$Unique_ID{bob00338} $Pretitle{} $Title{Japan Chapter 5B. Local Government} $Subtitle{} $Author{Donald M. Seekins} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{political court local urban government japan rural japanese community district} $Date{1981} $Log{} Title: Japan Book: Japan, A Country Study Author: Donald M. Seekins Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 1981 Chapter 5B. Local Government As of 1981 Japan was divided into forty-three rural prefectures (ken), two urban prefectures (fu-Kyoto and Osaka), one district (Hokkaido), and one metropolitan district (Tokyo). These jurisdictions were subdivided into cities, towns, and villages; Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, and other large cities were subdivided into wards (ku), which were further split into precincts (machi or cho). Each prefecture or district had a governor and a unicameral assembly; both were elected by popular vote every four years. All prefectures and districts were required by national law to maintain departments of general affairs, finance, welfare, health, and labor. Departments of agriculture, fisheries, forestry, commerce, and industry were optional, depending on local needs. The governor was responsible for all activities supported by prefectural funds that were collected through local taxation as well as for funds made available to his jurisdiction by the national government. Relationships between the governor and the prefectural or district assembly were mutually restraining. The power of the assembly to pass a vote of no confidence against the chief prefectural executive was balanced by the governor's power to dissolve the legislature. Cities, like prefectures and districts, were self-governing units and were administered independently of the larger units within which they were located. In order to become a city, a town or village had to have at least 30,000 inhabitants, 60 percent of whom were engaged in urban occupations. It was also required to have appropriate commercial facilities, and 60 percent of its buildings had to stand within the urban core. City government was headed by a mayor who was elected for four years by popular vote. A city assembly, having varying numbers of representatives according to population, was elected at the same time. In large cities like Nagoya, Yokohama, Fukuoka, and Kobe, as well as Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto, each ward elected an assembly, which in turn elected ward superintendents. The terms machi and cho designated self-governing towns outside the cities as well as the subdivisions of urban wards. Like the cities, each had its elected mayor and assembly. Such a town could be formed by the incorporation of a large village or the merger of neighboring villages. Villages were the smallest self-governing entities in the rural areas, often consisting of a number of hamlets (buraku) containing several thousand people connected with one another only through the formally imposed framework of the village administration. The principal village official was the elected mayor, who administered assorted local projects with the village council, both being elected every four years by popular vote. Beneath the village in the rural areas and the ward in the cities were systems of "neighborhood self-government" consisting of chokai or burakukai, which were subdivided into several smaller units consisting of twenty or thirty adjacent households, called han. In prewar Japan, these units were useful for purposes of social control, and although they did not in 1981 have a formal, legal status, they continued to serve as the focus for local community activities in many areas. Han have served as conduits for government notices, and their members have engaged in cleanup, fire prevention, crime prevention, and garbage collection activities. Leaders of han and chokai often have had great political influence on the local level, and have been usually rather conservative (see fig. 11). Taken as a whole, local governments have not been as autonomous as the law authorized them to be. Local initiative has been often stifled because of inadequate resources and the dependence of local entities on the financial support of the central government (see Fiscal Policy, ch. 4). Local officials have found that they spend most of their time administering the policies and projects of the national ministries. In the 1970s, however, the election of reformist mayors and governors in many prefectures and cities heralded a change in the relationship between local governments and the center, one in which the former struggled to be more independent (see The Opposition Parties, this ch.). The Electoral System The electoral system in late 1981 was based on the Public Offices Election Law of 1950, as amended, and the Local Autonomy Law of 1947, as amended. There were three types of elections: general elections to the House of Representatives held every four years unless the lower house was dissolved sooner; elections to the House of Councillors held every three years to choose one-half its deputies; and local elections for offices in prefectures, cities, and villages held every four years. Elections were supervised by election committees at each administrative level under the general direction of the Central Election Administration Committee. This central committee was appointed by the prime minister on the advice of the Diet; local committees were selected by local assemblies. The minimum voting age was twenty years, and a voter had to satisfy a three-month residency requirement before being allowed to cast a ballot. For those seeking office there were two sets of age requirements: twenty-five years of age for admittance to the House of Representatives, to the assemblies in the prefectures, cities, towns, and villages, as well as to the mayorship in cities, towns, and villages; and thirty years of age for admittance to the House of Councillors and to the prefectural governorship. Candidates for office were required to file with a local election committee. Campaign tactics and finances were subjects of detailed and restrictive legislation, but complaints about election irregularities were not infrequently heard. The 130 electoral districts of the House of Representatives elected three to five representatives, depending on their population; the one exception was the district comprising the Amami Islands, south of Kyushu, which elected only one man to the Diet. Successful candidates were those who won at least the fifth largest aggregation of votes in a five-man district, the fourth largest in a four-man district, or the third largest in a three-man district. Voters cast their ballots for only one candidate. In House of Councillors elections, the prefectural constituencies-forty-seven in 1981 including Tokyo and Hokkaido-elected from two to eight councillors, depending on their population, and each voter also cast one ballot for a candidate in the national constituency. Representation in the House of Representatives and among the councillors who were elected from the prefectural constituencies was based on population alone; the purpose of having a national constituency was to have a nongeographical basis of representation, consisting either of persons of outstanding talent and reputation or of the representatives of important national interest and opinion groups that might not be represented through district elections alone. The apportionment of election districts in late 1981 reflected the structure of the population in the years just after World War II, when only one-third of the people lived in the urban areas and two-thirds in the rural areas; in the three decades since then, in the wake of rapid economic development and urbanization the proportion has shifted to over 78 percent urban and 22 percent rural. This has led to a serious underrepresentation of urban voters, because no reform of the districts has been undertaken. The number of urban districts was increased by five in 1964, bringing nineteen new representatives to the lower house; and in 1975 increased by six, with twenty new representatives being given to them and to other urban districts. Yet great inequities remained. In the 1976 House of Representatives election, 281,082 votes were needed to elect a candidate in the urban Fourth District of Chiba Prefecture, east of Tokyo, while only 80,404 votes were needed to elect one from the rural Fifth District of Hyogo Prefecture. Despite the differential weighting of House of Councillors prefectural constituencies by population, it still took over a million votes to elect a councillor from Kanagawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo, which contains the large city of Yokohama, while only 208,000 were needed to elect one in rural Tottori Prefecture on the Sea of Japan. The Supreme Court handed down a decision on April 4, 1976, declaring unconstitutional the allocation of lower house seats because it violated the principal of equal representation; but little progress has been made in the direction of reform, largely because rural overrepresentation has favored the LDP, which might be forced out of power if metropolitan areas were more fairly represented (see Bases of Support, this ch.). The Judicial System The Constitution guarantees the independence of the judicial branch of government and prohibits the exercise of judicial powers outside the system of constitutionally established courts. The highest court is the Supreme Court. It consists of fifteen justices, appointed for life by the cabinet; the chief justice is appointed by the emperor but approved by the cabinet. These appointments, according to Article 79 of the Constitution, must be "reviewed" by the voters in a referendum held at the time of the first general election following the justice's appointment and every ten years thereafter. The Supreme Court renders decisions either from a full bench of the fifteen justices, or from petty benches of five justices each. Full benches are required for decisions on cases involving constitutionality, on cases where there has been no precedent in the Supreme Court, on those in which the decision of the petty bench ended in a tie, or on those which, though not involving constitutional questions, are considered to be of special importance. The Court includes twenty "research clerks," usually themselves experienced judges, who are roughly equivalent to the clerks of the United States Supreme Court. The functions of the Supreme Court reflect the constitutional emphasis on the independence of the judiciary. It is the court of last resort for civil and criminal cases. It is also responsible for the administration of the entire court system and can promulgate civil, criminal, and other procedural rules, assign judges to specific courts, appoint and remove court officials other than judges, prepare court budgets, and make rules both for the courts and for public prosecutors. The cabinet must appoint judges to lower courts from a list of those nominated by the Supreme Court. Article 81 of the Constitution gives the Supreme Court the power of judicial review; it can declare laws, official acts, and administrative rules unconstitutional. This power, however, is rarely exercised. There was no precedent for judicial review in the Meiji judicial system, and the Supreme Court has been reluctant to render decisions on the unconstitutionality of laws and administrative rules because of an unwillingness to become involved in political issues. In 1960 the Supreme Court refused to rule on the constitutionality of the 1952 dissolution of the House of Representatives because "an official act which is of a highly political nature directly affecting the basis of the government is beyond the reach of judicial review, even if its validity is drawn into question in an otherwise justiciable controversy." The decision of April 4, 1976, on electoral districts, however, may represent a departure from this pattern. Lower courts have often proved more willing to rule on constitutionality than the Supreme Court. Perhaps the most famous example of this is the Tokyo District Court's 1959 decision in the Sunakawa Case that the 1952 Security Treaty between the United States and Japan was unconstitutional on the basis of Article 9 (renunciation of war). A similar case is the Naganuma decision of September 7, 1973, growing out of a dispute over the construction of an SDF antiaircraft missile base on a forest preserve in Hokkaido in which the Sapporo District Court ruled that the SDF was unconstitutional. Another example is the 1971 decision of the Nagoya Higher Court (reversing a lower court decision), ruling that the employment of a Shinto priest in groundbreaking ceremonies for a municipal building in the city of Tsu in Mie Prefecture was a violation of Article 20 of the Constitution on the separation of religious and state affairs and that the mayor of Tsu must pay the city treasury compensation for the expense of the ceremony. The Supreme Court, judging the legality of the security treaty to be a political issue, refused to exercise judicial review in the Sunakawa case, and it reversed the Nagoya Higher Court decision, ruling that Shinto ceremonies of the sort held at the groundbreaking were "custom" rather than "religion." The Court as of late 1981 had not yet ruled on the Naganuma decision. In 1981 there were eight high courts throughout the country, which functioned as courts of appeal in both criminal and civil cases and also had original jurisdiction over election disputes. Below these were the district courts, situated in fifty different cities, which had original jurisdiction in all criminal and civil cases except petty offenses involving light fines and certain cases specifically placed under the jurisdiction of other courts. Fifty family courts, on a level with the district courts, had original jurisdiction in matters concerning inheritance, divorce, juvenile delinquency, and the rehabilitation of juvenile offenders. Summary courts were located in 570 cities and towns. These courts generally performed the functions of small courts and justices of the peace in the United States. They had jurisdiction over minor offenses and small civil claims. Political Values and Attitudes The Japanese are often described as being a community-oriented people. The individual is characterized as "submerged" in the collective, having only the weakest notion of selfhood or private, as apart from community, interests. It has been pointed out that communities in both traditional and modern Japan, from buraku or rural hamlet of feudal times, to the large, modern corporation or bureaucracy with its cohorts of lifetime employees, strive to be all-inclusive. The relationship of the individual to the community is "functionally diffuse"; it provides a person not only with income and sustenance but also with emotional support and individual identity. The focus of social life is within that community, and persons rarely form significant relationships outside them. Japanese call the inclusiveness of this sort of community the takotsubo seikatsu, or "octopus-pot way of life." Large pots with narrow openings at the top are used by Japanese fishermen to catch these sea creatures, and the term refers to persons being so wrapped up in their particular social group that they cannot see the world outside its constricted confines. Parallel with the inclusiveness of community is an emphasis on hierarchy. In what the anthropologist Nakane Chie calls Japan's "vertical society," human relationships are defined in terms of inequality, and people relate to each other as superiors or inferiors along a minutely differentiated gradient of social status. This is true not only within bureaucratic organizations where such a hierarchical structure might be expected, but in many, if not most, aspects of daily life outside the work place. Hierarchy is described as expressing itself along two dimensions. There is, first of all, an internal differentiation within the community in which all its members are ranked according to seniority, education, or occupational status. Secondly there is the differentiation between "insiders" and "outsiders," between members and nonmembers of the community, and the tendency to rank whole groups (communities) along a vertical continuum. Thus Japanese universities are given precise rankings; Tokyo University is at the top, followed by Kyoto University and other national institutions (the former "imperial universities"), and prestigious private institutions such as Keio and Waseda follow them. Likewise, since the nineteenth century Japanese have been extremely concerned with enhancing their country's international position, and have conceived of it as ranking, at least until recently, below the "advanced" Western nations yet above the developing countries of Asia and Africa. An awareness of rank and hierarchy is by no means unique to Japan. Japanese are, however, uncommonly sensitive to its nuances in all aspects of daily life. The language possesses an unusual feature that reflects this preoccupation with hierarchy: keigo, or "honorific language," establishes the superior position of one speaker and the inferior position of the other through the correct use of subtle vocabulary differences and grammatic structures. These usages define the "place" of each speaker in terms of social status, and Japanese cannot be spoken correctly without their use. The hierarchical orientation was reinforced by the introduction into Japan of Confucian ethical concepts from China. Confucianism emphasized rigidly defined, unequal social relationships and the importance of obedience to one's parents and to one's lord. The moral and educative role of a well-defined elite class-the scholar-officials in China and the samurai or bushi in Japan-was stressed. The doctrines of Confucius were introduced into Japan as early as the fifth century A.D., but it was not until the Edo period that the shoguns made ultraconservative Neo-Confucian principles, especially those expounded by the Chinese philosopher Zhu Xi (1130-1200), the official ideology. In Confucianism the interests of the community as a whole are assumed to be superior to, if not identified with, the interests of the individuals composing it. The legitimacy of private interests is not recognized. Yet tensions are necessarily generated by life within a hierarchical, collective-oriented social structure. Political mechanisms are needed to reduce these tensions in order to achieve harmony (wa), that much sought-after ideal of social life. One very natural means of lessening tension within the community is through the aging process. As men or women grow older, gaining seniority within a community or organization, they obtain authority and higher status, commanding greater respect from others. The seniority principle is reinforced by the great reluctance to place younger persons in positions of authority over older ones. Yet the prerogatives of age are not absolute. Early retirement is a feature common to most Japanese organizations, including government institutions. The top ranks retire at age fifty-five or sixty, allowing younger men to succeed them. The institution of early retirement serves the purpose of keeping the process of promotion to higher positions smooth and predictable. The system enables talented individuals to succeed to the most responsible positions and prevents a small group of older persons, or what the Japanese call a "one-man leader," from monopolizing leadership positions, frustrating those below and imposing on the organization ideas and policies that might be increasingly outmoded and old-fashioned. Retirees, however, often continue to wield great influence in an advisory capacity and usually pursue second careers in organizations affiliated with the one from which they retired (see The Corporate System, ch. 4). A second political mechanism is the salience of personal, rather than legalistic or coercive, ties between superior and subordinate. These are most typically characterized in terms of fictive familial relationships, analogous to the bonds between parents and children (the oyabun-kobun relationship). The ideal leader is the paternalistic one, who has a warm and personal concern for the welfare of his followers. Surveys of social and political attitudes carried out by social scientists during the postwar years reveal that Japanese of all ages and occupations consistently and overwhelmingly prefer leaders who have warm, "human feelings" (ninjo) and a sincere concern for their subordinates over those who are impersonally fair, but emotionally distant. For those lower down in the hierarchy, loyalty is both morally prescribed and emotionally sustained by the ethic of paternalism. In the political world the personalist and paternalistic nature of leadership expresses itself in terms of patron-client relationships that permeate the entire political system. Community is pervasive, but it is also fragile, because social ties are sustained not only through adherence to universal legal norms or out of a sense of common self-interest, but upon the affective interplay of human sensitivities as defined by the patron-client relationship. Conflict poses a definite danger to the continued existence of the community, and thus the making and implementation of policy require an elaborate process of consultation and consensus-building involving all the parties concerned. According to political scientist Lewis Austin, "Everyone must be consulted informally, everyone must be heard, but not in such a way that the hearing of different opinions develops into opposition. The leader and his assistants 'harmonize opinion'...in advance, using go-betweens to avert the confrontation of opposing forces." After a preliminary agreement among all the parties has been reached, a formal meeting will be held in which the agreed-upon policy will be suggested and adopted. This process is called nemawashi, a term translated as "root trimming" or "root binding," suggesting the image of a gardener preparing a tree or shrub for transplanting, i.e., a change in policy. Austin points out that a common Japanese verb meaning "to decide," matomeru, means, literally, to gather, collect, or bring together. Decisions are the "sum of the contributions of all." Political leaders have had to deal not only with the problem of maintaining solidarity and harmony within a single group, but also that of gaining cooperation among different groups who find themselves in often bitter and acrimonious competition. The "octopus-pot way of life" can lead to an often destructive sectionalism that undermines common interests. Within groups, loyalties to personal leaders rather than to a set of abstract ideals can lead to bitter factionalism and infighting. Modern societies with divergent and well-organized interests possess a high level of political conflict, and political leaders have had to use all their consensus-building skills to the utmost to maintain the cooperation of their constituents. The traditional values of community and hierarchy have contributed to the stability of the political system, especially in the postwar period. The emphasis on consensus-building and the harmonization of different points of view have encouraged an ethic of cooperation and moderation among political groups with divergent interests. Although history reveals many exceptions, Japanese "political style" has tended to be slow-moving, pragmatic, and dependent upon personalistic ties sealed by the exchange of favors and support. The rhetoric of ideological confrontation is downplayed as productive of divisive conflict. Studies of political attitudes and behavior in rural and urban areas reveal a contrast between "old" and "new" political values. Researchers have discovered an interesting paradox: political participation is higher in rural than in urban areas, yet, largely because of better educational standards, urban people have greater interest in, and more knowledge of, political affairs than rural people. In rural villages there appears to be a great measure of political mobilization based on personalistic or patron-client ties of the oyabun-kobun type. Politicians on the local level make themselves available for the exchange of favors for votes and support, many of these being influential people within the structure of informal neighborhood self-government institutions (see Local Government, this ch.). This also seems true in the older urban neighborhoods, where people have been settled for several generations. Yet other city people are less likely to have personal connections with politically influential people. Danchi (high-rise apartment) dwellers, who form a significant portion of Japan's urban population, are especially likely to be politically unconnected. In rural areas and in old city neighborhoods, the locality provides a medium through which political leaders can reach their supporters directly. People in the newer urban areas, which have grown tremendously in the 1960s and 1970s-suburban "bedroom" communities as well as danchi-are apt to be the employees of large government or private organizations, and it is these, rather than the locality, which dominate their social focus. Although values of community solidarity and hierarchy are much stressed in the company context, this is largely outside the sphere of local or national politics. Urban people are apt to be spectators of, rather than participants in, the political process, gaining most of their information from newspapers, magazines, and television. Voting percentages are higher in rural than urban areas, though city people see politics more in terms of issues and ideologies than in terms of personalities. Public opinion surveys in the postwar years have revealed a general tendency for voters to regard politicians with a mixture of resignation and mistrust. Voter participation rates in Diet elections ranged from between 58 and 73 percent between 1946 and 1979, with no firm upward or downward trend, although the number of independent voters with no firm party identification has increased in recent years. The general mood of mistrust has been reflected in the surveys on Japanese national character carried out by the Institute of Statistical Mathematics every five years, since 1953. The number of respondents who said that they found politicians trustworthy declined from 43 percent in 1953 to 23 percent in 1973, while the number who mistrusted them increased in the same period from 38 to 51 percent. This same survey showed that while only 19 percent of all respondents supported no party in 1953, in 1978 there were 34 percent who did. Nonetheless people have remained generally content with things the way they are. In 1978 only 3 percent of all respondents said that radical change was needed, while 89 percent supported moderate reform. Interest Groups Of the great variety of groups and associations in contemporary Japan, many are never, or only occasionally, involved in politics while others were established specifically for that purpose. The most prominent of the latter are identified with economic issues and relate to the individual in terms of his or her occupation. Others concern themselves with issues related to the quality of life. Despite the self-perceived homogeneity of the population, there are a number of active minority rights movements. Among religious groups Christians have spoken out on issues involving the separation of religious and state affairs; with the great exception of the Soka Gakkai, Japan's "new religions" have tended to be apolitical (see The Komeito, this ch.). Since the late 1960s Japanese women have become politically active, tending to identify themselves with livelihood issues such as consumerism and the environment, although women's rights issues have also become increasingly important in what is perceived to be a male-dominated social and economic system. Business Interests Business interests in Japan are powerful, well organized, and in close touch with government leaders on the highest levels. Business leaders are active participants in the making of policies that have shaped Japan's development in the decades since the end of the war. The links between business leaders and government have been maintained through four national organizations: the Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren), the Japan Federation of Employers' Associations (Nikkeiren), the Committee for Economic Development (Keizai Doyukai), and the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Nissho). As of late 1981 Keidanren was the most important of the four. Its membership included the largest corporations and some 110 manufacturers' associations, and its Tokyo headquarters served as a kind of nerve center for the country's most important economic enterprises. Thirty-nine standing committees dealt with issues affecting different sectors of the economy and international trade relations. The prime minister and members of his cabinet regularly sought Keidanren's advice on policy issues; it also served as a major conduit for political contributions to the LDP, although this role has been reduced since a law regulating campaign contributions was passed in 1976 (see The Liberal Democratic Party; Bases of Support, this ch.). Nikkeiren, established in 1948, has been largely concerned with issues of labor-management relations and with enabling business to present a united front in the face of union demands. The Keizai Doyukai, composed of younger and more liberal business leaders, has claimed to concern itself with the social responsibilities of big business. Nissho, the oldest business organization in the country (its antecedents go back to the Tokyo Chamber of Commerce and Industry established in 1878), represented the interests of Japan's small- and medium-scale businesses and thus has been generally regarded as the least influential of the four groups. Labor Unions Postwar labor unions were set up with the blessings of the occupation authorities. The mechanism for collective bargaining was established, and unions were organized on an enterprise basis. Membership was on the basis of company affiliation rather than skill or industry classification, and it was in general limited to permanent, nonsupervisory employees. Workers have been organized into a number of loose labor federations, including, in order of size: the General Council of Trade Unions of Japan (Sohyo), the Japanese Confederation of Labor (Domei), and the Federation of Independent Labor Unions (Churitsu Roren-see Labor Relations, ch. 4). Labor federations have attempted to foster greater unity among their constituent unions, though with little success; the two largest, Sohyo and Domei, have been active politically, being the principal supporters of the Japan Socialist Party (JSP) and the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP), respectively (see The Opposition Parties, this ch.). Their political influence, however, has been limited by the fact that these political parties have not had the opportunity to form governments. In late 1981 Sohyo, the organizer of Japan's annual spring "Labor Offensive" wage demands, was strongly ideological. Many of its constituent unions were composed of government employees, such as the Japan Teachers Union (Nikkyoso) and the All-Japan Union of Prefectural and Municipal Workers, or of employees of public corporations, such as the National Railway Workers Union and the Joint Council of Telecommunications Workers. A major issue for Sohyo has been gaining the right of government employees to strike, which has been prohibited by law. A majority of the country's primary and secondary school teachers were members of Nikkyoso (see Education in the 1980s, ch. 3). The significance of Nikkyoso goes beyond its role as a labor organization, campaigning to improve the working conditions of teachers. It has had an active role in the formulation of educational policies, which remain an ideological issue for progressives and conservatives alike. It has struggled to preserve the occupation-inspired reforms of the school system, such as local autonomy for school boards, which have been under intensifying conservative attack, and has promoted curricula emphasizing democratic and internationalist themes and a structure of classes and grades that stresses equality, especially on the primary school level (see Education, ch. 3). Moral education courses, which were at the core of the nationalistic prewar school curriculum, were first resisted by union teachers, but since their adoption in 1959 the emphasis has been on teaching themes of cooperation, mutual respect, and good citizenship rather than nation- or emperor-centered ideology. Thus universal middle school education has exposed most of the younger generation to democratic political and social values. Yet Nikkyoso has been one of Japan's most radical unions, and conservatives have accused it of not instilling in students a respect for traditional "Japanese values." Extreme rightists and union members have often been involved in confrontations, particularly at the union's annual conventions. Agricultural Interest Groups Observers have suggested that the great influence exercised by the Central Union of Agricultural Cooperatives (Nokyo) over policymaking is in part the result of a widespread feeling of "gratitude" to the dwindling agricultural sector, which in the past supported the country's industrial modernization. Nokyo spokesmen have been vociferous in their claims that the agricultural sector is somehow intimately connected with the "spirit" of the nation. They have also argued that self-sufficiency, or near self-sufficiency in food, resulting from government support of a healthy agricultural sector, is central to Japan's security. Yet it is also true that Nokyo has been politically powerful because the LDP has gained a significant measure of its support from the overrepresented rural constituencies (see The Electoral System, this ch.). Nokyo, organized in 1947 at the time of the land reform, had in late 1981 local branches in every rural village, and its members included practically all of the country's 5 million farming households. Since its founding Nokyo has been preoccupied with maintaining and increasing government price supports on rice and other crops and with holding back the import of cheaper agricultural products from abroad. Nokyo's techniques often have been heavy-handed. Each year when the national budget is being drawn up, thousands of farmers come to Tokyo in order to demonstrate and pressure members of the Diet and government for more generous supports. The costliness of subsidies and the high price of food have led to widespread criticism, but Nokyo's privileged position, like that of Keidanren and other business organizations, has been assured in the generous contributions it has made to LDP campaign funds. Other interest groups associated with agriculture included the National Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Purchasing Associations, the National Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Associations, and the Japan Forestry Association. There were also a small number of left-wing farmer's unions.