My opinin this week(111):
Two unidentified ships
In last week, NATO Air Force started attacking Yugoslavia and some disputes
over this action were raised among international society. Just after this
news, two unidentified ships were found in the territory of Japan Sea. On March
26 issue, Tensei Jingo of Asahi Newspaper column criticized those two nations'
conduct, i.e. Yugoslavia and North Korea, for their absurd behavior at this
time were the causes for the troubles at this time. I personally agreed with
this comment. I will not talk any about the case of Yugoslavia now. I would
like to make some comments only on the latter the case of two unidentified
ships.
The report was firstly made by Mr. Kawasaki, Minister of Transportation.
He mentioned that two unidentified ships were found in Japan Sea and the
Maritime Safety Agency were investigating the nationality of the ships and
purpose of staying in that area. Then Mr. Norota, Defense Force Agency Chief
followed Mr. Kawasaki reporting all details of their actions taken to chase
those mysterious ships. That was the first time in the history that Japanese
Self Defense Force had conducted that kind of defense action to cope with
intruding ships in the Japanese territory.
Those actions taken by the Government leaders and Self Defense Force seemed
to be mostly appropriate and timely. There were some criticism for the fact
that they could not catch the ships. Some said they might intentionally let
them to avoid more serious troubles expected from the capture. Some expressed
concern about the limited capacity of Japanese ships for the fact that they
could not catch up the speed of those ships.
Regardless of those disputes, however, it is generally appreciated that
any further troubles did not occur any more at this time.
@Soon after the report of this accident, all Government leaders including
Prime Minister got together to discuss the case and decided to take proper
actions without delay. That's good, indeed. The case happened at this time
was rather clear and small intruding case in the light of international
laws. However, this was the first case that Self Defense Force rather than
Maritime Safety Agency had been directly involved with. So it is natural
that Japanese Government had taken all actions very carefully.
There were not so many criticism among Opposition Parties at this time not
as in the past. But there were still some number of criticism from mass media
and Opposition Parties against the action taken by the Government at this
time. Some expressed concerns in relation to the constitutional issues.
Some expressed that the Government should have taken more careful approach.
They also expressed some worry relating to the Defense Guide Line laws which
are being discussed at the Diet at the moment. Most of those group and
people who are too cautious to take any any aggressive actions like this
time request the mandatory report to the Diet and previous approval to the
action to be taken by the Defense Force whenever such cases happen.
I wonder if any of such approval by the Diet is really necessary in any
cases. The accidents at this time is not serious one at all. If such cases
of intrusion were more serious which require quicker decision and counter
actions, how could the Government leaders handle the situation? I agree that
it is necessary to decide some basic guidelines before hand taking all
possible cases into consideration . But once such guidelines were set,
some concrete decision and actions are to be left to the Administrative
leaders , especially to the Prime Minister to the fullest extent. The report
to the Diet is necessary. But the decision as to what actions should be taken
are to be left to the Prime Mister as much as possible to cope with such
emergent cases. That is a kind of common sense in any countries in the world.
It is hard to understand such mysterious behavior by North Korea at this
time. But it is true that they had provided a kind of good case study for
Japan and Japanese people. They had also provided a good opportunity to work
with neighboring countries such as South Korea and Russia through diplomatic
channels. US satellite confirmed the fact that two ships went back to the
port of North Korea. Such international corporation and diplomatic activities
will become a kind of strong restraint against North Korea on their possible
irregular and mysterious behaviors in the future.
The most important meaning of all is that the accident has provide a good
opportunity for all people of Japan, who are immune from any such national
defense issues to study the necessity of critical risk management relating
defense issues of the country.
1998/4/3
Tadashi HAYASE
My opinion this week(112):
Prof. Iwao Nakatani of Hitotubashi University, has determined to become a
director of Sony Corporation at the coming Shareholders Meeting. But the
National Personal Authority stopped this saying that they could not approve
this appointment. Hitotubasi University is a National University and
professors of a National Universities are public servants. Under the
Public Servants Rule, any public servants are prohibited to become directors
of any private enterprises. The Ministry of Education will approve this
as an exception, but the National Personal Authority is against this. The
latter is right, for sure, isn't it?
@ Prof. Nakatani expressed his desire to become a director even though he
resigned from the current position. That is fine, indeed. Prime Minister
Obuchi made the following comments on this issue at the press conference.
"It is necessary for teaching stuffs of National Universities to have an
experience working for business firms to learn a real business activity.
I would like to admit this as one of a good example of deregulation which
are said to be removed to activate various social activities. "
Sound very reasonable! But I want to say to Mr. Obuchi is entirely
wrong. It seems that he misunderstand the meaning of deregulation.
Deregulation means that various restraints and regulations set by govern-
ment which exists to limit freer and more flexible activities of private
firms are removed. In this case it is not regulation at all to limit public
servants to work for private firms. It is not regulation or any kind regardless
it is clearly written in the rules or not. It is common ethics for all public
servants as a matter of fact. In any sense it is not fair for public servants
who are paid by income tax of people to work for private firms.
Without waiting for the comments by Mr.Obuchi, I agree with the necessity
for the personnel interchange between Universities and business enterprises.
Prof. Nakatani said that teaching staffs of collages should not just stay
in a ivory tower. No body will deny his idea. It is true that there are
little personnel interchange between educational world and business world.
Prof. Nakatani was formerly a Professor at University of Osaka and moved to
Hitotubashi. That is very rare case by itself, In US, on the other hand,
such personnel interchange between colleges and business firms is very
active and frequent. And it seems that there are a lot of advantages resulted
from such exchange,
When it comes the interchange, however, it is absolutely necessary for any
colleges to be more opened by themselves to become more competitive research
institutions in the world. In order to attain this purpose, all National
Universities may be privatized and become private institutions.
@If Hitotubashi University is a private institution, there is no problem
at all for them to send their faculty members to private firms in any way.
All private universities are sort of business enterprises by themselves in
a free competitive market place, All sort of personnel interchange with
business world will be recommended and encouraged without any restraints
and reservation.
1999/4/10
Tadashi HAYASE
My opinion this week(113):
Open a new shogunate
The first stage of local election is over. As many mass media predicted,
Mr. Ishihara was elected to the Governor of Tokyo. This election has been
paid much attention among people in many respects and one of the key point
in dispute is the organizational relationship between the central government
and local governments. Mr. Ishihara and Mr. Masuzoe, another candidate for
this election insisted that local government should have stronger power
against the central government and they said they would fight with the
central government on many issues when they were elected to the governor.
"A new governor would open a new shogunate in Tokyo provided that he were
elected." "We are watching how the new governor to be will attain such a big
public pledges." Those two Senryus are making fun of the public pledges
presented by Mr.Ishihara indicating that his public pledges are kind of
things which would never be attained in reality under the present circum-
stance.
Contrary to Mr. Ishihara, Messrs. Hatoyama and Akashi, another candidates
for the election stressed the stance that they would attain their public
pledges in the election by keeping a good corporation and relationships with
the central government. Mr. Aoshima, the Governor of Tokyo expressed his
support to Mr. Hatoyama stating that Mr. Ishihara's public pledges are not
realistic at all. He said that Mr. Ishihara should become Prime Minister if
he talks big that way. His points are obviously concerned with Mr.Ishihara's
public pledges such as the return of Yokota Air Base from the United States
and some necessity of revision of Japan US Security Treaty. Mr. Aoshima would
like to say that those are issues are the one to be handled by the central
government and not by the Governor of Tokyo.
I want to support Mr.Ishihara when he says that the problem of Tokyo is the
problem of Japan. Although Mr. Masuzoe was defeated in the election, he also
insisted that he would fight with the central government on any key issues
which lie between local governments and the central government. The relation-
ship between the central government and local governments is still the one
that the former control the latter.
When Messrs. Ihihara and Masuzoe say that they will fight with the central
government, they mean that they would make some severe debate with them. They
do not literally mean that they would confront with them in any issues. They
intended to change such control and dependent relationship between the
central government and local governments to some extent.
It is true that many serious issues have been brought up in political worlds
due to the fact that the decision making process in this country is too much
centralized. I won't say that Japan should immediately introduce the states
system for this reason as often discussed in these days, but there is no doubt
about the fact that local governments including Tokyo should be granted much
more autonomy and independence for the improvement of political system in this
country.
There will be a lot more argument on this issue from now on, and I expect
that the new Governor, Mr. Ishihara will present some good examples of debate
with the central government. He said he would make some intense debate with
the central government when he starts his new jobs. I believe that various
political systems of this country will be improved in many ways for Tokyo
Prefecture to have greater independence and autonomy. Yes, Mr. Ishihara
should try to open new shogunate in Tokyo.
1999/4/17
Tadashi HAYASE
My opinion this week(114):
Introduction of united states system
The Prime Minister's Economic Council Board presented 15 major policy
projects to be executed in next ten years in the national economy. One of
those 15 items is to study the possibility of introducing "Dosyusei" , united
states system in this country. One of the key concern of the national politics
today is an administrative reform or establishment of small government system
that closely relates to this united states system.
The idea is to reorganize the country as the United States of Japan like
the United States of America by integrating 48 prefectures into 5 to 10 states.
Each states will have much stronger autonomy compared with that of the present
prefectures. The size of the central government will be much smaller in size
concentrating in such functions as defense and diplomacy of the nation.
Today both the Central Government and local governments are in a serious
financial difficulties. The total deficits including the central and local
governments count almost 500 trillion yen. Under this circumstance, the key
concern is to make a kind of drastic administrative reform to reconstruct the
country. The purpose of introducing the united states system is to streamline
rationalize the organization of the central and local governments in total.
In business fields, a number of severe restructuring process are going on
in many industries. The way to streamline and rationalize business process
is rather obvious. The whole process is to make the organization smaller
and more efficient. Specifically speaking, the process is to make organization
flatter, more computerized and closer integration by network system. A large
pyramid organization is broken into many smaller subsidiaries which will
have larger autonomy and independence as business firms. As a result, the total
organization will become more efficient and be vitalized overall .
The way how to reorganize government offices is same. Today, it seems that
Japanese political system is too much centralized, overlapped and inefficient.
This is true with the local governments organization as well. They are typical
pyramid or hierarchy in style and organized vertically.
When it comes to local political systems, there are prefecture diets and
city or town diets. In this information intense societies, a lot of information
are delivered very quickly to every citizens without delay. The desire and
opinions of citizens will also be delivered rather smoothly to the local
diet members. Is it really necessary to have two stages as prefectures diets
and city or town diets ? As a premise to introduce the united states system,
the integration of so many prefectures into smaller number of states is
absolutely necessary. It is also necessary to integrate so many cities and
towns into some smaller units such as county in along with the integration
of prefectures.
In summary, some drastic reduction of public cost and expenses is necessary
by administrative reforms and legislative reforms. More extensive welfare and
lesser tax for people can only be attained by establishing smaller governments
both at central level and local level. I completely agree with this united
states system for this contains the possibility to attain the purpose. It is
requested that the Economic Council Board will present more concrete plans
as soon as possible so that people of Japan will have chance to participate
in the discussion of such new political systems in 21 century.
1999/4/24
Tadashi HAYASE
English Home Page
Japanese Home Page