TIME: Almanac 1995

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<text id=94TT0771> <title> Jun. 13, 1994: Book Excerpt:Toward a Bolder Japan </title> <history> TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1994 Jun. 13, 1994 Korean Conflict </history> <article> <source>Time Magazine</source> <hdr> BOOK EXCERPT, Page 38 Toward a Bolder Japan </hdr> <body> In his best-selling book, Ichiro Ozawa, Tokyo's most influential politician, lays out a daring new agenda By Ichiro Ozawa As the crisis between the U.S. and North Korea escalates, Japan faces its severest foreign policy test in the postwar era. Few nations have a greater interest in preventing the Kim Il Sung regime from developing a nuclear arsenal. Yet no major industrial state is as hamstrung--by laws, attitudes and political system--from supporting international action that might prevent its devastation. "We have to change that," says Ichiro Ozawa, chief strategist of Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata's government. After 25 years as a top lieutenant to powerful and corrupt bosses of the Liberal Democratic Party, Ozawa is the seminal figure in an effort to turn Japan into a more vigorous global actor. Last year he captained the forces that broke the Liberal Democrats' 38-year grip on power, and he masterminded a historic political-reform bill. He produced Blueprint for a New Japan, a powerful argument for transforming his country from an export titan into a responsible world military power and partner for the U.S. The book, which so far has sold 700,000 copies in Japan, is reshaping the country's assumptions about itself. This September it will be published in English. Some excerpts: I once visited the Grand Canyon National Park. Its 5,700-ft. depth is awesome, but to my surprise, I didn't see any fences. I saw a young couple playing on one of the great boulders, but no park official was telling them to be careful. In Japan there would be fences, NO ENTRY signs and park attendants to warn people away. Japanese people take it for granted that we are always under government protection--that even as adults, choosing our own pursuits, we are protected by some government office. Of course America has its restrictions as well, but fundamentally, Americans expect to take responsibility for themselves. Japanese prefer to have regulations not only to prevent accidents but also to govern all societal needs. Japan is a society that respects not majority rule but unanimous consensus. If even one person opposes a decision, it can't be made; everyone has to conform. Japanese-style democracy might be defined as a system in which individuals are assured a secure life in exchange for burying themselves in the group. There is no room in this system for the concept of individual responsibility. This Japanese-style democracy is no longer able to respond adequately to the changes taking place at home and abroad. We cannot continue to seclude ourselves. We must reform our politics, our economy, our society and our consciousness to bring them into greater currency with the rest of the world. We can no longer enjoy the luxury of devoting ourselves exclusively to our own economic development. We must learn to respond to the world around us, and do so with the peace and economic well-being of the entire world in mind. We need to change in at least three ways. First, we must establish political leadership. We must show who bears political responsibility in Japan, what they think and what their larger visions are. Second, we must decentralize. Except where absolutely necessary, power should be transferred from the national to the local governments. Third, we must abolish excess regulations. We should preserve only the minimum number of rules necessary to govern economic and social activity, and adopt fundamentally laissez-faire policies. The ultimate goal of these three reforms is the autonomy of the individual. Without it, we cannot be a truly free and democratic society. Japan's most pressing need is a change in the consciousness of our people. Time to Join the World As an international power, Japan has a global responsibility to frame active, comprehensive, long-term, dynamic and consistent policies. But we continue to devise policies that are passive, partial and short term, and even these tend to be the product of last-minute decisions. The Gulf War was a painful lesson. Citing constitutional restraints, we were unable to cooperate militarily when we were really needed. Some people in Japan charged that a bankrupt America unable to fight its own battles was going to war on Japanese and German money. This is patently false. Financial cooperation was only fourth or fifth among the requests America made of Japan. It was Japan that, unable to deploy even a single person to the gulf region, instead sought to get by simply by writing checks. Resource-poor Japan built its economic might on wealth accumulated in the world free-trade system. If Japan loses the ability to trade, it will lose the very source of its prosperity. More than any other nation, Japan must quickly and actively assume its international responsibilities and help create a new, stable post-cold war global structure. Japan must become a "normal nation." What is that? It is a nation that willingly shoulders those responsibilities regarded as natural in the international community. How can Japan, which so depends on world peace and stability, seek to exclude a security role from its international contributions? For many people, the thought of Japan playing any sort of role in the security arena conjures up images of a rearmed, militaristic Japan. But this is not an issue of militarization or aspirations to military superpower status. It is a question of Japan's responsible behavior in the international community. For almost half a century the U.S. was content to take on Japan's share of the costs of peace and freedom. Had Japan borne these costs, it would not have been able to achieve today's prosperity. With the end of the cold war, America no longer has reason to bear Japan's share. In this sense, the very foundations of postwar Japan's economic prosperity are beginning to tremble. If Japan evades the costs associated with free trade and stability, world peace and freedom, we run the serious risk of denying ourselves our own peace and prosperity. The time has come for Japan to contribute actively to the maintenance of peace. We must take the leap from our "exclusive defense strategy" to a dynamic "peace-building strategy." To this end, we should work actively with the U.S. on a U.N.-centered strategy. The only overseas uses of force that we can permit our nation are peacekeeping activities under the U.N. flag. We must also recognize that Japanese cooperation in U.N. peacekeeping activities, under U.N. command, is not only possible under our constitution; it is necessary. We must face the demands of a new age. Time for a Japanese Dream I once heard a well known American intellectual say, "We wouldn't want to be like the Japanese." The more I thought about it, the less surprising the comment became. He was implicitly criticizing the huge gap between our high income and poor standard of living. He was thinking of our inferior housing, impoverished social capital, high prices, long working hours, severe exam competition. We will not be able to exercise leadership in international society as long as foreigners are unable to say that Japan is a laudable country, that they would like to live here or to build their countries on a Japanese model. We must create our own "Japanese dream." For all its faults, contemporary Japanese society does have much to be proud of. Its safety and stability are unmatched. The gap between rich and poor is exceptionally small. Anyone who works in the conventional way can live without undue anxiety about his own life or his society. Few countries enjoy this degree of stability. But our economy and society are showing signs of strain. The people have become mere cogs in the Japanese corporate wheel. I would like to see Japan strive toward the goal of "five freedoms." -- Freedom from Tokyo requires reversing the extreme concentration of population and resources in Tokyo and making the transition from urban overcrowding and rural depopulation to more balanced development. -- Freedom from companies means placing the individual rather than the company at the center of the social and economic framework, so that citizens can approach work more freely and place greater value on individual life. -- Freedom from overwork requires taking steps that will aggressively reduce hours so that people may plan their own futures. We must also alter the excessively competitive examination system. -- Freedom from ageism and sexism means enabling the growing number of senior citizens to participate more fully in society and letting women play more active and varied roles. -- Freedom from regulation entails abolishing anachronistic and meaningless rules. It also means allowing individuals and companies more freedom. The reform of Japan does not belong only to Japan. Japan will only be able to fulfill its responsibilities in international society when people overseas can look at us and say, "We do want to be like the Japanese." </body> </article> </text>