Shinzo Abe's First 100 Days: Sasaki Takeshi

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.

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