THE STRUCTURE OF GOVERNMENT. The Legislature
Article 41 of the constitution describes the National Diet, or national legislature, as "the highest organ of state power" and "the sole law-making organ of the State". This statement is in forceful contrast to the Meiji Constitution, which described the emperor as the one who exercised legislative power with the consent of the Diet. The Diet's responsibilities include not only the making of laws but also the approval of the annual national budget that the government submits and the ratification of treaties. It can also initiate draft constitutional amendments, which, if approved, must be presented to the people in a referendum. The Diet may conduct "investigations in relation to government" (Article 62). The prime minister must be designated by Diet resolution, establishing the principle of legislative supremacy over executive government agencies (Article 67). The government can also be dissolved by the Diet if it passes a motion of no confidence introduced by fifty members of the House of Representatives, the lower chamber. Government officials, including the prime minister and cabinet members, are required to appear before Diet investigative committees and answer inquiries. The Diet also has the power to impeach judges convicted of criminal or irregular conduct.
Japan's legislature is bicameral. Both the upper house, the House of Councillors, and the lower house, the House of Representatives, are elective bodies. The constitution's Article 14 declares that "peers and peerages shall not be recognized." Upon the enactment of the 1947 constitution, the old House of Peers was abolished. Members of the two new houses are elected by universal adult suffrage, and secrecy of the ballot is guaranteed (Article 15). The term of the House of Representatives is four years. It may be dissolved earlier, however, if the prime minister or members of the House of Representatives decide to hold a general election before the expiration of that term (Article 7). Multiple representatives are elected from 130 constituencies based theoretically on population. In 1993 the House of Representatives had 511 members.
Members of the House of Councillors have six-year terms. One half of these terms expire every three years. There are two types of constituencies in the upper house: prefectural constituencies, for the forty-seven prefectures and districts, represented by thirteen councillors, apportioned according to the district populations; and a national "proportional representation" constituency, represented by 127 councillors, which yields a total of 140 in 1992. The proportional representation system, introduced in 1982, was the first major electoral reform under the postwar constitution. Instead of choosing national constituency candidates as individuals, as had previously been the case, voters cast ballots for parties. Individual councillors, listed officially by the parties before the election, are selected on the basis of the parties' proportions of the total national constituency vote. The system was introduced to reduce the excessive money spent by candidates for the national constituencies. Critics charged, however, that this new system benefited the two largest parties, the LDP and the Japan Socialist Party (Nihon Shakaito; after 1991 known as the Social Democratic Party of Japan), which in fact had sponsored the reform.
The House of Representatives has the greater power of the two contemporary houses, in contrast to the prewar system in which the two houses had equal status. According to Article 59, a bill that is approved by the House of Representatives but turned down by the House of Councillors returns to the House of Representatives. If the latter passes the bill with a two-thirds or higher majority on this second ballot, the bill becomes law. However, three important exceptions to the principle exist; covering the approval of the budget, adoption of treaties with foreign countries, and the selection of the prime minister. In all three cases, if the upper and lower houses have a disagreement that is not resolved by a joint committee of the two houses, then after a lapse of thirty days "the decision of the House of Representatives shall be the decision of the Diet" (Articles 60, 61, and 67). Budgeting is an important annual political function, setting both taxes and the allowable expenditures of all segments of the central government, and the impotence of the upper house has been demonstrated on a number of occasions. Nevertheless, the House of Councillors, with its fixed terms, cannot be dissolved by the prime minister. In times of emergency, the cabinet may convene the House of Councillors rather than the House of Representatives (Article 54).
In the July 23, 1989, election for half the members of the House of Councillors, the LDP lost its majority. It won only thirty-six of the seats contested in the prefectural and national constituencies, while the opposition parties together won ninety, the largest opposition party, the Japan Socialist Party, won fortysix. This result gave an admittedly unstable coalition of opposition groups the opportunity to use the limited powers of the upper house to delay or frustrate initiatives taken in the LDP-dominated lower house. On August 9, 1989, for the first time in forty-one years, the two houses nominated two different candidates for prime minister--Kaifu Toshiki of the LDP and Doi Takako of the Japan Socialist Party. Although Kaifu was finally chosen because of the principle of lower house supremacy, the events showed how opposition control of the upper house could complicate the political process. In March 1990, the upper house rejected a supplementary budget bill for fiscal year (FY) 1989 that had been proposed by the lower house. Although the bill was eventually approved despite rejection by the upper house, the wrangling caused some minor inconvenience to the country's more than 1 million national civil servants whose monthly salary payments were delayed. The more serious upheaval, which might have occurred had there been a real deadlock or a potential shift in fiscal policies brought about by the opposition parties, was avoided.
The LDP won 223 seats in the July 1993 House of Representatives election, thirty-three seats short of the simple majority required to control the 511-member lower house. With postelection adjustments and realignments, the Japan New Party head, Hosokawa Morihiro, was able to gain the support of the Shinseito, the Sakigake, the Komeito, the Social Democratic Party of Japan, the Democratic Socialist Party, and United Social Democratic Party to form a minority government. This coalition of small conservative parties that had broken off from the LDP and socialist-based opposition parties differed on many issues but shared the common objective of passing political reform legislation. In early 1994, it remained to be seen how long and how effectively Prime Minister Hosokawa would be able to hold the coalition together.
12. Japanese Government: The Constitution of Japan.
The present Constitution of Japan is an amended form of the 'Constitution of the Empire of Japan” which was in force prior to 1946. The present constitution was proclaimed post-war while Japan was still under the American occupation and has been in force since 1947.
Japan's present-day constitution is comprised of the ‘preamble and one hundred and three articles, which cover areas such as: the Emperor, the renunciation (отказ) of war, the rights and duties of the people, the National Diet, the Cabinet, and the administration of justice. The modern Constitution of Japan differs from that of the Meiji Era in that sovereignty (независимость) rests with the people and not the Emperor, there is a greater emphasis on pacifism and the basic rights of the people are guaranteed.
Basic human rights include, to begin with, freedom of religion, freedom of thought and conscience (совесть) and freedom of the press and of speech. As well as these, the right of each citizen to demand of the state the ability to lead a reasonable human existence (the 'right to live') and the right to privacy are also covered by such rights.
With the development of computers, the need for a system to protect privacy became apparent and in 1988, the law to protect personal information was proclaimed.
THE POSTWAR CONSTITUTION
On July 26, 1945, Allied leaders Winston Churchill, Harry S. Truman, and Joseph Stalin issued the Potsdam Declaration, which demanded Japan's unconditional surrender. This declaration also defined the major goals of the postsurrender Allied occupation: "The Japanese government shall remove all obstacles to the revival and strengthening of democratic tendencies among the Japanese people. Freedom of speech, of religion, and of thought, as well as respect for the fundamental human rights shall be established" (Section 10). In addition, the document stated: "The occupying forces of the Allies shall be withdrawn from Japan as soon as these objectives have been accomplished and there has been established in accordance with the freely expressed will of the Japanese people a peacefully inclined and responsible government" (Section 12). The Allies sought not merely punishment or reparations from a militaristic foe, but fundamental changes in the nature of its political system. In the words of political scientist Robert E. Ward: "The occupation was perhaps the single most exhaustively planned operation of massive and externally directed political change in world history."
The wording of the Potsdam Declaration--"The Japanese Government shall remove all obstacles..."--and the initial postsurrender measures taken by MacArthur, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), suggest that neither he nor his superiors in Washington intended to impose a new political system on Japan unilaterally. Instead, they wished to encourage Japan's new leaders to initiate democratic reforms on their own. But by early 1946, MacArthur's staff and Japanese officials were at odds over the most fundamental issue, the writing of a new constitution. Prime Minister Shidehara Kijuro and many of his colleagues were extremely reluctant to take the drastic step of replacing the 1889 Meiji Constitution with a more liberal document. In late 1945, Shidehara appointed Matsumoto Joji, state minister without portfolio, head of a blue-ribbon committee of constitutional scholars to suggest revisions. The Matsumoto Commission's recommendations, made public in February 1946, were quite conservative (described by one Japanese scholar in the late 1980s as "no more than a touching-up of the Meiji Constitution"). MacArthur rejected them outright and ordered his staff to draft a completely new document. This was presented to surprised Japanese officials on February 13, 1946.
The MacArthur draft, which proposed a unicameral legislature, was changed at the insistence of the Japanese to allow a bicameral legislature, both houses being elected. In most other important respects, however, the ideas embodied in the February 13 document were adopted by the government in its own draft proposal of March 6. These included the constitution's most distinctive features: the symbolic role of the emperor, the prominence of guarantees of civil and human rights, and the renunciation of war. The new document was approved by the Privy Council, the House of Peers, and the House of Representatives, the major organs of government in the 1889 constitution, and promulgated on November 3, 1946, to go into effect on May 3, 1947. Technically, the 1947 constitution was an amendment to the 1889 document rather than its abrogation.
The new constitution would not have been written the way it was had MacArthur and his staff allowed Japanese politicians and constitutional experts to resolve the issue as they wished. The document's foreign origins have, understandably, been a focus of controversy since Japan recovered its sovereignty in 1952. Yet in late 1945 and 1946, there was much public discussion on constitutional reform, and the MacArthur draft was apparently greatly influenced by the ideas of certain Japanese liberals. The MacArthur draft did not attempt to impose a United States-style presidential or federal system. Instead, the proposed constitution conformed to the British model of parliamentary government, which was seen by the liberals as the most viable alternative to the European absolutism of the Meiji Constitution.
After 1952 conservatives and nationalists attempted to revise the constitution to make it more "Japanese," but these attempts were frustrated for a number of reasons. One was the extreme difficulty of amending it. Amendments require approval by twothirds of the members of both houses of the National Diet before they can be presented to the people in a referendum (Article 96). Also, opposition parties, occupying more than one-third of the Diet seats, were firm supporters of the constitutional status quo. Even for members of the ruling LDP, the constitution was not disadvantageous. They had been able to fashion a policy-making process congenial to their interests within its framework. Nakasone Yasuhiro, a strong advocate of constitutional revision during much of his political career, for example, downplayed the issue while serving as prime minister between 1982 and 1987.
13. Japanese Government: The Emperor and the National Diet, their functions.
The political power in Japan is divided among three branches of government. The legislative power resides in the Diet (орган законодательной власти, национальный парламент), the executive power in the Cabinet (орган законодательной власти, национальный парламент), and the judicial power in the courts. The Diet selects the Prime Minister, who is the head of the Cabinet. The Cabinet selects the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and citizens eligible to vote choose Diet members in an election.
The Emperor of Japan is, according to the 1947 Constitution of Japan adopted by the Postwar Japanese government, "the symbol of the state and of the unity of the people," which simultaneously dissolved the Empire of Japan. He is a ceremonial figurehead under a form of constitutional monarchy and is head of the Japanese Imperial Family with functions as head of state. He is also the highest authority of the Shinto religion[1]. In his dual role as head of a religion and head of state the Emperor resembles the British monarch, who is "supreme governor" of the Church of England.
The Emperor is called the Tennō (天皇) in Japanese, literally meaning "heavenly sovereign". He is also referred to in English as the Mikado (帝) of Japan.
The role of the Emperor of Japan has historically alternated between a largely ceremonial and symbolic role and that of an actual imperial ruler.
Unlike most constitutional monarchies, the Emperor is not even the nominal chief executive explicitly in the Constitution of Japan, but has duties "in matters of state", which are closely regulated. The constitution states that the Emperor "shall perform only such acts in matters of state as are provided for in the Constitution and he shall not have powers related to government" (article 4) and that the "advice and approval of the Cabinet shall be required for all acts of the Emperor in matters of state" (article 3). Article 4 also states that these duties can be delegated by the Emperor as provided for by law. Article 65 explicitly vests the executive power in the Cabinet, of which the Prime Minister is the leader.
The other detailed regulation of the Emperor's duties is laid down in article 7 of the constitution, where it is stated that the "Emperor with the advice and approval of the Cabinet, shall perform the following acts in matters of state on behalf of the people:
Promulgation of amendments of the constitution, laws, cabinet orders and treaties.
Convocation of the Diet.
Dissolution of the House of Representatives.
Proclamation of general election of members of the Diet.
Attestation of the appointment and dismissal of Ministers of State and other officials as provided for by law, and of full powers and credentials of Ambassadors and Ministers.
Attestation of general and special amnesty, commutation of punishment, reprieve, and restoration of rights.
Awarding of honors.
Attestation of instruments of ratification and other diplomatic documents as provided for by law.
Receiving foreign ambassadors and ministers.
Performance of ceremonial functions."
The National Diet
The National Diet is Japan's sole legislative body (единоличный законодательный орган) and is made up of the House of Representatives (the Lower House) and the House of Councilors (the Upper House). The are 480 members of the Lower House and 252 members of the Upper House. The proportion of female representation in the Diet was reported in 2000 as being 10.7%, which when compared with other democracies, ranks lower in the world. It is quite easy to see that men run the politics in Japan.
In 1993, during the time of the Hosokawa Cabinet, a woman, Takako Doi, was elected as the Speaker of the House of Representatives and women were appointed as government ministers. The role of women in Japanese politics began to make a strong impact. It is believed that the numbers of female Diet members will continue to increase in the future
14. Japanese Government: The procedure of Elections.
Diet members are elected to their positions by the people. At the time of an election, ballot papers are sent out to every eligible voter over the age of twenty in each city, town and village. When a person reaches the age of twenty-five, they earn the right of eligibility for election.
Members of the Lower House are elected for a term of four years, however, to date there has been a dissolution of the Diet every two and a half years, on average, leading to an election. Members of the Upper House serve a six-year term, with an election of half of the members every three years.
The Japanese political system has three types of elections: general elections to the House of Representatives held every four years (unless the lower house is dissolved earlier), elections to the House of Councillors held every three years to choose one-half of its members, and local elections held every four years for offices in prefectures, cities, and villages. Elections are supervised by election committees at each administrative level under the general direction of the Central Election Administration Committee. The minimum voting age for persons of both sexes is twenty years; voters must satisfy a three-month residency requirement before being allowed to cast a ballot. For those seeking office, there are two sets of age requirements: twenty-five years of age for admission to the House of Representatives and most local offices, and thirty years of age for admission to the House of Councillors and the prefectural governorship.
In the general election of February 18, 1990, the thirty-ninth held since the first parliamentary election in July 1890, the 130 multiple-seat election districts of the House of Representatives returned two to five representatives, depending on their population. There were two exceptions: the district encompassing the Amami Islands, south of Kyushu, elected only one representative to the lower house, while the first district of Hokkaido elected six. Successful candidates were those who won at least the fifth largest aggregation of votes in a five-person district, the fourth largest in a four-person district, and so on. Voters cast their ballots for only one candidate. Competition for lower house seats in the February 1990 general election varied from district to district. Tokyo's fourth district had seventeen candidates running for five seats, while the second district in Ibaraki Prefecture had only four persons running for three seats. In Okinawa Prefecture's single five-seat district, there were only six candidates.
In House of Councillors elections, the prefectural constituencies elect from two to eight councillors, depending on their population. Each voter casts one ballot for a prefectural candidate and a second one for a party in the national constituency system.
15. Japanese Government: Transfer of Political Power.
In 1993, the Hosokawa Administration ended the long 40 years of single-party rule of the Liberal Democratic Party, ushering (вводить) a new era of coalition government into the world of Japanese politics. In order to build a democratic society, it may be necessary to have various ideas and values, rather than a single ideology. Perhaps this might be a way of interpreting these events
A general election in Japan was held on August 30, 2009,[1] for all 480 seats of the House of Representatives of Japan, the lower house of the Diet of Japan.
In the election, the opposition Democratic Party (DPJ) defeated the ruling coalition (Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and New Komeito Party). The LDP had ruled Japan since its formation in 1955, except for an 11-month period from 1993 to 1994.[2] The DPJ received 42.4% of the proportional block votes cast, taking 308 seats to only 119 for the LDP (26.7% of the block votes).[3][4][5]
Under Japan's constitution, this result virtually assured DPJ leader Yukio Hatoyama would be the next Prime Minister of Japan. He was formally named to the post on September 16, 2009.[6]
Prime Minister Taro Aso conceded late on the night of August 30, 2009 that the LDP had lost control of the government, and announced his resignation as party president.[7] A leadership election was held on September 28, 2009.
The election marked the worst defeat for a governing party in modern Japanese history. It was only the second time the LDP has lost a general election, and was the first time since its formation that the LDP lost its status as the largest party in the lower house.
16. Japanese Government: The Cabinet.
On January 6, 2001, the national government was reorganized into the Cabinet Office and twelve ministries and agencies. This was a rather bold (отважный, смелый, храбрый) reformation, considering that the prior administrative structure was made up of the Prime Minister's Office and twenty-two ministries and agencies. The major changes accomplished through the reorganization were the establishment of the Cabinet Office (created from mainly the Prime Minister's Office, the Economic Planning Agency, and the Okinawa Development Agency), and the integration of some ministries and agencies into new ministries. So nowadays there exist the following: the Ministry of General Affairs, the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, the Ministry of Labor and Welfare, the Ministry of National Land and Transport. Additionally, three departments were merely renamed. Those are the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of the Treasury, and the Ministry of Economy and Industry.
The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, the Ministry of Home Affairs, and the Management and Coordination Agency were combined to form the Ministry of General Affairs; the Ministry of Education and the Science and Technology Agency became the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology; the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Ministry of Labor became the Ministry of Labor and Welfare; and the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Construction, the Hokkaido Development Agency, and the National Land Agency became the Ministry of National Land and Transport. Additionally, three departments were renamed, with the Environment Agency changing to the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of Finance changing to the Ministry of the Treasury, and the Ministry of International Trade and Industry changing to the Ministry of Economy and Industry.
It is hoped that this large-scale restructuring will be a positive change, bringing about a government that is led by politicians, not bureaucrats, and is responsive to the voice of the people.
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.
17. Japanese Government: The Law Courts.
In Japan, the Courts are responsible for the administration of justice. Legal proceedings, whether criminal cases or civil cases, may be sought in the Supreme Court, the High Court, the District Court, the Summary Court or in Family Court.
Japan differs from American society, however, in that, in Japan, people prefer to resolve matters through negotiation without having to take them to court and many civil cases are apparently resolved through private settlement.
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Now let’s look more precisely at some parts of the Constitution. A distinctive feature of the constitution, and one that has generated as much controversy as the status of the emperor, is the Article 9 "No War" clause. It contains two paragraphs: the first states that the Japanese people "forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes"; the second states that "land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential will never be maintained." The article's acceptance by the Japanese government may in part be explained by the desire to protect the imperial throne. Some Allied (страны - члены антигерманского блока времён Первой мировой войны, союзники по Антанте) leaders saw the emperor as the primary factor in Japan's warlike behavior. His assent to the "No War" clause weakened their arguments in favor of abolishing the throne or trying the emperor as a war criminal.
Article 9 has had broad implications for foreign policy, the institution of judicial review as exercised by the Supreme Court, the status of the Self-Defense Forces, and the nature and tactics of opposition politics. During the late 1980s, increases in government appropriations (ассигнования) for the Self-Defense Forces averaged more than 5 percent per year. By 1990 Japan was ranked third, behind the then-Soviet Union and the United States, in total defense expenditures, and the United States urged (побуждать) Japan to assume a larger share of the burden of defense of the western Pacific. Given these circumstances, some have viewed Article 9 as increasingly irrelevant. It has remained, however, an important brake on the growth of Japan's military capabilities. Despite the fading of bitter wartime memories, the general public, according to opinion polls, continued to show strong support for this constitutional provision.
"The rights and duties of the people" are prominently featured in the postwar constitution. Altogether, thirty-one of its 103 articles are devoted to describing them in considerable detail, reflecting the commitment to "respect for the fundamental human rights" of the Potsdam Declaration (Потсдамская декларация Опубликована 26 июля 1945 в Потсдаме от имени глав правительств США, Великобритании и Китая во время работы Потсдамской (Берлинской) конференции [Potsdam Conference ]. В ней содержалось требование к правительству Японии о безоговорочной капитуляции на предъявленных ему условиях). Although the Meiji Constitution had a section devoted to the "rights and duties of subjects," which guaranteed "liberty of speech, writing, publication, public meetings, and associations," these rights were granted "within the limits of law." Freedom of religious belief was allowed "insofar as it does not interfere with the duties of subjects".
Such freedoms are delineated (очерченный) in the postwar constitution without qualification. In addition, the later constitution guarantees freedom of thought and conscience; academic freedom; the prohibition of discrimination based on race, creed (вероисповедание), social status, or family origin; and a number of what could be called welfare rights: the right to "minimum standards of wholesome and cultured living"; the right to "equal education"; the "right and obligation to work" according to fixed standards of labor and wages; and the right of workers to organize. Equality of the sexes and the right of marriage based on mutual consent (in contrast to arranged marriage in the most traditional sense, in which families decide on the match) are also recognized. Limitations are placed on personal freedoms only insofar as they are not abused or interfere with public welfare.
Some United States origins of the constitution are revealed in the phraseology of Article 13, which states that the right of the people to "life, liberty, and the pur’suit (поиски) of happiness" shall be the "supreme consideration in legislation and other governmental affairs." It was with some awkwardness that such concepts were translated into Japanese. Yet the document goes further in enumerating rights than do the United States and many other Western constitutions. For example, the article pertaining (иметь отношение к (чему-л.)) to equality of the sexes (Article 14) bans sexual (as well as racial, religious, and social) discrimination "in political, economic, or social relations" as clearly as the proposed United States equal rights amendment, which failed to be ratified (утверждать) during the 1970s and 1980s. Unlike their Japanese counterparts, United States schoolteachers and university professors are not protected by a special provision on academic freedom (Article 23). Instead, American teaching and research activities are subsumed under the more general guarantee of freedom of speech in the First Amendment.