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Title: Shadow Shoguns: The Rise and Fall of Japan's Postwar Political Machine by Jacob M. Schlesinger ISBN: 0-8047-3457-7 Publisher: Stanford Univ Pr Pub. Date: July, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (3 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Politics is power. Power is numbers.
Comment: This is a far better book than the more theoretical approach by Karel van Wolferen in 'The Enigma of Japanese Power'.
After reading this book there is no enigma anymore.
Jacob M. Schlesinger reveals extremely clearly how the Japanese system worked and who pulled the strings. He shows that Japanese politics in the last half of the 20th century was firmly controlled by four men, with Kakuei Tanaka as the most predominant tycoon.
Tanaka's tactics were very simple: use his home base as a platform for his political career by lavishy spending state money in his election district and by buying votes; use his financial clout to control the Japanese majority party; become still richer by corrupting the state bureaucracy, bid-rigging (200 % and more margin) and briberies (by private companies).
In fact, the author shows clearly that the whole system was controlled by a corrupt oligachy.
The men in power were not afraid of racket type interventions. One example: the ruling government proposed stiff taxes on automobiles. After the automobile industry paid heavy contributions to the party in charge, the bill was watered down.
This book is an exemplary analysis of a corrupt political system. Not to be missed.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Hidden Power Behind Japan's Political System
Comment: Why has Japan changed its prime ministers with such frequency through much of the post-war period? Why did those prime ministers seem powerless to affect real change to the political system? "Shadow Shoguns" answers these questions by way of a brilliantly told story of the Liberal Democratic Party's most powerful political faction called the "gundan".
The story of the "gundan" - which means "army corps" -- is primarily the story of the man who created and ruled over it for much of the 70s and 80s, Kakuei Tanaka. Jacob Schlesinger spends more than half of "Shadow Shoguns" examining Tanaka's life, including his roots in the construction business, his entry into politics, how he made money work for him in consolidating political power, and finally, his fall from power.
Tanaka was a fascinating figure. In many ways he was a combination of LBJ and Boss Tweed. His appetite for power and money was huge, and his experience in the construction industry gave him the ability to amass both. Coming from one of the poorest prefectures in Japan, he fought hard to bring huge pork barrel construction projects back to his constituents, and they in turn gave him unflinching support even when he was charged with crimes and became a national symbol of corruption.
A scandal removed Tanaka from the prime minister's seat in 1974, but due to his constituents' support, it did not remove him from the parliament. From then until the mid-80s, Tanaka would be the power behind the throne, using money from construction projects to strengthen his faction, and his faction to strengthen his hold over national politics.
What finally removed Tanaka from his position as leader over Japan's most powerful faction was not angry voters, other factions or their political leaders, but his own underlings. Tanaka had attracted some of the most talented politicians in Japan to his faction, and handling those egos was a full-time job. After a stroke in 1985, Tanaka was unable to reassert his power, and three of his protégés (Shin Kanemaru, Noburu Takeshita, and Ichiro Ozawa) wrenched the faction away from him.
The final third of the book focuses on those protégés, their strengthening of the faction, and finally the fall of their machine as Japan's economy began to flounder. As Schlesinger tells it, the success of the faction was always predicated on continued strong economic growth. When the Japanese economy faltered throughout the early 1990s, so did the mechanism by which the "gundan" governed Japan.
This is a book that gives vivid life to a political system and to politicians many people find boring. Schlesinger shows that because Japan's most capable and interesting politicians operated out of the limelight for much of the last three decades, their story is a compelling one as well as the key to understanding the history of the modern Japanese political system.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Land of the Rising Bribe
Comment: Concise and well written, it opens up postwar Japanese politics. Incredulous happenings! Maybe we should send some of our congressmen to Japan to check this out.-- Short shrift is given, however, to the all-pervading involvement with, and use of, the criminal organisations where the police seem powerless. Also, it should have photographs of the main actors to make it more three-dimensional.
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Title: The Logic of Japanese Politics by Gerald L. Curtis ISBN: 0231108435 Publisher: Columbia University Press Pub. Date: 15 October, 2000 List Price(USD): $19.50 |
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Title: Regime Shift: Comparative Dynamics of the Japanese Political Economy (Cornell Studies in Political Economy) by T. J. Pempel ISBN: 0801485290 Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr Pub. Date: November, 1998 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Miti and the Japanese Miracle: The Growth of Industrial Policy, 1925-1975 by Chalmers A. Johnson ISBN: 0804712069 Publisher: Stanford Univ Pr Pub. Date: January, 2004 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Japan's Postwar Party Politics by Masaru Kohno ISBN: 0691015961 Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr Pub. Date: 17 January, 1997 List Price(USD): $23.95 |
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Title: Japanese Phoenix: The Long Road to Economic Revival by Richard Katz ISBN: 0765610744 Publisher: M.E.Sharpe Pub. Date: October, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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