Civil service of Japan
Encyclopedia
The Japanese civil service has over one million employees, with 400,000 workers in postal service, or Japan Post
(since 2003), being the biggest part, whilst the Japanese Self-Defence Force being the second biggest, with 247,000 personnel. In the post-war period, this figure has been even higher, but the privatization of a large number of public corporations
since the 1980s, among them NTT
and Japanese National Railways
, already reduced the number. Postal privatization is the next step. Still, the government as an employer is held in high regard. After the breakdown of the Japanese asset price bubble
in the early 1990s, wages and privileges in the private sector were cut, but public service workers still enjoy many of the benefits introduced in the boom years.
National government civil servants are divided into "special" and "regular" categories. Appointments in the special category are governed by political or other factors and do not involve competitive examinations. This category includes cabinet
ministers, heads of independent agencies, members of the Self-Defense Forces, Diet officials, and ambassadors. The core of the civil service is composed of members of the regular category, who are recruited through competitive examinations. This group is further divided into junior service and upper professional levels, the latter forming a well-defined civil service elite.
as the people who really govern Japan, although they composed only a tiny fraction of the country's more than 1 million national government employees. Several hundred of the elite are employed at each national ministry
or agency. Although entry into the elite through open examinations does not require a college degree, the majority of its members are alumni of Japan's most prestigious universities
. The University of Tokyo
law faculty is the single most important source of elite bureaucrats. After graduation from college and, increasingly, some graduate-level study, applicants take a series of difficult higher civil service examinations: in 2009, for example, 22,186 took the tests of higher (the 1st grade) civil service, but only 1,494, or 6.7 percent, were successful. Of those who were successful, only 660 were actually hired. Like the scholar-officials of imperial China, successful candidates were hardy survivors of a grueling education and testing process that necessarily began in early childhood and demanded total concentration. The typical young bureaucrat, who is in most cases male, is an intelligent, hardworking, and dedicated individual. But some bureaucrats, critics argue, lack imagination and compassion for people whose way of life is different from their own. Recently, many top-class candidates in universities prefer to choose financial companies or certificate of lawyers and accountants rather than civil services, however. This is because salary in civil services is lower especially when they are young, and civil services undergo significant criticism and reforms these days.
The public's attitude toward the elite is ambivalent. The elite enjoy great social prestige, but its members are also resented. They live in a realm that is at least partly public, yet far removed from the lives of ordinary people. Compared with politicians, they are generally viewed as honest. Involvement of top officials in scandals such as the Recruit affair
, however, had to some extent tarnished their image.
Japan's elite bureaucrats are insulated from direct political pressure because there are very few political appointments in the civil service. Cabinet
ministers are usually career politicians, but they are moved in and out of their posts quite frequently (with an average tenure of under a year), and usually have little opportunity to develop a power base within a ministry, or force their civil service subordinates to adopt reforms. Below the cabinet minister is the administrative vice minister. Administrative vice ministers and their subordinates are career civil servants whose appointments are determined in accordance with an internally established principle of seniority.
), when the imperial court adopted the laws and government structure of Tang
China
. However, the distinctive Chinese (confucian
) institution of civil service examinations
never took root, and the imported system was never successfully imposed on the country at large. But by the middle of the Tokugawa period
(1600- 1867), the samurai
class functions had evolved from military to clerical and administrative functions. Following the Meiji Restoration
(1868), the new elite, which came from the lower ranks of the samurai, established a Western-style civil service.
dismantled both the military and zaibatsu
establishments, it did little, outside of abolishing the prewar Home Ministry
, to challenge the power of the bureaucracy. There was considerable continuity —in institutions, operating style, and personnel — between the civil service before and after the occupation, partly because General Douglas MacArthur
's staff ruled indirectly and depended largely on the cooperation of civil servants. A process of mutual co-optation occurred. Also, United States policy planners never regarded the civil service with the same opprobrium as the military or economic elites. The civil service's role in Japan's militarism was generally downplayed. Many of the occupation figures themselves were products of President Franklin D. Roosevelt
's New Deal
and had strong faith in the merits of civil service professionalism. Finally, the perceived threat of the Soviet Union
in the late 1940s created a community of interests for the occupiers and for conservative, social order-conscious administrators.
quotes a retired vice minister of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry
(MITI) who said that the Diet was merely "an extension of the bureaucracy". The official claimed that "the bureaucracy drafts all the laws.... All the legislature does is to use its powers of investigation, which for about half the year keeps most of the senior officials cooped up in the Diet."
In the years since this official made his proud boast, however, it became apparent that there were limits to the bureaucrats' power. The most important was the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan's growing role in policy formation. Political scientist B.C. Koh suggested that in many cases members of the LDP policy-oriented tribes (zoku
) had greater expertise in their fields than elite bureaucrats. Before the latter drafted legislation, they had to consult and follow the initiatives of the party's Policy Research Council. Many analysts consider the role of the bureaucracy in drafting legislation to be no greater than that of its counterparts in France
, Germany
, and other countries. Also, the decision of many retired bureaucrats to run as LDP candidates for the Diet might not reflect, as had been previously assumed, the power of the officials but rather the impatience of ambitious men who wanted to locate themselves, politically, "where the action is."
An intense rivalry among the ministries came into play whenever major policy decisions were formulated. Elite civil servants were recruited by and spent their entire careers in a single ministry. As a result, they developed a strong sectional solidarity and zealously defended their turf. Nonbureaucratic actors—the politicians and interest groups—could use this rivalry to their own advantage.
is generally considered the most powerful and prestigious of the ministries. Its top officials are regarded as the cream of the elite. Although it was relatively unsuccessful in the 1970s when the deficit rose, the ministry was very successful in the 1980s in constraining government spending and raising taxes, including a twelve-year battle to get a consumption tax
passed. The huge national debt in the early 1990s, however, may be evidence that this budget-minded body had been unsuccessful in the previous decade in curbing demands for popular policies such as health insurance, rice price supports, and the unprofitable nationwide network of the privatized Japan Railways Group. Ministry of International Trade and Industry
(MITI) frequently encountered obstacles in its early postoccupation plans to reconsolidate the economy. It has not always been successful in imposing its will on private interests, politicians, or other ministries. According to law professor John Owen Haley, writing in the late 1980s, MITI's practice of gyōsei shidō, or administrative guidance, often described as evidence of the bureaucracy's hidden power, was in fact a second-best alternative to "express statutory authority that would have legitimated its exercise of authority." Administrative reform policies in the 1980s imposed ceilings on civil service staff and spending that probably contributed to a deterioration of morale and working conditions.
Still another factor limiting bureaucratic power was the emergence of an affluent society. In the early postwar period, the scarcity of capital made it possible for the Ministry of Finance and MITI to exert considerable influence over the economy through control of the banking system (see Monetary and fiscal policy
). To a decreasing extent, this scarcity remained until the 1980s because most major companies had high debt-equity ratios and depended on the banks for infusions of capital. Their huge profits and increasing reliance on securities markets in the late 1980s, however, meant that the Ministry of Finance had less influence. The wealth, technical sophistication, and new confidence of the companies also made it difficult for MITI to exercise administrative guidance. The ministry could not restrain aggressive and often politically controversial purchases by Japanese corporate investors in the United States
, such as Mitsubishi Estate's October 1989 purchase of Rockefeller Center
in New York
City, which, along with the Sony
Corporation's acquisition of Columbia Pictures
several weeks earlier, heated up trade friction between the two countries.
The whole issue of trade friction and foreign pressure tended to politicize the bureaucracy and promote unprecedented divisiveness in the late 1980s and early 1990s. During the Structural Impediments Initiative talks held by Japan and the United States in early 1990, basic changes in Japan's economy were discussed: reforms of the distribution and pricing systems, improvement of the infrastructure, and elimination of official procedures that limited foreign participation in the economy. Although foreign pressure of this sort is resented by many Japanese as an intrusion on national sovereignty, it also provides an opportunity for certain ministries to make gains at the expense of others. There is hardly a bureaucratic jurisdiction in the economic sphere that is not in some sense affected.
Internationally minded political and bureaucratic elites have found their market-opening reforms, designed to placate United States demands, repeatedly sabotaged by other interests, especially agriculture
. Such reactions intensified United States pressure, which in turn created a sense of crisis and a siege mentality within Japan. The "internationalization" of Japan's society in other ways also divided the bureaucratic elite. MITI, the Ministry of Labor
, and the Ministry of Justice
had divergent views on how to respond to the influx of unskilled, usually South Asian and Southeast Asian, laborers into the labor-starved Japanese economy. An estimated 300,000 to 400,000 of them worked illegally for small Japanese firms in the late 1980s. Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture
revision of guidelines on the writing of history textbooks, ostensibly a domestic matter, aroused the indignation of Japan's Asian neighbors because the changes tended to soften accounts of wartime atrocities (see Japanese history textbook controversies
).
was implemented to merge existing ministries, strengthen the operation of cabinet and achieve more efficient work. Criticism to civil services from media and people has got stronger against some scandals, amakudari
practice to assure the advantages of high-rank officials after retirement, salary standard and many other factors.
In 2009 general election
, the Democratic Party of Japan
(DPJ) came to power after the regime of Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP) lasted for many years. DPJ set up the policy of “leadership by politics”, criticized the initiative of bureaucracy in the era of LDP and will reform civil service. Decision-making style in the government and ministry in Japan is changing significantly.
Japan Post
was a government-owned corporation in Japan, that existed from 2003–2007, offering postal and package delivery services, banking services, and life insurance. It had over 400,000 employees and ran 24,700 post offices throughout Japan and was the nation's largest employer. One third of all Japanese...
(since 2003), being the biggest part, whilst the Japanese Self-Defence Force being the second biggest, with 247,000 personnel. In the post-war period, this figure has been even higher, but the privatization of a large number of public corporations
Japanese public corporations
Although the Japanese economy is largely based on private enterprise, it does have a number of government-owned corporations, which are more extensive and, in some cases, different in function from what exists in the United States.- History :...
since the 1980s, among them NTT
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone
, commonly known as NTT, is a Japanese telecommunications company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Ranked the 31st in Fortune Global 500, NTT is the largest telecommunications company in Asia, and the second-largest in the world in terms of revenue....
and Japanese National Railways
Japanese National Railways
, abbreviated or "JNR", was the national railway network of Japan from 1949 to 1987.-History:The term Kokuyū Tetsudō "state-owned railway" originally referred to a network of railway lines operated by nationalized companies under the control of the Railway Institute following the nationalization...
, already reduced the number. Postal privatization is the next step. Still, the government as an employer is held in high regard. After the breakdown of the Japanese asset price bubble
Japanese asset price bubble
The was an economic bubble in Japan from 1986 to 1991, in which real estate and stock prices were greatly inflated. The bubble's collapse lasted for more than a decade with stock prices initially bottoming in 2003, although they would descend even further amidst the global crisis in 2008. The...
in the early 1990s, wages and privileges in the private sector were cut, but public service workers still enjoy many of the benefits introduced in the boom years.
National government civil servants are divided into "special" and "regular" categories. Appointments in the special category are governed by political or other factors and do not involve competitive examinations. This category includes cabinet
Cabinet of Japan
The of Japan is the executive branch of the government of Japan. It consists of the Prime Minister and up to fourteen other members, called Ministers of State. The Prime Minister is designated by the Diet, and the remaining ministers are appointed and dismissed by the Prime Minister...
ministers, heads of independent agencies, members of the Self-Defense Forces, Diet officials, and ambassadors. The core of the civil service is composed of members of the regular category, who are recruited through competitive examinations. This group is further divided into junior service and upper professional levels, the latter forming a well-defined civil service elite.
Elite bureaucrats
In trying to discover "who's in charge here," many Japan analysts have pointed to the elite bureaucracyBureaucracy
A bureaucracy is an organization of non-elected officials of a governmental or organization who implement the rules, laws, and functions of their institution, and are occasionally characterized by officialism and red tape.-Weberian bureaucracy:...
as the people who really govern Japan, although they composed only a tiny fraction of the country's more than 1 million national government employees. Several hundred of the elite are employed at each national ministry
Ministries of Japan
The most influential part of the executive of the Japanese government are the ministries. In postwar politics, the posts of ministers have been given to senior legislators, mostly of the LDP. However, few ministers have been serving their terms for more than one or two years, and developed the...
or agency. Although entry into the elite through open examinations does not require a college degree, the majority of its members are alumni of Japan's most prestigious universities
Higher education in Japan
- University entrance :University entrance is based largely on the scores that students achieved in entrance examinations . Private institutions accounted for nearly 80% of all university enrollments in 1991, but with a few exceptions, the public national universities are the most highly regarded...
. The University of Tokyo
University of Tokyo
, abbreviated as , is a major research university located in Tokyo, Japan. The University has 10 faculties with a total of around 30,000 students, 2,100 of whom are foreign. Its five campuses are in Hongō, Komaba, Kashiwa, Shirokane and Nakano. It is considered to be the most prestigious university...
law faculty is the single most important source of elite bureaucrats. After graduation from college and, increasingly, some graduate-level study, applicants take a series of difficult higher civil service examinations: in 2009, for example, 22,186 took the tests of higher (the 1st grade) civil service, but only 1,494, or 6.7 percent, were successful. Of those who were successful, only 660 were actually hired. Like the scholar-officials of imperial China, successful candidates were hardy survivors of a grueling education and testing process that necessarily began in early childhood and demanded total concentration. The typical young bureaucrat, who is in most cases male, is an intelligent, hardworking, and dedicated individual. But some bureaucrats, critics argue, lack imagination and compassion for people whose way of life is different from their own. Recently, many top-class candidates in universities prefer to choose financial companies or certificate of lawyers and accountants rather than civil services, however. This is because salary in civil services is lower especially when they are young, and civil services undergo significant criticism and reforms these days.
The public's attitude toward the elite is ambivalent. The elite enjoy great social prestige, but its members are also resented. They live in a realm that is at least partly public, yet far removed from the lives of ordinary people. Compared with politicians, they are generally viewed as honest. Involvement of top officials in scandals such as the Recruit affair
Recruit scandal
The was an insider trading and corruption scandal that forced many prominent Japanese politicians to resign in 1988.Recruit is a human resources and classifieds company based in Tokyo. Its chairman, Hiromasa Ezoe, offered a number of shares in a Recruit subsidiary, Cosmos, to business leaders and...
, however, had to some extent tarnished their image.
Japan's elite bureaucrats are insulated from direct political pressure because there are very few political appointments in the civil service. Cabinet
Cabinet of Japan
The of Japan is the executive branch of the government of Japan. It consists of the Prime Minister and up to fourteen other members, called Ministers of State. The Prime Minister is designated by the Diet, and the remaining ministers are appointed and dismissed by the Prime Minister...
ministers are usually career politicians, but they are moved in and out of their posts quite frequently (with an average tenure of under a year), and usually have little opportunity to develop a power base within a ministry, or force their civil service subordinates to adopt reforms. Below the cabinet minister is the administrative vice minister. Administrative vice ministers and their subordinates are career civil servants whose appointments are determined in accordance with an internally established principle of seniority.
Pre-modern Japan
The Japanese had been exposed to bureaucratic institutions at least by the early seventh century A.D. (Nara periodNara period
The of the history of Japan covers the years from AD 710 to 794. Empress Gemmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō . Except for 5 years , when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the capital of Japanese civilization until Emperor Kammu established a new capital, Nagaoka-kyō, in 784...
), when the imperial court adopted the laws and government structure of Tang
Tang Dynasty
The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...
China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
. However, the distinctive Chinese (confucian
Confucianism
Confucianism is a Chinese ethical and philosophical system developed from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius . Confucianism originated as an "ethical-sociopolitical teaching" during the Spring and Autumn Period, but later developed metaphysical and cosmological elements in the Han...
) institution of civil service examinations
Imperial examination
The Imperial examination was an examination system in Imperial China designed to select the best administrative officials for the state's bureaucracy. This system had a huge influence on both society and culture in Imperial China and was directly responsible for the creation of a class of...
never took root, and the imported system was never successfully imposed on the country at large. But by the middle of the Tokugawa period
Edo period
The , or , is a division of Japanese history which was ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family, running from 1603 to 1868. The political entity of this period was the Tokugawa shogunate....
(1600- 1867), the samurai
Samurai
is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...
class functions had evolved from military to clerical and administrative functions. Following the Meiji Restoration
Meiji Restoration
The , also known as the Meiji Ishin, Revolution, Reform or Renewal, was a chain of events that restored imperial rule to Japan in 1868...
(1868), the new elite, which came from the lower ranks of the samurai, established a Western-style civil service.
Occupied Japan
Although the United States occupationOccupied Japan
At the end of World War II, Japan was occupied by the Allied Powers, led by the United States with contributions also from Australia, India, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. This foreign presence marked the first time in its history that the island nation had been occupied by a foreign power...
dismantled both the military and zaibatsu
Zaibatsu
is a Japanese term referring to industrial and financial business conglomerates in the Empire of Japan, whose influence and size allowed for control over significant parts of the Japanese economy from the Meiji period until the end of World War II.-Terminology:...
establishments, it did little, outside of abolishing the prewar Home Ministry
Home Ministry (Japan)
The ' was a Cabinet-level ministry established under the Meiji Constitution that managed the internal affairs of Empire of Japan from 1873-1947...
, to challenge the power of the bureaucracy. There was considerable continuity —in institutions, operating style, and personnel — between the civil service before and after the occupation, partly because General Douglas MacArthur
Douglas MacArthur
General of the Army Douglas MacArthur was an American general and field marshal of the Philippine Army. He was a Chief of Staff of the United States Army during the 1930s and played a prominent role in the Pacific theater during World War II. He received the Medal of Honor for his service in the...
's staff ruled indirectly and depended largely on the cooperation of civil servants. A process of mutual co-optation occurred. Also, United States policy planners never regarded the civil service with the same opprobrium as the military or economic elites. The civil service's role in Japan's militarism was generally downplayed. Many of the occupation figures themselves were products of President Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
's New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
and had strong faith in the merits of civil service professionalism. Finally, the perceived threat of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in the late 1940s created a community of interests for the occupiers and for conservative, social order-conscious administrators.
1970s and 1980s
In a 1975 article, political scientist Chalmers JohnsonChalmers Johnson
Chalmers Ashby Johnson was an American author and professor emeritus of the University of California, San Diego. He served in the Korean War, was a consultant for the CIA from 1967–1973, and chaired the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of California, Berkeley from 1967 to 1972...
quotes a retired vice minister of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry
Ministry of International Trade and Industry
The Ministry of International Trade and Industry was one of the most powerful agencies of the Government of Japan. At the height of its influence, it effectively ran much of Japanese industrial policy, funding research and directing investment...
(MITI) who said that the Diet was merely "an extension of the bureaucracy". The official claimed that "the bureaucracy drafts all the laws.... All the legislature does is to use its powers of investigation, which for about half the year keeps most of the senior officials cooped up in the Diet."
In the years since this official made his proud boast, however, it became apparent that there were limits to the bureaucrats' power. The most important was the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan's growing role in policy formation. Political scientist B.C. Koh suggested that in many cases members of the LDP policy-oriented tribes (zoku
Zoku
is a Sino-Japanese term meaning tribe, clan, or family. As a suffix it has been used extensively within Japan to define subcultural phenomena, though many zoku do not acquire the suffix ....
) had greater expertise in their fields than elite bureaucrats. Before the latter drafted legislation, they had to consult and follow the initiatives of the party's Policy Research Council. Many analysts consider the role of the bureaucracy in drafting legislation to be no greater than that of its counterparts in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, and other countries. Also, the decision of many retired bureaucrats to run as LDP candidates for the Diet might not reflect, as had been previously assumed, the power of the officials but rather the impatience of ambitious men who wanted to locate themselves, politically, "where the action is."
An intense rivalry among the ministries came into play whenever major policy decisions were formulated. Elite civil servants were recruited by and spent their entire careers in a single ministry. As a result, they developed a strong sectional solidarity and zealously defended their turf. Nonbureaucratic actors—the politicians and interest groups—could use this rivalry to their own advantage.
1990s
The Ministry of FinanceMinistry of Finance (Japan)
The ' is one of cabinet-level ministries of the Japanese government. The ministry was once named Ōkura-shō . The Ministry is headed by the Minister of Finance , who is a member of the Cabinet and is typically chosen from members of the Diet by the Prime Minister.The Ministry's origin was back in...
is generally considered the most powerful and prestigious of the ministries. Its top officials are regarded as the cream of the elite. Although it was relatively unsuccessful in the 1970s when the deficit rose, the ministry was very successful in the 1980s in constraining government spending and raising taxes, including a twelve-year battle to get a consumption tax
Consumption tax
A consumption tax is a tax on spending on goods and services. The tax base of such a tax is the money spent on consumption. Consumption taxes are usually indirect, such as a sales tax or a value added tax...
passed. The huge national debt in the early 1990s, however, may be evidence that this budget-minded body had been unsuccessful in the previous decade in curbing demands for popular policies such as health insurance, rice price supports, and the unprofitable nationwide network of the privatized Japan Railways Group. Ministry of International Trade and Industry
Ministry of International Trade and Industry
The Ministry of International Trade and Industry was one of the most powerful agencies of the Government of Japan. At the height of its influence, it effectively ran much of Japanese industrial policy, funding research and directing investment...
(MITI) frequently encountered obstacles in its early postoccupation plans to reconsolidate the economy. It has not always been successful in imposing its will on private interests, politicians, or other ministries. According to law professor John Owen Haley, writing in the late 1980s, MITI's practice of gyōsei shidō, or administrative guidance, often described as evidence of the bureaucracy's hidden power, was in fact a second-best alternative to "express statutory authority that would have legitimated its exercise of authority." Administrative reform policies in the 1980s imposed ceilings on civil service staff and spending that probably contributed to a deterioration of morale and working conditions.
Still another factor limiting bureaucratic power was the emergence of an affluent society. In the early postwar period, the scarcity of capital made it possible for the Ministry of Finance and MITI to exert considerable influence over the economy through control of the banking system (see Monetary and fiscal policy
Monetary and fiscal policy of Japan
Monetary policy pertains to the regulatio, availability, and cost of credit, while fiscal policy deals with government expenditures, taxes, and debt...
). To a decreasing extent, this scarcity remained until the 1980s because most major companies had high debt-equity ratios and depended on the banks for infusions of capital. Their huge profits and increasing reliance on securities markets in the late 1980s, however, meant that the Ministry of Finance had less influence. The wealth, technical sophistication, and new confidence of the companies also made it difficult for MITI to exercise administrative guidance. The ministry could not restrain aggressive and often politically controversial purchases by Japanese corporate investors in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, such as Mitsubishi Estate's October 1989 purchase of Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller Center is a complex of 19 commercial buildings covering between 48th and 51st streets in New York City, United States. Built by the Rockefeller family, it is located in the center of Midtown Manhattan, spanning the area between Fifth Avenue and Sixth Avenue. It was declared a National...
in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
City, which, along with the Sony
Sony
, commonly referred to as Sony, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan and the world's fifth largest media conglomerate measured by revenues....
Corporation's acquisition of Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
several weeks earlier, heated up trade friction between the two countries.
The whole issue of trade friction and foreign pressure tended to politicize the bureaucracy and promote unprecedented divisiveness in the late 1980s and early 1990s. During the Structural Impediments Initiative talks held by Japan and the United States in early 1990, basic changes in Japan's economy were discussed: reforms of the distribution and pricing systems, improvement of the infrastructure, and elimination of official procedures that limited foreign participation in the economy. Although foreign pressure of this sort is resented by many Japanese as an intrusion on national sovereignty, it also provides an opportunity for certain ministries to make gains at the expense of others. There is hardly a bureaucratic jurisdiction in the economic sphere that is not in some sense affected.
Internationally minded political and bureaucratic elites have found their market-opening reforms, designed to placate United States demands, repeatedly sabotaged by other interests, especially agriculture
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing in Japan
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing form the primary sector of industry of the Japanese economy, together with the Japanese mining industry, but together they account for only 1.3% of gross national product...
. Such reactions intensified United States pressure, which in turn created a sense of crisis and a siege mentality within Japan. The "internationalization" of Japan's society in other ways also divided the bureaucratic elite. MITI, the Ministry of Labor
Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (Japan)
The ' is a cabinet level ministry of the Japanese government. It is commonly known as Kōrō-shō in Japan. This ministry provides regulations on maximum residue limits for agricultural chemicals in foods, basic food and drug regulations, standards for foods, food additives, etc.It was formed with...
, and the Ministry of Justice
Ministry of Justice (Japan)
The is one of Ministries of the Japanese government.-Meiji Constitution:The Ministry of Justice was established under the Constitution of the Empire of Japan in 1871 as the .-Constitution of Japan:...
had divergent views on how to respond to the influx of unskilled, usually South Asian and Southeast Asian, laborers into the labor-starved Japanese economy. An estimated 300,000 to 400,000 of them worked illegally for small Japanese firms in the late 1980s. Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Japan)
The , also known as MEXT or Monkashō, is one of the ministries of the Japanese government.The Meiji government created the first Ministry of Education in 1871....
revision of guidelines on the writing of history textbooks, ostensibly a domestic matter, aroused the indignation of Japan's Asian neighbors because the changes tended to soften accounts of wartime atrocities (see Japanese history textbook controversies
Japanese history textbook controversies
Japanese history textbook controversies refers to controversial content in government-approved history textbooks used in the secondary education of Japan...
).
2000s
Civil services in Japan underwent significant changes and reforms to work more efficiently in severe budget situation of the government. In 2001, Central Government Reform2001 Central Government Reform
The by the Japanese government involved the establishment of a new ministry, the merging of existing ministries and the abolition of others. This resulted in little more than a change of ministry names .-External links:*...
was implemented to merge existing ministries, strengthen the operation of cabinet and achieve more efficient work. Criticism to civil services from media and people has got stronger against some scandals, amakudari
Amakudari
is the institutionalised practice where Japanese senior bureaucrats retire to high-profile positions in the private and public sectors. The practice is increasingly viewed as corrupt and a drag on unfastening the ties between private sector and state which prevent economic and political...
practice to assure the advantages of high-rank officials after retirement, salary standard and many other factors.
In 2009 general election
Japanese general election, 2009
A general election in Japan was held on August 30, 2009, for all 480 seats of the House of Representatives of Japan, the lower house of the Diet of Japan....
, the Democratic Party of Japan
Democratic Party of Japan
The is a political party in Japan founded in 1998 by the merger of several opposition parties. Its socially liberal platform is generally considered center-left in the Japanese political spectrum...
(DPJ) came to power after the regime of Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP) lasted for many years. DPJ set up the policy of “leadership by politics”, criticized the initiative of bureaucracy in the era of LDP and will reform civil service. Decision-making style in the government and ministry in Japan is changing significantly.