New Year Message

 A Happy New Year! No serious accidents have happened due to Y2K issues. 
Different from the ordinal years, many people worked in new year
days preparing for the possible hazard. I would like to express our 
sincere appreciation for their works. We should not say that such works
were useless for nothing happened as a matter of fact.  Many of such
training and simulative works would help central government, local
government and business firms just in case when some natural disasters
happen in the future. The experience at this time will be more meaningful
in that respect rather than for the possible accidents of Y2K.

  Since that big Hanshin Awaji earthquake, weak risk management of 
this country have often been pointed out and the need to strengthen
risk management system have been a key issue all the time. But we
Japanese tend to forget any serious natural hazards very easily.

  Last year, we observed two serious earthquakes in Turkey and one in 
Taiwan loosing so many people. Well, we have so many earthquakes in
our country and it is quite possible that we suffer from another 
serious earthquakes in near future. It is requested that we continue
to pay the utmost attention on that all the time, for earthquake can
never be predicted as some accidents of Y2K.

  All of government authorities and private business firms which
trained people at this time, should continue to provide the same kind
of care in the year to come, This is, I may say, a real risk management
in any sense.

2000/1/1
Tadashi HAYASE

My opinion this week(149)

Way of thinking of Mr.Arima

  Achievement level of Japanese college students is now one of key issues
among various educational reforms plan under way. Recently I read an article
of Asahi Newspaper in which Mr. Arima, the former Minister of Education
commented on how to improve this situation. I had somewhat entirely different
view from what Mr. Arima said in this article.(Asahi Newspaper Jan4:New 
Century of smaller number of children)

  According to the article, Mr,Arima explained how to improve this situation
to a staff of the Ministry by showing a certain numerical formula.  He said :
"Achievement of Japanese college students comes down when number of children
decreases." In a word,  Mr.Arima said:" The number of children allowed to
enter colleges should be limited in proportion to decrease of number of 
children."  In order to improve the achievement level students, Japanese
colleges should narrow down their entrance by making entrance exam more 
difficult. The level of intelligence of students who pass more difficult
exams will get higher accordingly.

  The article of Asahi Newspaper does not clearly object to the idea of 
Mr.Arima, but they introduce the opinion of Professor Shikata of Meijyo
University in Aichi Prefecture, in contrast to Mr.Arima's idea. Prof.Shikata
was used to be a Professor of Mathematics at Nagoya University. He presented
a math quiz at his class at Meijyo University that was provided at the
entrance examination of Nagoya University several years ago. Those answer
presented by his students at Meijyo University were much more unique and
creative in many ways than those presented at the entrance examination of
Nagoya University, according to Prof. Shikata.

  What Prof.Shikata would like to stress is that the intelligence level of
students at the time of entrance to colleges may differ greatly after a few 
years study at colleges. The ability will be improved greatly after their
training at the colleges, although ability level was  a kind of low at the
time of entrance to collages.

  Well, I can easily guess that is quite true. Needless to say, Japanese
colleges are very difficult to enter, but very easy to graduate. Once students
pass the difficult entrance exams, they make little effort to study hard to
graduate. In the case of US colleges, the situation is entirely different.
According to my personal experience, this difference between US and Japanese
colleges are very obvious. Because of this difference, US college students
study much harder than Japanese students before they graduate from colleges.
Their achievement level is higher that those of Japanese students without 
any dispute. In addition, academic level of US university is also higher than
that of Japanese universities.

  The idea of Mr. Arima is wrong, if he believes that quality level of 
Japanese student will be improved by setting higher entrance exams. The
idea should be reversed. Many more number of students should be allowed
to enter University of Tokyo, University of Kyoto as well as universities
of many famous private ones. And much harder screening should be done 
after their entrance. 

  This is the only way to improve the quality of Japanese colleges. Some of
those assertion have been suggested many times by many academic and social
critics in the past. I wonder why this kind of a simple but important 
principle is not accepted in Japan. I also wonder why such a professional
man as Mr.Arima has such an ordinary idea on this issue.

2000/1/15
Tadashi HAYASE

My opinion this week(150):

Digital Government

  The Council of Capital Transfer submitted the report on two candidates 
area to the Government and the discussion to select the one candidate area
is starting in coming diet session. But it is not quite clear yet as to
how soon the discussion will start and the decision will be made at the
diet. The reason for that is obvious. The project itself require a 
tremendous amount of money and timing is very bad when a great financial
deficits is now a big issue of the current politics. It is very difficult 
to decide one candidate itself because it involves all sort of speculation
and concern for any politicians and prefectures of this country.

  As a matter of fact. Mr.Ishihara, the Governor of Tokyo and the Tokyo
Prefecture itself, expressed a strong opposition against the capital 
transfer plan. It is quite understandable that Tokyo Prefecture is against
any of such plans , for Tokyo will loose their position as the capital of
Japan once such plan is materialized.

  I personally do not understand at all that what this project is all about.
Some say that Tokyo is already too crowded to make any business efficiently.
Some more economic development is very limited for too much business is
concentrated in Tokyo. The reasoning is something like this. But I wonder
if politics and economy will be improved by transferring administrative 
functions to other local area. Will functions of administration, legislation
and such transfer will improve jurisdiction?

  Above all, will the life of people of Japan be improved? I cannot find 
any good answer for those questions. The major points of those who try to
proceed the plan are that the project will create a great demand in the
national economy. The project is a big public investment that has been
done in the past any way.  Once such projects are in effect, there will
be a huge public spending to build a lot of facilities and transportation.
They must be very effective to vitalize national economy.

  Wait a minute! Such kind of thought is just the same as a number of
conventional public investment conducted so far. Under such circumstance,
I was moved to read an article of Weekly Diamond, issued Dec.11th, 1999,
written by Prof. Y.Noguch of Tokyo University. In this article, he
expressed his criticism on this capital transfer project and suggested
to creat a digital government idea in stead. He wrote that the capital
should be transferred to the network rather than to some other local
area. He indicated further that so-called small government would become
possible through further advancement of networks of any administrative
functions.

  I quite agree with Prof. Noguchi's idea. The limitation of conventional
public investment is very clear now. But many politicians and economists
still stick to them by proceeding of many more buildings, roads, railways
and bridges such as three big ones between Honshu and Shikoku. We should
not say that all of those public works were useless. But what is required 
right now is "information highway " rather than ordinal highway and networks
of administrative functions to materialize the administrative reforms in
question. 

  I also agree with Prof.Noguchi's comment that Japan will be able to
catch up US in the field of information technology and network business
by proceeding such over all digital government projects.

2000/1/22
Tadashi HAYASE

My opinion this week(151)

Dawn of Japanese democracy

  The plebiscite on dam construction at Yoshino River in Shikoku was 
conducted on January 23. There ware about 10 plebiscites conducted so
far in Japan, but this was the first case to decide whether the 
Government public works should be carried out as scheduled or not.This 
plebiscite drew a great attention in this country, for the plebiscite
was questioned two points, The one was that whether or not the voting rate
would hit over 50%. The second was how residents would judge the necessity
of public works. If the voting rate did not go over 50%, the plebiscite 
itself would become invalid, regardless the ballot. The outcome was
that the voting rate hit 55% and majority of residents were against the
project itself.

  The plebiscite at this time was done according to that kind of city
legislation decided at Tokushima City Diet. I think it very strange 
legislation when I knew it at first. Why did they make such strange
legislation? If it were an ordinal ballot to elect city diet members,
there are no such restriction at all. All ballots is effective regardless
the voting rate. 

  At any rate, such plebiscite system as this, conducted at Tokushima
city, has not yet been accepted as an official democratic procedure in
Japan. In the last city diet members election, those diet members who
were affirmative on the plebiscite shared the majority seats in the
city parliament. Then it was decided that the plebiscite would be done
but with such condition of 50% rate rule. 

 Regardless rather strong opposition of citizens on the dam construction,
the Ministry of Construction and their local branch office at Tokushima
have been trying to execute the plan very aggressively. The residents
around the river started a strong opposition campaign against the plan
insisting that the dam construction would destroy natural environment
of the surrounding of the river. They requested the plebiscite to 
decide whether or not the project should be executed. It seems that
that approach is quite reasonable in any sense. But the Ministry of
Construction and their office at Tokkushima insisted that no such 
plebiscite procedure is necessary to carry out  such an important national
project as flood control. Mr.Nakayama, the Minister of  Construction
stated that the Ministry would go ahead to execute the project regardless
the outcome of the plebiscite. 

  What a tyrannical idea it is! Honestly speaking, I cannot say anything
definite as the necessity of the movable dam in question. I cannot
say which is right and wrong on the necessity of dam itself. But the
definite fact is that some at least 50% of residents are against the
project with the reason that that would destroy the environment around 
the river. They requested the Government to listen to their concern
through the plebiscite. It looks just an ordinal process of democracy,
doesn't it? 

  In Japan, any of such plebiscites are not yet considered as a part of
democratic process to settle some political issues in question. Most of
politicians and central Government officials do not admit it at all. 
This fact is serious, I may say. The major reason for it is that politics
will be in chaos, provided that they admit the validity of plebiscite 
while there are ordinal national and local election to select diets members.

 Anybody who support the plebiscite system are not saying that plebiscite 
is effective and necessary for all sort of political decision. But for
any specific and critical issues as this case that relate the interest
of citizens life very closely, plebiscite system is very necessary. 
It is very strange to say that such plebiscite is not necessary because
no such system does not exist at the moment. 

  The necessity to listen to the public opinion on a certain specific 
issues are not limited only to local political issues necessarily. There
are many national political issues that the central Government should ask
the opinion of people directly from all over the country. Some issues are,
for examples, the change of some articles of Constitution, the decision
on national flag and national anthem as debated last year, etc. It is good
and necessary to listen to people's opinion directly make any political 
decision through the country.

  I think that it is now the time to transfer to the direct democracy
type system from the indirect system as of today. When it comes to
democracy, I believe that more of the direct participation by people to
make any political decision is desirable than indirect decision in any
respect. Thanks to the development of communication media and computers, 
it is now possible to summarize the result of ballot much faster than
before. People may wish now such direct ballots. In this sense, the plebiscite
conducted at Tokushima this time was very meaningful. This is to be referred to
as dawn of real democratic system in Japan.

2000/1/29
Tadashi HAYASE