Japan in Their Own Words (JITOW)/日本からの意見

Old Trickery Squashed: Five Years and Five Months of Koizumi Politicis
YAYAMA Taro / Political Commentator

September 26, 2006
This is an attempt to summarise the five years and five months of Koizumi politics as it comes to an end. The succeeding prime minister needs to take over the positives and make up or rectify the negatives. Those who are unaware of these points should be put on notice that they disqualify as a successor.

Prime Minister Koizumi never discussed his philosophy on international relations or foreign policy. He has, however, earned close to a full mark on Japan-US relations and diplomacy vis-a-vis China and South Korea. Between Japan and the United States there was a time of so-called Ron-Yasu relationship, but that was in the days of US-Soviet cold war when Japan had no other choice. Japan-US relations were built with extremely rational closeness in those days.

There was an outrageous prime minister in Japan some time ago who released terrorists claiming that "the human life was weightier than the Earth". Prime Minister Koizumi, in contrast, acted to the fullest extent possible in the fight against terrorism within the confines of domestic laws.

In the final days of his administration he put on the ultimate performance at Elvis Presley's Graceland Mansion. There are people who criticise his theatrics but no Japanese prime minister before him has ever made the top headline in the three major TV networks and three major newspapers in the United States. The news report of that single scene must have made the American public understand why their president and the first lady welcome the Japanese prime minister and why a foreigner could fly in Air Force One. They must have felt the weightiness of the Japan-US alliance. What most gratified me was that he let the world know that Japan does have some pranksters.

For the Japan-US alliance one remaining issue that needs to be addressed is that of the right to collective self-defense or more specifically the question of the interpretation or amendment of the constitution in relation to that right. It is a shame that the bill on national referendum, which is a must if the constitution were to be revised, fell through as the Diet went into recess.

Quite a few people regard the Koizumi administration negatively because Japan’s diplomatic relations with China and South Korea soured. I, however, regard it positively because an "abnormal situation" is showing signs of returning to a "normal situation". What is most heartening is that the prime minister has resumed, be it as a private citizen or as a public official, the act to mourn and thank the war dead who dedicated their lives to the state. Such act should be taken for granted in a nation state. A nation that has lost that spirit is doomed to perish sooner or later.

The Japanese prime minister discontinued the practice in 1986 when China started to complain that Class-A war criminals were enshrined at Yasukuni shrine. Anti-Japan Japanese in this country and Japanese who curry favor with China took advantage of it. However, China actually began to complain about Japanese prime minister's visits to the shrine because it needed "Anti-Japan patriotism" as a new guiding principle in lieu of communism following the introduction of its open-door and reform policy which drove the country towards a market economy.

Class-A war criminals were enshrined at Yasukuni in 1978 whereas it was only seven or eight years later that China began to complain. Miyazawa and Hashimoto administrations were, if anything, underlings of China; every time China complains, they would apologize and even put up money. Koizumi squashed this absurd trickery. As China already has acceded to WTO the principle of "separation of politics from economics" is sufficient to run exchanges between Japan and China. Summit meetings are entirely unnecessary.

Symbolic of reform in domestic politicis was the privatisation of Japan Post. Approximately 350 trillion yen, i.e. one quarter of the 1,500 trillion yen personal financial assets in the country, is siphoned into Postal Savings and Postal Insurance and spent by the government in total disregard for market principles. A government with eight policy financial institutions affiliated with it is no different than Chinese state-owned banks that are trapped in the sea of non-performing loans. The Japanese bureaucracy created these unnecessary institutions so that they could land jobs there after retirement (a practice called "descent from heaven") and concoct work to spend money on.

The Postal Savings and Postal Insurance funds nurtured "pork-barrel politics" which, for years, resisted any change. In FY1998 public works-related spending amounted to a staggering 14.3 trillion yen. Japan's government spending as a percentage of GNP at its peak (FY1996) stood at 6.4% whereas the average for US, UK, Germany and France stays around 2% at all times. Koizumi administration managed to almost halve the public works spending to 7.2 trillion yen and bring down government spending as a percentage of GNP to 3.7%.

Globally there are two million construction companies. Six-hundred thousand of them are in Japan, twice the number of tobacconists in the country. You won't find a country this unusual anywhere else. Structural reform was carried out to rid the country of construction industry domination and nurture proper manufacturing industry. Since no country can be self-sufficient it has no choice but to adopt international rules for distribution and customs tariffs among others. Countries around the world submit requests to each other. So it is incorrect to claim that Japan capitulated to the United States by citing the "Annual Reform Recommendations" Japan receives from it. It is utterly specious to complain that Postal Savings and Postal Insurance institutions were sold off to vulture funds.

It is not deregulation and structural reform that produced Horiemon and the Murakami Fund. Rather, it is the absence of education that undermined the "Dignity of the State". It is regrettable that the prime minister did not pay even the slightest attention to the Basic Education Law. Decentralisation and reduction of civil servants did not produce results.

The original article was published in the 25 August 2006 issue of Sankei shimbun's "Seiron".
The English-Speaking Union of Japan




小泉政治の5年5ヶ月を総括する 馬鹿げた絡繰りの数々ぶち壊す
屋山太郎 / 政治評論家

2006年 9月 26日
5年5ヵ月に及ぶ小泉長期政権が終わるにあたって、その評価をしてみる。後継総裁はプラスの面を引き継ぎ、マイナスの面は補い、補修する必要がある。この引き継ぎ、補修の諸点について認識のない人は総裁侯補の資格がないと心得るべきだ。

小泉首相は国際関係や外交政策について、その哲学を語ったことはないが、日米関係、対中・韓外交については結果的に百点満点に近い。かつてロン・ヤス関係というのがあったが、当時は米ソ冷戦の最中で、他に選択肢もなく、日米関係は極めて理性的な親密さで構築された。

過去に日本では、「人命は地球より重し」と言ってテロリストを釈放するとんでもない首相が出たが、小泉首相はテロと戦うという姿勢を国内法の制約の中で最大限に発揮したと思う。

最後の場面で小泉氏はプレスリー邸でパフォーマンスの極致を見せてくれた。あの場面をけなす人がいるが、米3大テレビ、3大新聞にいずれもトップで取り上げられた日本の首相は初めてである。この一場面によってアメリカの大衆は、なぜ日本の首相を大統領夫妻が歓迎しているのか、なぜ外国人がエアフォースワン(大統領専用機)に乗れるのか、日米同盟の重さを感じ取ったことだろう。嬉しかったのは、ふざけん坊の日本人もいるのだぞと世界に見せてくれたことだ。

日米同盟を考えるとき、残った間題は集団的白衛権の行使という憲法解釈、あるいは憲法改正の間題だろう。憲法改正に不可欠な国民投票法案を流したのは痛かった。

対中・韓外交が悪化したからマイナスと評価する人が多いが、私は「異常な状態」が「正常な状態」に戻る兆しをみせていると評価する。何よりも良かったのは、総理が私人にせよ公人にせよ、国家のために殉じた人々に哀悼と感謝の意を表することを再開したことだ。国民国家なら当然のことで、この精神を失った国はいずれ滅びる。それを1986年以来しなくなったのは、中国が靖国神杜にA級戦犯が合祀されていると文句をつけ始めたからだ。これに国内の反日日本人と媚中派が便乗したのだ。しかし、中国が文旬を言い出した動機は、改革開放、市場経済化にともなって「共産主.義」に代わる新たな指導原理として「反日愛国主義」が必要になったからだ。A級戦犯が合祀されたのは78年で、中国が文句をつけ出したのは、その7、8年後のことである。宮沢、橋本といった政権は、中国が叩けば謝る、さらに、金を出すという子分のような内閣だった。小泉氏は、このばかげた絡繰りをぶち壊した。中国は既にWTO(世界貿易機関)に加入しているのだから、日中交流は「政経分離」の原則で十分。首脳会談などは不必要だ。

内政における改革の象徴的なものは郵政公社の民営化だろう。個人金融資産1500兆円の4分の1、約350兆円が郵貯・簡保に集められ、「官」の手によって市場原理と離れたところで使われてきた。政府が8つの政策金融機関を持つなどという姿は、不良債権漬けの中国の国営銀行さながらだ。日本の官僚は、こういう不要の機関を設立し、そこに天下って、金を使うための仕事を興してきた。

この郵貯・簡保の資金を元にバラまき財政体質が培われ、それは一向に変わらなかった。1998年度には公共事業関係費は実に14、3兆円にのぼった。政府支出の対GDP(国内総生産v比はピーク時(96年)6、4%で、米英独仏の平均は常時、2%前後である。小泉政権で公共事業関係費は約半分の7、2兆円。政府支出の対GDP比も3、7%まで落とされた。

建設会杜は世界に200万社あるが、そのうち60万社が日本にある。これはたばこ屋の倍の数であって、こんな異様な国は他にない。この土建屋体質を清算し、まともなモノヅクリ産業を育てるための構造改革が行われた。一国で自給自足できない限り、流通や関税のルールは国際化せざるを得ない。各国は互いに要求書を交換しているが、米国の対日「年次改革要求書」を持ち出して、日本が米国に屈したと非難するのは見当違いだ。郵貯・簡保をハゲタカファンドに売り渡したという反対論も奇説というほかない。規制緩和、構造改革がホリエモンや村上ファソドを生み出したのではなく、教育の不在が「国家の品格」を損なっているのである。首相が教育基本法を一顧だにしなかったのは残念だ。地方分権と公務員の削減は成果がなかった。

(本論文は2006年8月25日の産経新聞「正論」に掲載されたものです。)
一般社団法人 日本英語交流連盟


English Speaking Union of Japan > Japan in Their Own Words (JITOW) > Old Trickery Squashed: Five Years and Five Months of Koizumi Politicis