Chalmers Johnson - MITI and the Japanese miracle

Amakudari provides one more channel of communication for the government, the business community, and the political world. Nakamura Takafusa believes it is the main channel of liaison between the business world and the bureaucratic world.

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Nonetheless, its influence is tempered by the similar but also cross-cutting influences of school ties, marital alliances, clan networks, deliberation councils, senior-junior relations, and the ministerial clubs of all retired bureaucrats (for example, MITI's Kayo-kai*, or Tuesday Club, had some 588 members in 1963).

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The human element also enters. Some bureau-

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TABLE

6

MITI Vice-Ministers and Their Amakudari Positions (as of 1978)

(Parentheses under names indicate years of active service in MITI)

Name

Vice-minister dates

Amakudari position(s)

1. Yamamoto Takayuki (19291952)

5/493/52

Vice-president, Fuji Iron and Steel; died May 17, 1961.

2. Tamaki Keizo * (19301953)

3/5211/53

President, then chairman, Toshiba* Electric Co.

3. Hirai Tomisaburo* (19311955)

11/5311/55

President, then adviser, New Japan Steel Corp.

4. Ishihara Takeo (19321957)

11/556/57

Vice-president, then auditor, Tokyo Electric Power Co.

5. Ueno Koshichi* (19321960)

6/575/60

Vice-president, then adviser, Kansai Electric Power Co.; president, Kansai Oil Co.

6. Tokunaga Hisatsugu (19331961)

5/607/61

Vice-president, New Japan Steel Corp.; then president, Japan Petroleum Development Corp.

7. Matsuo Kinzo* (19341963)

7/617/63

Chairman, Nippon Kokan* Steel Co.

8. Imai Zen'ei (19371964)

7/6310/64

President, Japan Petrochemical Corp.

9. Sahashi Shigeru (19371966)

10/644/66

Sahashi Economic Research Institute; chairman, Japan Leisure Development Center.

10. Yamamoto Shigenobu (19391968)

4/665/68

Executive director, Toyota Motor Co.

11. Kumagai Yoshifumi (19401969)

5/6811/69

President, Sumitomo Metals Corp.

12. Ojimi* Yoshihisa (Spring 19411971)

11/696/71

President, Arabian Oil Co.

13. Morozumi Yoshihiko (Autumn 19411973)

6/717/73

President, Electric Power Development Company.

14. Yamashita Eimei (19431974)

7/7311/74

Managing director, Mitsui Trading Co.; president, Iran Chemical Development Co.

15. Komatsu Yugoro* (19441976)

11/747/76

Director, Kobe Steel Corp.

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crats simply do not like amakudari because they feel that it is beneath them as officials to become involved in business for profit or because they do not want to come back to their old ministry to lobby their younger colleagues. Iwatake Teruhiko, for example, joined Kobe Steel after retirement from MITI, but he did not approve of amakudari. When a Ministry of Finance official, Inoue Yoshimi, beat him out as president of Kobe Steel, he was offered the presidency of a satellite company, but he resigned instead and became a lecturer in literature at Todai *, something he had wanted to do for many years.

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The Japanese government-business relationship does not always work as smoothly as it appears to on the surface. A major check to its effectiveness, one that often alters the various relationships within the establishment in unforeseen ways, is competition among ministrieswhat the Japanese call "sectionalism." Some observers believe that it is the most important characteristic of the Japanese government, either limiting its potential effectiveness or mitigating its enormous powers.

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To judge by the Japanese term commonly used to describe it

gun'yu

*

kakkyo

(the rivalry of local barons)one would think that the Japanese believe sectionalism is an inheritance from the samurai era. Certainly one demonstrable cause of sectionalism was the Meiji Constitution of 1889, with its provisions for "independent responsibility to the throne," meaning that ministers and their ministries were not accountable to the prime minister, the cabinet, or the Diet, but only to the Emperorand hence to no one but themselves. The drafters' intent was to prevent rivals to the oligarchs from coming to power and using the government against them, but the actual result was numerous instances in which the military ministries used their radical independence to defy all authority. And many scholars believe that the lack of coordination between the army, the navy, and the rest of the government during the Pacific War was a major cause of Japan's overwhelming defeat.

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The Constitution of 1947 states that "executive power shall be vested in the Cabinet" (art. 65), and that "the Cabinet, in the exercise of executive power, shall be collectively responsible to the Diet" (art. 66). Nonetheless, the cabinet has no coordinating organs, and executive power has remained, as it was before the war, in the ministries. (Neither the Board of Audit nor the Cabinet Legislation Bureau, the two main staff organs attached to the cabinet, has supervisory or coordinating powers over the ministries.) A minister can no longer bring down a government simply by resigning, but the old traditions of intense independence and of rivalry persist. Sahashi Shigeru, a former MITI vice-minister, contends that on this score the cabinet sys-