1. J APANESE P OLITICS WEEK 4 The 1955 system

2. 1955 SYSTEM What is 1955 system? The 1955 System (55 年体制 gojūgonen taisei) is a name used for the party system in place in Japan from 1955 to 1993. In the party politics of Japan the "1955 System" or "1955 setup" has played a greater role in overall development of Japan. In this 'system' or 'setup' the reunification of the Japan Socialist Party (JSP), which had split since 1951 and the merger of two conservative parties (Japan Democratic Party and Liberal Party) led to the formation of Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in November 1955, was called "1955 System or setup", and was dominated by two parties. This resulted later in "one and half party system" since the LDP had about two-times more seats than the opposition party' JSP, in the Diet.

3. 1955 SYSTEM -2 After the formation of 1955 System or setup, the LDP was the dominant political party until 1993. From 1970 to 1983, in every House of Representatives election the opposition parties received more votes than the LDP, and the time was ripe for electoral pacts between all the like-minded opposition parties with the sole purpose of gathering the extra seats in the elections. Nonetheless, oppositions failed to do so, and later development was emerged in the year 1983, elections for the upper house and lower house were held in June and December respectively. However, the scandals, long awaited reform programs, and factions within the party had led to the downfall of LDP after ruling 38 years in August 1993 and this year is referred as the 'collapse of 1955 System or setup' in Japanese political history.

4. C OMPETING ACTORS : THE HABATSU As early as 1955, the newspapers began classifying LDP Diet members into habatsu, or factions. (in Korean 파벌 ) These were small to middle-sized groups of between 10 to 25 members and were essentially the personal followings of politicians of prime ministerial calibre. Between 1960 and 1972, the first generation of faction leaders retired or died. Confusing realignments ensued. Nevertheless, habatsu gradually became so institutionalized. Year 1963 regard as starting point for tabulating faction membership Since then, data on the factional affiliation of all LDP Diet members are coherent and systematic. From 1972 to 1980, the fierce battle between Tanaka Kakuei and Fukuda Takeo for the control of the party — the “Kaku–Fuku war” — marked a turning point for the habatsu.

5. C OMPETING ACTORS : THE HABATSU -2 Kakuei Tanaka ( 田中 角栄 or 田中 角榮 Tanaka Kakuei 4 May 1918 – 16 December 1993) was a Japanese politician who served in the House of Representatives from April 26, 1947 to January 24, 1990, and as the 64th and 65th Prime Minister of Japan from 7 July 1972 to 9 December 1974 (his two terms being divided by the 1972 general election). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakuei_Tanaka Takeo Fukuda ( 福田 赳夫 Fukuda Takeo, 14 January 1905 – 5 July 1995) was a Japanese politician and the 67th Prime Minister of Japan (67th administration) from 24 December 1976 to 7 December 1978 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takeo_Fukuda They expanded in size, until Tanaka-ha temporarily reached 139 members in 1986.

6. C OMPETING ACTORS : THE HABATSU -3 They also turned into self-sustaining machines, guided by their own corporate logic rather than by the will of their leaders. The smallest factions disappeared and their number shrunk from 13 in 1970 to nine in 1972 and five in 1980. The number of lawmakers without factional affiliation shrunk to insignificance to 16 out of 289 LDP members of the Lower House in 1992. According to the dominant view the habatsu perform only two functions, political recruitment and the allotment of benefits They help their Diet members to gain re-election against other LDP candidates in the multi-member electoral districts; they also scout promising new candidates, then fund and run their campaigns. Cabinet and party posts are shared on the basis of factional affiliation, and the factions leaders themselves — as opposed to the prime minister — allocate them to their supporters. But the habatsu do not perform any policy-making function. We can define the habatsu as uni-dimensional actors whose role in coalition-building game differs from that of political parties, which are multidimensional actors concerned with demands from the electorate at large, as well as policies decision-making and policy outputs.

7. “D OMINANT GROUPS ” WITHIN THE LDP At the beginning, the winning coalition or shuryu-ha (majority group) — the one which won the prime minister- ship for its candidate at the bi-annual party convention used to grab disproportionate share of posts, while the losers or han shuryuha (minority group) received only a few. But as time went by, the bonus for the winners diminished until the prime minister’s faction sometimes came to get less than its proportionate share of posts. Thus the distinction between shuryu-ha and han shuryu- ha became so blurred that the terms faded out of use after the second Nakasone cabinet (1983–1984). From 584-587p History of habatsu (Don’t need to read or memorize) We must know why did the government party tolerate such a costly system for managing coalition- building?

8. P OLITICAL “ SUB - SPACES ” IN J APAN Most formal spatial models consider policy spaces as a continua. Moving beyond formal legislative politics, however, they might be more accurately seen as connected sets of political “sub-spaces”, or “territories”, more or less insulated from each other. A political subspace maybe broadly described as a private territory under the dominance of a single political party. This territory is in a sense “inhabited” by a hardcore electorate that never ventures “abroad” as well as by a set of politicians and administrators who service this clientele. Inhabitants share a strong sense of identity rooted in the same political sub-culture. For example, with a labour union that maintains strong institutional links with the party and is rewarded with parliamentary seats on the party’s ticket. A sub-space has its own Constitution — the by-law of its ruling party — and its own institutions which deliver posts, prestige and money to competing actors within its clientele. It is a community with a strong identity, a web of functional relationships, the framework for the daily life of large number of people, and it has a political system of its own.

9. P OLITICAL “ SUB - SPACES ” IN J APAN -2 During most of the 1955 system period, there were five neatly-defined subspaces in Japanese politics. These were centred on the Communists, the JSP–Soˆhyoˆ, the Buddhists (Soˆkagakkai– Koˆmeitoˆ), and the small Democratic Socialist Party sponsored by the moderate Doˆmei labour union. The conservative elite controlled the “solid vote” (koˆteihoˆ) of about 20 per cent the electorate. Political and economic decision-making process among themselves within what was known as the “Power Triangle” formed by the LDP, the big business establishment and the bureaucracy. Control of the State budget, enormous political contributions from the Business establishment and favourable decisions from the bureaucracy, is three main things they share. In 1955, the conservative territory was perfectly insulated by the overwhelming LDP dominance of the Diet and by the major cleavages that separated it from the opposition parties. As time went by, however, insulation gradually weakened, until the sub-space was no longer protected either by parliamentary arithmetic or socio-economic cleavages. As a consequence, LDP powerbrokers were forced to offer ever-growing benefits to those who might otherwise have been tempted to leave.

10. P ERIOD ONE : PERFECT INSULATION (1955– 1967) In order to run the Japanese Lower House smoothly, a working majority of 18 seats above an absolute majority is necessary. During the period under consideration, the LDP surpassed this threshold by between 43 to 57 seats. To build a rival working majority, three of the five large habatsu, or up to six of the medium and small-sized groups, would need to have defected in a concerted move. During the period the LDP presidency was hotly contested. The winners duly maximized their gains. The costs of this system of allocating the spoils are obvious. Factional infighting led to extreme instability — six of the 15 cabinets lasted only six months — and endangered decision-making. During the next period, the combination of this pattern with a resurgent dominant duo produced an era of “stability through unstability”

11. P ERIOD TWO : LOOSENING INSULATION (1967–1976) Following the Lower House elections of January 1967, the LDP surplus slid to 24 seats. It rebounded to 44 in 1969, then went down again to 28 in 1972. Any of the five main habatsu were in a position to deprive the party of a working majority by defecting, and any of the three biggest could shatter its absolute majority. The DSP, which left the JSP in 1960, and the Koˆmeitoˆ, which entered the Lower House in 1967, won 19–31 and 25–47 seats, respectively, during this period. With most controversial issues either solved or pushed onto the back burner as a result of economic growth, an alliance with these centrist parties was no politically unthinkable. As soon as the LDP majority shrank, the portfolio shares of the Prime Ministerial faction and the dominant duo began to diminish. The attempt by the dominant duo to keep the old way under Tanaka’s regime led to costly factional infighting.

12. P ERIOD THREE : NEAR - PARITY IN THE D IET (1977–1980) During four years between 1977 and 1980, the LDP was deprived of a working majority in the Lower House, and reduced to a razor-thin majority in the Upper House. The party sealed an informal or “partial” coalition with the opposition parties that allowed these a say in budget-making and a de facto veto upon any piece of legislation. The political distance between the LDP and the Centrists was reduced to almost nothing, as they now joined hands to expel the leftists from local power all over Japan. The JSP itself entered into coalition with the Conservatives at the local level. In the Diet, lawmakers interacted in a friendly way in a “grey area” of hidden compromises, inebriated conviviality and secret money. The last attempt by the dominant duo to return to a system disproportionate payoff allocations by exploiting their majority — by forcing an election for the presidency to oust Fukuda, then taking back the LDP secretary-ship under Ohira regime — led to savage infighting. Second Ohira cabinet lost a no-confidence vote in May 1980. Only an unexpectedly large victory in the ensuing Lower House polls and intense pressure from within the “Power Triangle”.

13. P ERIOD FOUR : LDP “ TERRITORY ” UNDER STRESS (1980–1993) In June 1980, the LDP won 23 seats more than a working majority. In 1983, it fell short by five seats and needed to bring the NLC into the cabinet. In 1986, it surpassed the threshold by 37 seats, and by 17 in 1990. However, since factions greatly increased in size during the period we have just discussed, the defection of a single habatsu could still destroy the conservative majority. Furthermore, the LDP lost its majority in the Upper House in 1989, ushering a new regime of informal coalition with opposition. New and pressing issues gained salience. Notable among these were “administrative reform” (code-word for economic deregulation and the market economy) and the cutting of both the public deficit and social welfare. These issues divided the LDP, whose backbenchers stubbornly resisted anything that threatened their constituencies. The decision-making process within the “Power Triangle” was unable to cope with this activation of new policy dimensions in the Japanese political space. LDP decision-making gradually ground to a halt when the bursting of the “bubble economy” in 1990 pushed the issue of “political reform” into the forefront amid public outcry over scandals. At the end of the 1980s, the Keidanren called for the building of a new political structure patterned on the American two-party system. As the conservative territory lost its cohesiveness under the stress of new and pressing issues, a growing part of the “Power Triangle” elite and the public as a whole clamoured for a strong political leadership — the code-word for which was “political reform”.

14. A FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING POLICY MAKING UNDER THE 1955 S YSTEM Recent studies have begun to characterize Japanese politics under the 1955 System as founded on a positive- sum game, in which shared information and expertise between politicians and bureaucrats helped both to achieve their policymaking goals. In such a world, it makes less sense to determine whether politicians or bureaucrats were more powerful. In Japan at least, subarenas are usually defined by the jurisdictional boundaries of government agencies, with perhaps three or four per ministry. They are populated by bureaucrats, politicians and PARC division members, interest-group representatives, and sometimes academic experts and reporters who specialize in that policy area. we can identify five types of policy-change processes, as depicted in Figure 1. (96p) When most of the significant policy change is Type 4 or 5, the decision-making system is centralized. Mind figures of 96P and apply it to LDP

15. A PPLYING THE FRAMEWORK : PATTERNS OF POLICY CHANGE UNDER ONE - PARTY LDP RULE Apply these framework to the 1955–1993 period of LDP dominance in Japan. Based on this framework, and taking into account factors that biased the conclusions of previous work, framework can offer new interpretations of Japanese governmental decision making. 1960s were a period of centralized, bureaucracy- dominated policy making, we see a relatively pluralistic system in which rank and file politicians played a critical role. On the 1980s describes a pluralistic, politician- activist system, we find a more centralized process, where rank and file politician power was not in initiation of policy, but in their ability to defend against the activist policy-making attempts of others.

16. 1960 S AND 1970 S In the 1960s, fewer policy initiatives came from the top. As a deliberate political strategy, PM Ikeda halted the reverse course; factional strife and its tendency to create policy conflict died down; and the LDP, less worried about its public support, was not as susceptible to big interest group demands or the temptation to buy votes with policy. The income-doubling plan was mainly an macroeconomic policy, relying on expansionary fiscal policy and the culture of growth to encourage private industry, rather than requiring detailed intervention into specialized policy making by the PM or other central actors. Most policy change was initiated at lower levels: taking place within sub- arenas (Type 1), squabbles across sub-arena boundaries (Type 2), and sub- governments appealing to heavyweight actors for approval of some large policy change (Type 3). Types 2 and 3 processes were quite significant in policy terms, but did not provoke much controversy because most conflicts could be solved by additional spending. A high proportion of policy-change decisions were thus left up to the sub-arenas (Type 1). Increased rank and file LDP power meant a decline in the ability of the center –in this case, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) – to control the budget even when backed by the PM.

17. 1960 S AND 1970 S -2 To summarize, work on Japanese decision making underestimated the extent of fragmentation and rank and file politician influence prior to 1970. The obscuring of much implicit conflict within and among sub-governments by the effects of economic growth, the disproportionate attention to the industrial policy sub-government in which politicians were not active, and the imbalance in the quantity of research on decision making between the 1960s and 1970s all contribute to a somewhat distorted picture of decision making in the 1960s as essentially unified, consensual, and bureaucratically dominated.

18. 1980 S -1 The new paradigm came to the fore in the early 1980s, and saw the decade as the culmination of the new paradigm pattern: a long-term linear trend that brought about pluralism and decentralization on the one hand and more power for politicians over bureaucrats on the other. Many focused on the ‘sub-government’ phenomenon and the decentralization of power. Also has opposite trend, strong and active leadership and ‘comprehensive’ rather than fragmented policy initiatives, these trends are not contradictory, but in fact fit neatly together. Three factors in the early 1980s produced a countertrend toward stronger central leadership and a corresponding weakening of the sub-governments and the LDP. Deficits and the fear of corporate tax hike, Japanese export strength and its own economic weakness activated the US, which pushed a variety of trade issues (and defense initiatives). Compared to earlier periods, there was more Type 5 decision making, heavyweight actors talking seriously about large-scale policy change, and more top–down (Type 4) decision making, as proposals –mostly about fiscal and administrative reform, and trade liberalization – affected interests throughout the governmental system. Sub-arenas were energized by the intrusion of general arena actors. When the specialized bureaucrats, politicians, and interest groups reacted and tried to fight back against these proposals, they naturally attracted press attention.

19. 1980 S -2 Welfare-related policy areas in the 1980s provide numerous examples of central, bureaucracy-led policy planning and success in the face of rank and file politician opposition. In the 1980s, the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MHW) played an active role in the process and regularly got its way. The MHW and the Administrative Reform Committee pushed major policy changes in health care and pensions, aimed largely at restraining current and future spending in particular, the MHW pushed every one of the major reforms and in many cases had been doing so since the late 1970s. The reforms expanded MHW control over health care at the expense of the employment-related health insurance institutions and the Japan Medical Association, which in the past had used their ties to the LDP to advance their interests. Another example is foreign affairs. While generally stressing the presence of increased pluralism and party power vis-`a-vis the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) in the 1980s, during that period the MFA had ‘gotten its way on most issues taken up in the Diet’ and the MFA’s coordinator role was ‘maintained and even strengthened in some respects’. Similar to the MHW examples, in both the MFA cases an important factor was greater effort and skill in politicking by the bureaucrats. Economic fluctuations and pressures from abroad were simultaneously recognized by all participants as requiring some sort of response.

20. 1980 S -3 Top-level policy agendas in 1980s: multiple attempts to enact a valued-added tax, taxing small savings accounts, ‘liberalization’ of education, the expansion of Japanese defense, election reform, trade and financial liberalization, a host of initiatives associated with administrative reform, social welfare constraints through reforms in health insurance and pensions, the privatization of public corporations –especially the national railroads – and liberalizing trade under American pressure. Who puts this agenda? It is not LDP! Nearly all the policy changes discussed in the 1980s thus ran against traditional LDP preferences. LDP generally favored lowering taxes, protecting tax-free savings accounts, leaving education much as it is, spending below 1%of GNP on defense, more spending in general and in particular for agriculture, public works and subsidies, higher benefits and lower burdens in welfare programs, and protecting money-losing local railroad lines. LDP was not responsible for pushing any of these proposals for policy change on to the agenda.

21. 1980 S -4 LDP politicians may have actually been weaker as initiators of policy than they had been in years. After all, in the past, several policy changes had been put on the agenda and enacted primarily as a result of pressure from party politicians: many of the ‘reverse-course’ initiatives of the 1950s, the party’s key role within the establishment in pushing for welfare expansions in the early 1970s, and innumerable budget grabs. It is noteworthy that there were almost no such cases in the 1980s. Who then were the sponsors of these policy changes? For one, the PM. Nakasone was almost solely responsible for the controversies over educational reform and higher defense spending, and was a prime mover of Administrative Reform. The PM is of course from the LDP, but, in general, party leadership is but one of the roles for chief executives. Although PMs may act as representatives of their party, most often Japanese (and many other countries’) chief executives are better seen as actors in their own right. Another initiator of these policy changes was big business. The Administrative Reform campaign, with Keidanren playing such a major role, was the most systematic and comprehensive business intrusion into domestic policy making in many years. Much of the impetus for the campaign stemmed from business fears of higher taxes, and the content of many specific reforms, such as deregulation and the privatization of NTT, mainly reflected long-held business views. A third ‘sponsor’ was international actors. On many occasions the United States functioned virtually as a participant in the Japanese system, particularly as an initiator of contentious issues. A fourth initiator, with regard to political morality, was a combination of the mass media and opposition parties.

22. 1980 S -5 Also, more often than has been recognized, the leading Japanese bureaucratic ministries played a major role in setting the policy agenda of the 1980s. The obvious case is the Ministry of Finance: the themes of the Administrative Reform campaign, other than big- business initiatives, were almost entirely long-held MOF objectives, virtually a replay of its abortive ‘Break Fiscal Rigidification Campaign’ of 1967. Administrative Reform Committee prominently attacked the ‘Three Ks’ (kome, Kenpo, Kokutetsu), which since the 1960s had symbolized the MOF’s consistent inability to overcome rank and file politician support for high spending on rice subsidies, doctors’ fees under health insurance, and wasteful railroads. Centralized Type 5 and especially top–down Type 4 decision making were predominant as central bureaucrats and LDP leadership increased the liberalization of agriculture. Types 4 and 5 policy making was also very clearly at work in tax reform was cited as a demonstration of party power because the various proposals were substantially worked over in PARC’s Tax System Research Commission. But its main provisions – particularly the Value Added Tax and taxation of small savings accounts –had been top policy priorities of the MOF since the 1970s. Both had earlier failed mainly because of LDP rank and file opposition. Table 1 lists the cases and illustrates our point: The LDP may win many battles, but it initiates few of the issues. Looking at Table 1, the LDP’s relative weakness as an agenda- setter becomes clear. In only five cases was the LDP (or a group within it) either the sole or a joint initiator or sponsor of a policy change, bringing the issue to the agenda. Moreover, although here the evidence can be a bit tricky to interpret, in just six cases (the + signs) did the balance of opinion in the LDP favor the policy change (as opposed to the status quo). Ultimately, in 12 of the 15 cases the view preferred by the LDP prevailed.

23. T ABLE 1 ( P 110)

24. CONCLUSION 1955 system is very important to understand Japanese politics. We have to understand that Power-Triangle in Japanese society. Similar to Korean one. We also studied that importance of research model in Area study. Politics has mainly for Divisions, CP (Comparative Politics), IR (International Relations), PT (Political Theory), AS (Area Studies), in old days AS didn’t care much on political methodology and research model however, as we see on this week even in Regional Studies now we need good research model and methodology. Next week, we learn about Rapid Economic Growth of Japan.

25. N EXT WEEKS R EADING Rapid Economic Growth In Post-War Japan (Miyazaki Yoshikazu) Japanese Economic Success: Timing, Culture, and Organisational Capability (Abe Etsuo and Robert Fitzgerald)