This is a new analysis of recent changes in important Japanese institutions. It addresses the origin, development, and recent adaptation of core institutions, including financial institutions, corporate governance, lifetime employment, and the amakudari system. After four decades of rapid economic growth in Japan, the 1990s saw the country enter a prolonged period of economic stagnation. Policy reforms were initially half-hearted, and businesses were slow to restructure as the global economy changed. The lagging economy has been impervious to aggressive fiscal stimulus measures and has been plagued by ongoing price deflation for years. Japan’s struggle has called into question the ability of the country’s economic institutions, originally designed to support factor accumulation and rapid development, to adapt to the new economic environment of the twenty-first century. This book discusses both historical and international comparisons including Meiji Japan, and recent economic and financial reforms in Korea, Scandinavia, Switzerland, and New Zealand, placing the current institutional changes in perspective. The contributors argue that, contrary to conventional wisdom that Japanese institutions have remained relatively rigid, there has been significant institutional change over the last decade.

Mired in national crises since the early 1990s, Japan has had to respond to a rapid population decline; the Asian and global financial crises; the 2011 triple disaster of earthquake, tsunami, and the Fukushima nuclear meltdown; the COVID-19 pandemic; China’s economic rise; threats from North Korea; and massive public debt. In Crisis Narratives, Institutional Change, and the Transformation of the Japanese State, established specialists in a variety of areas use a coherent set of methodologies, aligning their sociological, public policy, and political science and international relations perspectives, to account for discrepancies between official rhetoric and policy practice and actual perceptions of decline and crisis in contemporary Japan. Each chapter focuses on a distinct policy field to gauge the effectiveness and the implications of political responses through an analysis of how crises are narrated and used to justify policy interventions. Transcending boundaries between issue areas and domestic and international politics, these essays paint a dynamic picture of the contested but changing nature of social, economic, and, ultimately political institutions as they constitute the transforming Japanese state.

Decentralized policymaking power in Japan had developed under the reign of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), yet in the1990s, institutional changes fundamentally altered Japan's political landscape. Tomohito Shinoda tracks these developments in the operation of and tensions between Japan's political parties and the public's behavior in elections, as well as in the government's ability to coordinate diverse policy preferences and respond to political crises. The selection of Junichiro Koizumi, an anti-mainstream politician, as prime minister in 2001 initiated a power shift to the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) and ended LDP rule. Shinoda details these events and Prime Minister Koizumi's use of them to practice strong policymaking leadership. He also outlines the institutional initiatives introduced by the DPJ government and their impact on policymaking, illustrating the importance of balanced centralized institutions and bureaucratic support.

In August 2009, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) won a crushing victory over the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), thus bringing to an end over fifty years of one-party dominance. Around the world, the victory of the DPJ was seen as a radical break with Japan's past. However, this dramatic political shift was not as sudden as it appeared, but rather the culmination of a series of changes first set in motion in the early 1990s. The Evolution of Japan's Party System analyses the transition by examining both party politics and public policy. Arguing that these political changes were evolutionary rather than revolutionary, the essays in this volume discuss how older parties such as the LDP and the Japan Socialist Party failed to adapt to the new policy environment of the 1990s. Taken as a whole, The Evolution of Japan's Party System provides a unique look at party politics in Japan, bringing them into a comparative conversation that usually focuses on Europe and North America.

During the last 30 years, the Japanese political economy system has experienced significant changes that are usually not well understood or analysed because of their complexity and contradictions. This book provides new analyses and insights on the process of evolving Japanese political economy including Japan’s current economic policy known as Abenomics. The first three chapters looks at evolutions at the corporate level, characterised in recent years by increasing firm heterogeneity. The authors apply theoretically driven analyses to the complex subject of corporate governance, human resource management and corporate reporting by discussing new developments in context of their economic opportunities as well as of their institutional contradictions with continuities in Japanese business practices. The second group of chapters deals with institutional changes and evolving economic reforms on the macro level of political economy. The two chapters focus on the financial system regulation and economic growth policies as two central elements of Japan’s political economy and key drivers in the evolution of its economy. Their analysis allows us to better understand the interplay between reforms and change in consumption credit and to reinterpret Abenomics as a manifestation of ongoing contradictions within the Japanese political economy. The chapters were originally published in a special issue in Japan Forum.

This book analyses institutional reforms implemented by Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzō, under his second administration from 2012 to 2020. Also examined is the evolution in the role of such actors in Japanese politics as bureaucrats, Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) factions, and backbenchers of the ruling party. Chapters offer multi-dimensional explanations for the preconditions of successful gradual institutional change in political systems, characterized by relatively strong veto players, rigid governmental structures, and numerous unofficial decision-making rules. It is argued that enhancement of the prime minister's position was implemented through the creative use of pre-existing policy venues, coupled with minor institutional changes in decision-making bodies. Using three illustrated case studies, it is demonstrated how the prime minister managed to centralize the decision-making process: a result of strategic appointment of ministers, empowerment of the Cabinet Secretariat and also taking advantage of wider advisory organs, largely circumventing deliberations on key policies in the ruling party. Seemingly minor changes thus manifested in a major redefinition of decision-making patterns: a result of the long-term perspective of the Abe administration. Gradual Institutional Change in Japan: Kantei Leadership under the Abe Administration will be useful for students seeking to understand the process of successful gradual institutional change and for scholars of Japanese studies and political science.

Debates regarding corporate governance have become increasingly important in Japan as the post-war model of bank-based, stakeholder-oriented corporate governance faces the new pressures associated with globalization and growing investor demands for shareholder value. Bringing together a group of leading scholars from economics, law, sociology and management studies, this book looks at how the Japanese approach to corporate governance and the firm have changed in the post-bubble era. The contributions offer a unique empirical exploration of why and how Japanese firms are reshaping their corporate governance arrangements, leading to greater diversity among firms and new 'hybrid' forms of corporate governance. The book concludes by looking at what effect these incremental but transformative changes may have on Japan's distinctive variety of capitalism.