Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Prospects for Japan's Political reform

The prospects for political reform in Japan has been triggered by some reasons. The first reason would be the entrenched corruption specifically highlighted in the last few decades by several major scandals. These involved both LDP politicians and opposition leaders. Another reason would be the slow pace of economic reform. Japan has recently making large trade with the western countries,especially with the US which some politicians could perceive this as a tremendous threat to Japanese economy.

There were a lot of reformers who had made efforts to restructure Japan’s political system. However almost none of them had made to change the political system. These movement failed to implement their purpose to destabilize LDP and to weaken the bureaucratic power. Koizumi has done efforts to reform the politics specifically the LDP. First, he tried to weaken the factional powerbrokers and the tribal politicians but until this moment, Japan could still see same faces in the government.

The great possibilty of political reform can be done if the people would start to loose their strong attachment to the status quo. Politics as well as History is being propelled by the culture of the people. It may be difficult to legislate a reform right a way. Now that Japan has been encountering changes specially with the youth, eventually, a great reform will come that will best suit the society.