Japan's New Cabinet of Heavyweights

Japan Times, Japan Times September 17, 2009

Democratic Party of Japan leader Yukio Hatoyama became Japan's new prime minister Wednesday as the Diet voted him in to the post, ending the long rule by the Liberal Democratic Party, which has been in power almost continously since late 1955. In an interesting historical twist, the new prime minister's grandfather, the late Ichiro Hatoyama, served as the first prime minister of the LDP.

True to his determination to give Japan a solid new start, Mr. Hatoyama has placed party heavyweights in key Cabinet positions: former DPJ chief Naoto Kan, as vice prime minister, is in charge of the National Strategy Bureau directly under the prime minister and must work out a vision for Japan and a budget outline; former party chief Katsuya Okada is foreign minister; former party head Seiji Maehara is infrastructure and transport minister; and former finance minister Hirohisa Fujii is assigned to the same portfolio.

Social Democratic Party leader Mizuho Fukushima is state minister in charge of consumer affairs and child-rearing support, and People's New Party (Kokumin Shinto) leader Shizuka Kamei is state minister in charge of financial and postal services.

The formation of the Hatoyama Cabinet comes at a time when Japan finds itself with many difficult challenges. Mr. Hatoyama must lead Japan as it has at least 3.59 million jobless people and enormous public debt amounting to nearly 1.7 times the nation's gross domestic product, plus such problems as the pension records fiasco, deteriorating medical services, and the graying and dwindling population.

It is hoped that the Hatoyama Cabinet and the three parties in the ruling coalition will make untiring efforts to ameliorate the causes of people's anxiety about the future.

The DPJ declares that taking the initiative for policy development from the hands of bureaucrats is its main political goal. While this is a worthwhile cause, it has so far failed to offer a grand vision of future Japan. Beyond individual policy matters, Mr. Hatoyama and his administration need to make clear what kind of nation they want to build amid the financial impasse and the transformation of population demographics.

It will be difficult to revive the high economic growth of the past. But the new administration should heed people's desire to see a clear strategy that will help stabilize the economy and build new industries that utilize people's ingenuity, thus creating new jobs. If Mr. Hatoyama cleverly handles his call for a 25 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2020, this could become an important part of such a strategy.

By utilizing the National Strategy Bureau, creating an administration reform conference to detect wasteful use of public money and dispatching some 100 lawmakers to government ministries, the DPJ aims to take the policy development initiative from the hands of bureaucrats and develop policies on its own. In doing so, the Cabinet and the party must avoid both intimidating bureaucrats and being duped by them. They need to develop a system that sets clear policy goals and encourages bureaucrats to cooperate with full understanding of the Cabinet's intentions and do their utmost to execute its policies.

The foremost task of the National Strategy Bureau should be prioritizing policy measures. Given the limited availability of funds, such prioritizing and full explanations about why particular policies are given funding priority will be extremely important. The bureau also should make the decision-making process transparent to gain public support and understanding. The new administration and the DPJ also must prevent lawmakers with vested interests from making deals with bureaucrats behind the scenes.

The new administration may become unable to fulfil some campaign promises because of a shortage of available funds. However, full disclosure of information concealed by bureaucrats will be useful not only for identifying problems in the workings of the government and working out solutions, but also for exposing how the "iron triangle" of lawmakers, bureaucrats and industries worked in the days of the LDP politics. The DPJ should not hesitate to invoke the Diet's right to "conduct investigations in relation to government" as guaranteed by Article 62 of the Constitution.

On the diplomatic front, Mr. Hatoyama needs to take utmost care that his coalition government does not send confusing signals to the international community. The new administration especially should strive to strengthen Japan's relations with the United States. Stable ties will be the basis for Japan's making any frank and new proposals to the U.S.

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