I now believe that we are at a stage where we need to review this policy.
Personally, last year I became the chairman for civil servants’ basic labour rights.
In fact I think that this is a core problem that needs to be drawn up again. How should civil servants’ work ethic be changed. Are things fine the way they are? If not, then it is time for our way of thinking to change? Then is it important to apply the same rules to dealing with central government civil servants as to civil servants, who belong to self governed regional systems? I am starting to think that, at the moment, this is the most important basic question.
I think moving Japan from the twentieth century and adapting it to the twenty-first century, in this area, is one of the core issues. In doing this, a corresponding order should be brought to several of the present systems. Then, necessary finances should be invested. Whether these investments will mature or not will not be known until it is tried, but until they do, in the meantime, the government will have to try to pull through. Perhaps there is no promise that a result will come of this. However, if the government does not attempt to go this far, then it will not be able to envisage how to draw up the next phase.
If we think about the way in which Japanese people work, indeed changes that affect civil servants have quite a large impact on the private sector as well. If the public sector changes, then this will perhaps induce an even greater change on the private sector. Social inequalities, other various problems and ultimately questions about future changes, job opportunities and options and the infrastructure of a society to support these changes are all interrelated issues. To put it in other words, in order to create a new structure for society the government is being asked to find solutions to how the public sector will be structured.
So for the time being, debating the pros and cons of a “Beautiful Country” should be put aside. Such a grand-scale aim will probably take 50 or 100 years to achieve. Until that time I think that we should organize the situation in our minds by setting mid-term aims, highlighting the core problems and the various surrounding issues connected with them.
The debate may turn to the educational reform, which is also part of the above mentioned issues. Now, I think bullying is a bad thing, but if it becomes overemphasized then we risk creating a debate about weeding out bullying, and although this is not a bad aim, the logical connection with the core issues will be lost.
I don’t think it is a negative thing that the government wants to distinguish itself from Koizumi’s government. However, in doing so, the question is what group of issues will the government seek to take on?
Shinzo Abe is probably noticing various branching issues. There does not necessarily have to be one issue alone, however, I don’t think that he is viewing these problems and then trying to grasp the root cause of them by looking at our daily lives.
This is not an easy task. However, the Prime Minister must discern what the core issues to this problem are.
It is important that the government looks at the problems, that are lined up and then, acknowledging that in fact these are one group of issues, it needs to sort them and explain them to the people.
Is a “Beautiful County, Japan” or are amendments to the constitution the core issues? Are these the aims? What are the central themes of the political issues? The government must offer people answers after narrowing down these questions. If it fails to do this, the government will not be able to shake off its intermissive and lethargic image. In other words, the feeling that its grip on politics is not working.
投稿者 gnpo : 09:59 AM
April 11, 2007
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Sasaki Takeshi
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Shinzo Abe’s Government: Its Visible Weaknesses, Perceptions of it and its Agenda Setting.
Presumably, the result of this is the logical development that is contained in “A Beautiful Country Japan”. Perhaps that is what Mr. Abe is thinking.
Whenever I listen to Mr. Abe speak he never uses the words “small government”. Rather, compared with Koizumi’s government, which basically thought of the government’s role in an extremely limited fashion, I feel that Mr. Abe views the role of the government in a more positive way.
In a certain sense, and from the perspective of those at Kasumigaseki too, Shinzo Abe’s government is not necessarily one that is against the current power of the government. Koizumi’s era wanted the government to play a more passive role. Therefore, the talk was all about making the government smaller. I don’t know whether Shinzo Abe’s government is trying to make the government smaller or not but the overall nuance seems to differ considerably from a course aiming to reduce it.
For that very reason, I think he dealt with the educational reform first. It was paramount to show the government was working hard in this area and that Mr. Abe was extremely devoted to the issue of the Basic Educational Law. I think the difference in tone between Shinzo Abe’s government and Koizumi’s government in this area of creating something new are very clearly cut.
However, the difficult thing with this is, once the policy has been made if you can’t handle questions of its appropriateness etc and various debates concerning the realization of the policies, which emerge, this will cause further confusion.
In many ways Koizumi “destroyed” the Liberal Democratic Party. That is a fact and now, it is possible that inside the party, there is a situation where many people feel lost and uncertain about what they should be doing. In the middle of this, there is Mr. Abe, who is trying to will his party on in a new direction, but if nobody follows him then there is a danger that Mr. Abe himself will be sucked in and buried in the middle of this prevailing atmosphere of directionless.
The Liberal Democratic Party has 300 seats in the Diet, so they won’t collapse that easily, but it is all the more worrying to have that many seats and yet be subject to a strange collapse. That is to say, in reality, although a government is in the process of collapse it can still manage to continue. However, governments that possess a large number of seats, tend to be more guarded. When the next election comes around、anxiety amongst party members increases.
So appealing to the citizens, who Genron NPO always emphasizes, and talking about promises that you will make, is easy, however, there are many politicians, who do not want to do this. If this is the case then for the time being the Liberal Democratic government will remain in power, and if “A” cabinet should collapse then talk will be of how “B” cabinet, will be able to do the job, regardless of the fact that it was built on the same basic foundation.
Whenever it is only the Prime Minister, who changes, then there is a possibility that the situation will only get worse. So if things do not go well for Mr. Abe, then I think there is no assurance that things will go well for his successor.
However, the government doesn’t want to break up. It can’t. It will survive. During that time international affairs will change and economic affairs will change and depending on luck, unexpected results will occur, but this will not necessarily prevent the debate from returning to the question, “What did Koizumi’s cabinet do?”
I think that there are weaknesses that accompany the fact that Shinzo Abe’s government is yet to undergo election. From the electorate’s perspective it seems, to a certain extent that Shinzo Abe is working from Koizumi’s manifesto. However, different people are in charge. The very nuance is also incorrect. One can make good use of a chance to make a fresh manifesto between the government and the people, to say that one would be able to bring such and such a policy into fruition. However, Shinzo Abe’s government has not been in a position to do this.
However, they have many seats in the Diet. Hence although it seems stable on the surface, there is a fear that on the inside their politics is becoming more and more vacuous. The government’s connection with the people is not clearly visible and so its rate of support has fallen. If the foundation of the government falls into disarray, then the remaining energy that is supporting the government will be just that little bit weaker. One gets the feeling that the fact that the government has not been elected by the people means, as a result, if the situation does not go well, then the meltdown of the present government will ensue.
Obviously, Shinzo Abe is in a situation where he does have a message to give to the nation. This is “A Beautiful Country, Japan” and “Constitutional Reform”. However, from the midst of the Liberal Democratic Party, there is talk that this will not be enough to win the election.
There is a difference of opinions on that point, however, there is an understanding that the government is losing touch with the people and so, to combat this, more committees are being established to deal with this.
As I mentioned earlier, there is concern that the relationship between the wide aim of “A Beautiful, Country Japan” and the policies to achieve this is either not clear or the relation is not being explained to the people.
It could be that there is perhaps a problem of perception regarding the gap between the philosophy of “A Beautiful County, Japan” and the issues that should be addressed at the moment. Perhaps the government is considering the present situation and therefore pursuing such and such policies, but people are getting the impression that it is just continuing along the same lines as the staunch policies of last year. It is also unclear whether, as a cabinet, they are debating based on their own real convictions and opinions or whether they are strangely trying to distance themselves from Koizumi’s course from last year, or again, whether they are not interested in that at all any more.
However, what I least understand is the core of the government’s message regarding the economy. To put it more clearly, compared with Koizumi’s Cabinet the present government is not clearly explaining how it will realize its policies.
Some say that policies are in motion in this area but I am not sure if that is really the case. Though they might say this, since the very beginning there have been no indications of how politicians are taking the realization of policies in this area into their own hands.
The government fails to explain this and what measures it will take to achieve this. Or may one judge from this that the government intends to cease what has been carried out thus far? It is impossible to judge what the government intends to do and whether this will connect with the core of the economic agenda. Politicians are offering explanations using hopeful arguments that, if they reply on macro-politics and manage to struggle through, then this will eventually bring motion into the economy. However, this sounds exceeding like an attitude of relying on other people to make things happen.
There are many ways we can connect this if we express the problem in terms of Japan’s issues with Asia. How will the government connect summit meetings with economic problems, will it handle issues in foreign relations? Or how will it combine the summit meetings with questions of security? To put it clearly having a system of summit meetings is not the aim, but rather, it is just a springboard. However, I am not sure that the government has started work with an aim whereby it will deal with such and such an issue and then end up with such and such a result.
The fact that the two heads of government had a summit meeting in Beijing and released a joint communiqué was an extremely important point in my opinion. However, after that, although there was a joint research group of scholars on history and there was talk of continuing relations between state heads, it is ultimately not visible what the government wants to do with China or what it intends to accomplish in this relationship. Once this is known and not before, only then can talk turn to self-assertion, however, the aims of this self-assertion have not been expressed.
Sino-Japan relations won’t take off from one minute to the next, but I think that within the structure of several stages of long term and mid term strategies, it is important that, more than last year, the contents of Japan’s self-assertion become more concrete and proposals concerning this are made. If these things do not materialize then diplomacy in Asia will become extremely fragile and if it worsens, I believe it could perhaps draw to a halt.
投稿者 gnpo : 10:29 AM
Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Sasaki Takeshi
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Why is Prime Minister Abe’s Message of “A Beautiful Country, Japan” Failing to Get Across?
Firstly, during Shinzo Abe’s first 100 days in office, it was made clear that the government was working very hard to find some form or other of expressing its intentions.
However, when it came to discussing in concrete terms, how it would achieve its aims, they were suddenly at a loss. Several committees were created in the circles around the cabinet and the Prime Minister himself took part in these committee meetings. However, although they have long since begun work, it is still not clear what they are doing or what sort of conclusions they are reaching.
That is the basic assessment of the present state of affairs. Nonetheless, these kinds of committees have continued to increase in number even after the government’s first 100 days.
At this point in time the reality is that all kinds of doubts have started to materialize about the future of Shinzo Abe’s government. Meetings are being held, but what policies are being hammered out in order to achieve the government’s aims? At the same time, can the present government mechanism comprehend the intentions of those committees and carry out the necessary work to implement them within a set time frame? Further, can the government manage to pass a bill at all? These are the kind of doubts that are surfacing.
Looking at the current state of the cabinet, the impression that you get is that you can’t see who is making the decisions for what.
On top of that, all kinds of issues are springing up such as problems with the government’s finances and ministers making unacceptable comments etc. Even if we put to one side the ultimate question about the content of “A Beautiful Country, Japan”, it is difficult to bridge the gap between the words “A Beautiful Country, Japan” and the reality of what is actually happening in the government. Now, the number of people sensing this discrepancy and wondering what needs to be done to turn the dialogue to address this problem is increasing.
For this reason, the understanding of “A Beautiful Country, Japan” that Shinzo Abe is emphasizing is, in several senses, failing to spread.
So what does this actually mean? Ultimately, at this point, I think it has still not been clarified what issues the government should be addressing.
For example, particularly in Koizumi’s government’s case, it was made extremely clear what targets it had set. Seen from the perspective of a nation that heard this strong message for 5 years, the present government of Shinzo Abe’s seems to be dealing with many issues. It is true that this is important too, however, given this, you often feel unsure about the government’s ability to carry out each individual policy.
Even if he managed to achieve it, the distance to Mr. Abe’s ultimate goal remains a significant one. Therefore, if he were to maintain this kind of approach, the debate would turn to how to reconcile these side issues with his actual aim and the rationality of his policies would not necessarily become any clearer. Rather it would give the impression that the government is dealing with several policies and issues that are simply lines up one after the other without forming an organic whole.
In a certain sense it would give the impression of being extremely versatile, however acting like a large pipeline connecting all these disparate issues does not equate strategic policy and the organization to realize this remains as yet, indiscernible.
During Koizumi’s era there was a clearly defined command post, the Economic Financial Advisory Committee. If you had a look around there, then it was clear that, to a certain degree, policies were being brought to life. Now, however, this is not clear at all. In a certain sense it could be said that there are so many different voices issuing from government ranks that uncertainty exists on how to appeal to the people in the run up to the elections. That, I think, is the current state of affairs.
Next we shall turn to “A Beautiful Country, Japan” but this too is difficult to understand. Using an extremely old expression, I think you could perhaps say, “A country, calm within itself.” This is to say everyone would be honorable, do what they were meant to do, study what they were meant to study and take care of themselves properly.
I think it is close to that kind of somewhat Confucian style of “calm reached first by attaining it within oneself”
Is this meant to recall a certain era? Maybe it is meant to recall a Japan of the past, for example the image of a postwar Japan or a prewar Japan. That too remains uncertain. Perhaps many Japanese citizens feel the same too. It is essential that this very point is made clear in the Diet.
The dialogue is in a process of changing from this to a debate about changing the bill that formed the postwar governmental system. If that is the case then it is paramount that an explanation is made about what direction a change would move in. Maybe Mr. Abe believes that this change will be beautiful but it could just be that other people don’t think it will be beautiful at all. Since only the phrase is spreading without the visible substance to support it, a feeling of discomfort is beginning to register amongst the people.
I personally have my reservations about whether, the current state of Japan, is one, which can afford many options. Rather than asking whether the country is beautiful or not, from now on, the debate in this country is at a stage, where we need to be asking whether Japan can survive in its current state or not and then move to overcome the extremely difficult situation we are in. Only then will the country’s prospects become discernible. This is the current state that I believe Japan is in.
Therefore, I would ask that we do without this debate about whether Japan is a beautiful country or not and once beyond this, we should be thinking, for the years to come, along the lines of doing our utmost to reduce the sacrifices that the citizens of this country have to make and the waste that is being created.
投稿者 gnpo : 09:58 AM
