After eight months of deliberations, the prime minister's defense ministry reform council, hastily convened after a series of scandals rocked the defense ministry in 2007, has released its final report on reforming the ministry.The report is available for download here.In the report, the council sought to address two issues. First, it investigated various institutional failures …
Tag: accountability
The race for defense ministry reform
Back in February, when Defense Minister Ishiba Shigeru was threatened with censure for his ministry's dilatory response to the Atago incident, Prime Minister Fukuda gave Mr. Ishiba a firm vote of confidence, calling upon the defense minister to "review the organization from its very foundation."It appears that Mr. Fukuda's support for comprehensive defense ministry reform …
Ishiba remains the scourge of the bureaucrats
With the fight over the nomination of Muto Toshiro taking center stage, opposition calls for Defense Minister Ishiba Shigeru to resign due to the Atago incident appear to have receded, leaving Mr. Ishiba to proceed with his efforts to clean up the Defense Ministry.The latest piece of that effort is his project team to "promote …
Continue reading Ishiba remains the scourge of the bureaucrats
"The state is less dependable than a convenience store"
Masuzoe Yoichi, minister of health, labor, and welfare and the LDP's resident political scientist, has an essay in the December issue of Chuo Koron in which he details the crisis of confidence in the Japanese state and calls for systemic change that will restore the confidence of the people in their government.The title of his …
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Men are not angels
Working in the office of a Japanese Dietman and watching Japan's "sausage-making" process has been valuable in a number of ways — many of which I have documented here one way or another — but one lesson that I have left largely unmentioned is my renewed appreciation for the American political system.No political system is …
Tobias S. Harris 