March 10, 2006; Volume 02, Number 10
of the
Japan Considered Podcast
[Listen to the audio file by clicking here]
Clink Links Below for Today's Topics
Good Morning from the beautiful campus of the University of South Carolina in downtown Columbia. Today is Friday, March 10 th, 2006. And you are listening to Volume 02, Number 10, of the Japan Considered Podcast.
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Thanks to all for tuning again this week. Subscription numbers for the program still continue to climb. I never expected this many of you to be interested in such a specific subject. And, according to the computer folks here at the University, even more of you are downloading both the sound files and the transcripts directly from the Japan Considered website. That’s a bit more inconvenient. But at least it takes you to the site, at www.JapanConsidered.org. There you can look around and see what else’s available. Keep sending your comments and suggestions to me at japanconsidered@gmail.com.
This week we’ll begin with a review of what happened during the latest round of negotiations between Japan and China over gas exploration in the East China Sea. Then we’ll turn our attention to parliamentary politics. And finally we’ll take a short web audio tour of the Japan Media Review website. [Return to Topics]
Negotiations with China re East China Sea
Let’s begin this week with a look at the latest round of negotiations with China over the East China Sea. This session was held in Beijing on Monday and Tuesday. Preliminary reaction in Tokyo has not been promising. The Chinese side did present a counter-proposal, as expected. But it appears that the counter-proposal contained little to recommend it to the Japanese negotiators.
Yesterday morning I talked by telephone about these Japan-China negotiations with Thomas Coffey. He’s an old friend, a former government official with more than 30 years’ experience in both Chinese and Japanese languages. Visit his website at www.orientrans.com. There aren’t many of us around who can handle both of those languages, let alone translate accurately and quickly from both into English. He’s agreed in a month or so to do a longer interview for the Japan Considered Project series. Then he’ll describe his career as an Asia hand, and give us his take on the enigmatic art of translation. Here are some of his comments.
RCA: Good Morning Tom, and thanks for joining us on the Japan Considered Podcast. We’d like to hear your take on latest round of bilateral Japan-China negotiations over exploitation of gas deposits in the East China Sea. First off, are there really any gas deposits there to argue about? Or is this whole thing just another symbolic bilateral spat?
Tom Coffey: Oh, there are enormous resources at dispute here. Furthermore it is my understanding that some of the preliminary surveys done by the Japanese would indicate that the bulk of these resources actually are located on their side, the Japanese side of the mid-line that Japan has drawn.
RCA: But the Chinese don’t accept Japan’s midline as legitimate, do they?
Tom Coffey: Precisely. The Chinese have written that they’ve done rather extensive geological surveys out there. The formations and so on suggest that the continental shelf extends all the way up to the Okinawa Trough. And that is where they are drawing the line.
RCA: Both the Japanese and the Chinese press have reported that there was no progress on that basic disagreement. Without that, it will be hard to reach agreement on joint development, I’d guess. There’s some speculation in the Japanese press that the Chinese already are drawing on the gas reserves in the region. And that the deposits tapped also run under what Japan considers to be Japanese territory. Do you believe the Chinese are already tapping the reserves?
Tom Coffey: Clearly, if it is not happening now, it is going to in the very near future. That, of course, really will put the ball in Japan’s court in terms of what they do about their own exploitation.
RCA: Well, a METI Vice Minister was asked about that at a press conference on Thursday. He insisted that Japan would continue to rely on the negotiation process and not begin drilling operations on their own. That can’t last forever, of course. Do you think the Chinese side will be more forthcoming at the next round of negotiations in Tokyo?
Tom Coffey: I don’t seen any real reason at this point for China to compromise on their rather hard-line stand. They may go into negotiations just hoping to delay, as it were, the start-up of real exploitation on the part of Japan.
RCA: Thanks for your comments, Tom. We’ll be talking with you soon in more detail about your career and about translation.
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Well, disappointing. But not altogether unexpected. As Tom Coffey suggested, China has little motive to compromise at this point. And they know it. This stand-off won’t last forever, however. Pressure already is building on Japan’s government to allow Japanese energy companies to join in the gas exploitation process. That’s likely to occur on the Japanese side of the mid-point line Japan has drawn. But China doesn’t recognize Japan’s demarcation. It’s hard to imagine an easy solution to the problem. [Return to Topics]
The Post-Nagata E-mail Domestic Political Climate
“Is there life after the Nagata e-mail scandal?” one could have heard a n anxious Japanese political journalist ask a colleague late last week. Well, this week it seemed as though there might well be. The “mail issue,” or “m e-ru mondai,” as it had become known in Japanese, still reverberated in the background of reporting on other domestic political issues. But clearly, by last Saturday, most attention had shifted to post-me-ru reporting.
And that’s probably a good thing. Not to suggest the Nagata mail scandal should be swept under the rug, to coin a phrase. But there are many other important things going on in Japan’s domestic politics that deserve attention. Progress of the Koizumi Cabinet’s reform legislation is one deserving issue. Another is the leadership succession struggles under way in the DPJ and LDP. [Return to Topics]
The LDP’s Government Reform Legislative Package
Let’s look first at the most immediate development: progress of Koizumi reform legislation through the Diet. Today in Tokyo, the 10 th of March, the Koizumi Cabinet announced agreement on a comprehensive legislative package. The package was submitted to the Diet immediately after approval. It is expected to dominate debate until the end of the session, after final passage of the FY2006 budget.
The Cabinet’s legislative package focuses on implementation of programs that will reduce the size of the government bureaucracy and consolidate eight government financial institutions into one. It also includes measures to bring independent administrative agencies under control, to moderate the evils of amakudari, and to sell off a substantial portion of government-owned assets.
In other words, these proposals are intended to make fairly significant changes in the role of government in Japanese society. Proposed changes that reach the very core of the timeless debate between political conservatives and progressives.
The Cabinet and ruling LDP appear to have a plan to achieve what they want. Ideally, the Opposition will be represented adequately to ensure a serious debate once the budget bill passes. This, however, is far from certain. [Return to Topics]
Whither the Democratic Party of Japan?
Since the 2006 budget bill arrived for debate in the Upper House Budget Committee, Japan’s national media have united to criticize the performance of the Nagata E-Mail- impaired Democratic Party of Japan. As the leading Opposition Party, the DPJ shoulders great responsibility. Will they be up to the task?
Newspapers across the ideological spectrum ran editorials throughout the week chiding the DPJ for its internal confusion and lack of direction. Would Maehara survive as Party President until September? Would he be fated to serve as a powerless figurehead, even if he did? Who would rebuild the DPJ’s credibility with the Japanese public. Opinion polls showed a drop of up to 5% in public approval for the Party since the Nagata fiasco. That brought them near single-digits in some polls.
DPJ members maintained a low posture on Monday as Upper House Budget Committee hearings began on the Lower House-passed 2006 budget. They apologized for Nagata’s imprudent behavior in the Lower House Budget Committee, and overall were something less than confrontational. Prime Minister Koizumi and his Cabinet members appeared to be enjoying a free ride! Not a word about the four heaven-sent issues with which the DPJ had intended to plague the LDP during this Diet session. Indeed, LDP questioners seemed more willing to press Koizumi and his administration on the Livedoor/Horie issue than were their DPJ counterparts. [Return to Topics]
Theatrics aside, this may actually matter. Having squandered opportunities for substantive debate in the Lower House hearings, this was the last chance the Opposition would have to exercise any influence over final 2006 budget bill. What would the public think of their performance?
It appears that DPJ leaders have concluded that the Party must establish its credibility with the public before anything else. Further, they appear to have concluded that Seiji Maehara and the youthful leadership group he has assembled were not up to this critical task. Party Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama and other senior Party figures last week persuaded Party veteran Kozo Watanabe to replace Yoshihiko Noda as chair of the Diet Affairs Committee. Since then, Watanabe has maintained a high profile with the press. [Return to Topics]
Kozo Watanabe is a genuine character. At 73, Watanabe has been elected to the Diet 13 times. He has a winning smile, and an open, frank manner. In press interviews, he employs his thick provincial accent in a fashion that reminds me of the late Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, or of Senator Howell Heflin of Alabama. Woe to the hapless adversary who fails to recognize that rustic façade for what it is.
Watanabe brings powerful personal skills and experience to the DPJ. In many ways, he’s a brilliant choice as front-man. He proved his negotiating skills as a prominent member of the Keiseikai. That’s the LDP bloc built by the legendary Kakuei Tanaka and his successors into the Party’s largest-ever faction. Watanabe served effectively in the cabinets of successive governments -- most notably as MITI Minister -- during periods of delicate international economic negotiations. He’s known for his ability to persuade people with widely divergent agendas to join in a common purpose. He represents the best of Japan’s traditional faction-based politics.
But Kozo Watanabe is no accommodating cipher who obeys instructions without question. DPJ Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama is said to have encouraged his appointment to succeed Noda. Since then, Hatoyama has spent much of his time before the television cameras explaining how it’s possible to have the Party’s Diet Affairs Chief articulate opinions so much at variance with the Party line. Here is a classic Kozo Watanabe performance:
[Kozo Watanabe Audio Clip]
Watanabe is telling the assembled, and adoring, Japanese press that he thinks Nagata should resign his Diet seat without being told to do so. Politicians are samurai, he insists, and samurai know when to commit hara-kiri without being told! Soon thereafter Yukio Hatoyama was telling the press that the Party leadership had decided not to ask Nagata to resign, and that the Party’s position was firm. The press, at least, and Watanabe, seemed to be having a great time. [Return to Topics]
Significance of Watanabe’s Prominence for the DPJ
So, the DPJ leaders have some important decisions to make. And the sooner they’re made, the better. Party President, Seiji Maehara, has faced strong internal opposition to his more centrist, even moderately right, policy line since his election. The Nagata fiasco may have provided the perfect opportunity for his opponents within the Party to dethrone, or at least, de-claw him.
There’s some truth to the charges of inexperience and lack of judgment being made by older Party members. Maehara and his immediate supporters within the DPJ handled the whole Nagata issue badly. Disastrously, even. Young, telegenic, idealistic, reform-minded candidates seem now to appeal to Japan’s fickle voters. Especially the “floating voters” who identify with no major party. But can the DPJ afford to trust its fate to such inexperienced leaders?
The selection of Kozo Watanabe to replace Yoshihiko Noda as Diet Affairs Chief suggests the traditionalists have won a round. Of course, one round is not the whole fight. One might expect Japan’s traditionally anti-LDP communications media to rally in defense of the youthful, reform-minded Maehara. But his positions on constitutional revision, relations with China, and security relations with the United States have alienated that potentially influential constituency.
It may well require the skills at negotiation and compromise of the politicians who in years past maintained the influence of the LDP’s Keiseikai to keep the diverse components of the DPJ in the Party. But these graying veterans of LDP factional politics make most unlikely reformers. Political or otherwise.
Japan’s voters may face an unusual choice in the next election. On the one hand, a Liberal Democratic Party headed by youthful, reform-oriented leaders, committed to implement their comprehensive legislative reform package. And on the other hand, a Democratic Party of Japan led by grizzled veterans of the LDP’s factional wars, most concerned with keeping their disparate group together, and maintaining the status quo.
During the last general election, the LDP under Koizumi’s leadership surprised us with its success among Japan’s floating voters. Perhaps recent developments within the main opposition party will allow the LDP to repeat that performance in the next election. Stranger things have happened. [Return to Topics]
Japan Media Review Web Sound Tour
Today we’ll take a few minutes for another web sound tour. These tours cover free-of-charge on-line assets that may be useful for Japan Considered Podcast listeners. This week we look at the Japan Media Review Project of the Other USC’s Annenberg School of Communication. That “other USC” is “the University of Southern California,” for those of you not living in South Carolina! You can reach their site by typing www.JapanMediaReview.com into your browser. Or, by clicking the link on the Communications Media page of the Japan Considered Project website.
Click the “About” link on the left-hand nav bar. That brings up a page of information that describes the project’s objectives and sponsors. Here we learn that Japan Media Review is “an online-only journal that examines how emerging technologies are changing the practice, ethics, law, business and politics of journalism in Japan.” Quite a charge! Sponsors, in addition to the Annenberg School, include USC’s East Asian Studies Center and GLOCOM. GLOCOM is the Center for Global Communications, housed at the International University of Japan. We’ll take a tour of the GLOCOM website later on to explore the information available there.
Japan Media Review’s resources are arranged as “articles,” “wikis,” and a “news blog.” Of these three, the “articles” section is most current, so we’ll begin there. Click on the “articles” link in the nav bar. That brings up a nicely arranged page of twenty or so articles and interviews. The topics are diverse. Nearly all should be of interest to Japan Considered Podcast listeners. The most recent entry is dated March 2 nd, 2006. It’s by Takehiko Kambayashi and explores the effects of media saturation on children. The next article on the list was posted on February 16 th. So, this section is kept current.
Each article here is brief – 1600 words or so. They are highly readable, and presented skillfully with photos and links that take advantage of web technology’s potential.
Note the “previous articles” link at the bottom of this page. It takes you to an archive, which has a section of topics listed near the bottom. Each page also includes a very effective “search” window on the left, just below the nav bar. I tried a dozen or so searches – some obvious, some obscure – and got very good results for the whole site. This is a nice feature.
The “News Blog” link on the nav bar brings up an interesting collection of entries by David Jacobson. Each entry ranges from a few to a dozen or so paragraphs. All entries are Japan media-related and informative, though the last entry is dated October 5, 2005.
Finally, click on the “Wikis” link. This page has only seven entries. Many of them written by Naomi Hatta and Nicholas Klar. Be sure to click through these seven entries to see the information available under each heading. There’s a comprehensive essay on Japan’s kisha clubs, or press clubs, with links, for example. Another with links and commentary on Japan’s major daily newspapers. The long list with the unassuming title, “helpful links,” at the top of the page was compiled and annotated by Nicholas Klar. A lot of work must have gone into this list, and it’s well worth a browse.
So there you have it. The Japan Media Review. I asked the folks at JMR why some of the site’s resources have not been updated. They told me they’ve had to suspend work on the Wikis and the Blog due to a lack of funds. Let’s hope the grant proposal they have in now is funded. This is a valuable resource for all of us interested in Japan. Check through their site and bookmark it for future reference. [Return to Topics]
Well, that’s all we have time for this week. Thanks for tuning in. I hope you found today’s program worthwhile. As always, drop by the Japan Considered Project webpage at www.JapanConsidered.org for a look around. And send comments and suggestions for the Podcast to me at japanconsidered@gmail.com. I read them all, and incorporate the suggestions in future programs. I’d be especially interested in suggestions of free web resources appropriate for future web sound tours.
Let’s go out this week with a few bars of the Seldom Scene’s “Mean Woman Blues.” This recorded in 1991 at the Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia, as part of the Scene’s 20 th Anniversary Concert. The full two-CD concert is available from Sugar Hill Records. Go get a copy and enjoy some music.
[bluegrass]
Goodbye all. Until next week. [Return to Topics]
