Memory, testimony, and activism: the politics of commemorating the massacre of Koreans after the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake

When Pope Francis was elected in 2013, the church and the world were in for many surprises. His first actions and gestures would speak volumes about his values, vision, and understanding of God's mission. In his humility, solidarity, and magnanimity, he paid his own bills, ate meals with common workers, and visited those in prisons. As he began articulating God's universal care for all, he showed his concern for the vulnerable and marginalized, especially those excluded from the centres of power, privilege, and opportunity--those from the margins. Beyond these initial, highly symbolic gestures, his travel itinerary also revealed much about his mission priorities and pastoral perspective. His first journey outside the Vatican was not to Washington, Geneva, London, Beijing, or other centre of political, economic, and cultural power. Instead he chose to visit a small island off the coast of southern Italy named Lampedusa, where thousands of refugees have perished in their dangerous sea crossing in search for better lives. For most of the world, this was an unknown, isolated, and insignificant territory. But to Pope Francis it would be the land from which he would speak about the message of the reign of God, a message that addressed directly the degrading and dehumanizing conditions that result in poverty, exploitation, and injustice. Pope Francis chose to go to Lampedusa because the tragic deaths of these migrants and refugees reached him like a "thorn in the heart." He went there to "make a gesture of closeness," "to challenge our consciences," and to pray for the thousands who have lost their lives after migrating from countries like Eritrea, Somalia, Egypt, Gambia, Mali, Pakistan, and other countries. (2) During his visit he celebrated a eucharist liturgy, and in addition to speaking through words, actions, and rituals, the symbols of the liturgy magnified the depth and importance of his message. Before mass began outside in the open air, he threw a wreath into the sea in memory of the many migrants who had drowned in these waters. A ship's wheel was placed at the lectern, and the cross, chalice, and altar were carved from refugee boats. During the homily, he contrasted the heart of God's mercy with our own heartlessness in the face of human suffering: Has any one of us wept because of this situation and others like it? Has any one of us grieved for the death of these brothers and sisters? Has any one of us wept for these persons who were on the [refugee] boat? For the young mothers carrying their babies? For these men [sic] who were looking for a means of supporting their families? We are a society which has forgotten how to weep, how to experience compassion--"suffering with" others: the globalization of indifference has taken from us the ability to weep! (3) Lampedusa, sadly enough, is not an isolated instance but rather a highly symbolic representation of a larger global phenomenon. Today there are more than 232 million international migrants in the world, making migration one of the defining issues of modern times. (4) In 2012 approximately 45 million migrants were forcibly uprooted, including 15.4 million refugees, 29 million internally displaced persons, and 2.4 million trafficked persons. (5) In 2010 alone 42 million were displaced by natural disasters. (6) By every estimate, these numbers will increase significantly in the coming years. They will continue to cross borders like those between Afghanistan and Iraq, Syria and Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece, Burma and Thailand, Democratic Republic of Congo and Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa, Mexico and the United States, and many others. Some of the most vulnerable people in the process are women and children, who bear much of the burden of the world's economic, social, and political disorders. (7) In this essay I would like to examine gender injustice and the issue of international migration in ways that expand on Pope Francis's liturgy at Lampedusa by looking at this "globalization of difference" and the challenges of conversion. …

This article explores the notion of ‘community spirit’ as it occurs in the discourse of community development (machizukuri) in the context of a society characterised by multicultural coexistence (tabunka kyōsei). It does so by examining multigenerational Korean residents’ integration in post-Korean Wave Japan. Despite the recognised deficiencies in Japan’s attempt to accommodate ethnic diversity in line with the government’s vision of multicultural coexistence, some long-term Korean and Japanese residents have begun to foster a shared sense of community as Japanese consumers of mainstream culture have familiarised themselves with Korean culture in recent years. Inspired by the existing gap between community spirit embodied among residents and the Japanese government’s sustained rhetoric aimed at maintaining the existing social order by juxtaposing Japanese and non-Japanese residents, this article aims to identify the keys to fostering an effective vision of an inclusive society in Japan. I argue that informal networks, personal engagement, and active participation would complement the current top-down policy that is implemented to negotiate Japan’s increasing diversity. Based on data gathered during ethnographic work that included participation in community initiatives and council discussions in western Japan’s Hanshin area, I shed light on the competing forces of inclusion and exclusion in contemporary Japanese society.

This paper was on evaluation and enhancing the effectiveness of community-based policing (vigilante) in combating crime in Ekiti Local Government of Kwara State. The work identified the roles of traditional vigilante groups in community policing in Ekiti LGA of Kwara State; found the extent to which crime constituted social menace in the area; assessed the impact of the vigilante groups in crime control in Local Government Area; determine the extent to which vigilantism has help in controlling crime in those communities; examined the problems militating against the optimal use vigilante groups to curtail crime in Ekiti and; suggested the best ways to improve the performance of the roles of the traditional vigilante groups in community policing in Ekiti LGA of Kwara State. The descriptive survey research design was adopted in the study, with the use of 330 respondents who were purposively and randomly sampled. An adapted questionnaire and interview guide was used in the study for data collection. Data collected was analysed using frequency counts, percentage scores and thematic analysis technique. Findings of the study indicated that: vigilante groups existed to save the lives and properties of people in Ekiti L.G.A. It also showed that the rate of crime was high before the formation of vigilante groups in its current form and low after the formation of the vigilante groups. It was also discovered that high rate of crime and police ineffectiveness led to the formation of the vigilante groups in its current form. More so, vigilante groups were perceived to be effective in crime control but are facing the problems of: lack of modern weapon to carry out their work effectively, poor funding and lack of mobility for them to use among others. The study concluded and recommended that: The role of community police is quite indispensable in combating crime perpetration and creation of social menace, risks and loss to the lives and properties of people in Ekiti LGA of Kwara State. It recommended that: Government should provide more modern security equipment for the vigilante group in combating crime in the LGA, provide funds adequately in paying the allowances and salaries of the Community-police members and that vigilante members should be well trained and operate within the frame work of the law amongst others.

This paper examines the proliferation of armed vigilante groups in Nigeria, especially with its tacit or official endorsements by the Federal and State Governments and the general public. In recent times, the activities of armed vigilante groups has sparked a lot of scholarly debates among authors, critics and analysts who tend to question the necessity for the normal security forces to abdicate their duties to alternative organizations in the country. The study used secondary sources of data collection methods, while the general systems theory provided the framework. The result of findings revealed that four different categories of vigilante groups exist in Nigeria, namely the neighborhood or community watch, ethnic vigilante groups, religious vigilante groups and state-sponsored vigilante groups. Despite the obvious shortcomings in their activities, the proliferation of these armed groups has the support of private individuals and public institutions in the country; thereby filling security gaps provided by the inefficient and ineffective policing of regular security forces. Therefore, it was suggested that the capability of the Federal Government to offer security and administer justice to its citizens needs to be improved irrespective of tribe or religious affiliations, provide better security and counter impunity, pursue police reform and bolster judicial capacity to deliver justice without fear or favor, delegate some policing authority to state and local governments, and create legislation to better control vigilante groups and the dangers involved in their operations. Otherwise, armed vigilante groups will continue to proliferate with increased capacity to upset national security systems.

Reviewed by: Crossing Empire's Edge: Foreign Ministry Police and Japanese Expansionism in Northeast Asia Selcuk Esenbel Crossing Empire's Edge: Foreign Ministry Police and Japanese Expansionism in Northeast Asia. By Erik Esselstrom. University of Hawai'i Press, 2008. 248 pages. Hardcover $59.00. Crossing Empire's Edge, by Erik Esselstrom, is part of the new field of transnational history, which looks at border-crossing issues and experiences that researchers working within the boundaries of the nation-state have frequently neglected. The work sheds critical light on the participation of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Gaimushō) in prewar imperialism and militarism in the context of the political intelligence role the ministry's police force played during the twentieth century. Making rigorous use of both published and unpublished ministry records and the available research on this aspect of Japanese imperialism—little known, especially in English-language scholarship—the book convincingly argues against remnants of the official view that, emerging from the Tokyo War Crimes Trial following World War II, has relegated responsibility for Japanese militarism solely to the army and a few radical Asianist extremists. As he states early in the book, Esselstrom takes issue with the [End Page 408] standard view of postwar scholarship, which has often characterized the Foreign Ministry as a liberal and progressive element that clashed with the Imperial Army, whose unilateral security prerogatives and reckless ideological ambition led to the Manchurian Incident of 1931 and its aftermath. The author challenges the so-called villains-and-victims view of prewar Japanese imperialism and militarism and its vindication of the American destruction of that polity and exoneration of "ordinary" Japanese from responsibility. By showing the involvement of the Foreign Ministry, the book provides insight into that institution's participation at each stage of Japan's colonial and imperialist project. In five concise chapters rich with solid evidence, Esselstrom discusses the activities, spanning roughly sixty-five years, of the consular police force organized under the Japanese Foreign Ministry and deployed, through a controversial interpretation of extraterritorial privilege, on the Asian continent as part of Japan's informal empire. Originally a small security force, the consular police evolved to become a "full-fledged political intelligence apparatus devoted to apprehending Korean, Chinese, and Japanese purveyors of dangerous thought" (p. 2). Active in China's treaty ports, North China, and Manchuria along the Korean border, at its peak in 1936 the consular police force numbered 1,794, or just over 70 percent, of the Foreign Ministry's 2,557 total personnel overseas. Beginning with a discussion of patterns of Japanese police work in late Chosŏn Korea, the first chapter recounts the origins of Japan's earliest quasi-colonial organization in northeast Asia as Japanese consular police institutions in Korea. The force stationed in Korea illustrates the part played by the Foreign Ministry in facilitating that country's annexation, a development in which Japanese residents were deeply involved. The second chapter looks at Japanese consular police in late Qing and early Republican China, and in Manchuria. Responsible for the protection of local Japanese civilians and Koreans, who were considered to be Japanese subjects, the consular police stationed in the Jiandao region (on the Manchurian/Korean border) became a source of jurisdictional ambiguity and led to clashes with Chinese police forces throughout this period. Chapter 3 sheds light on the history of Japanese intelligence, tracing the development of Japanese consular activities in this area as a means of guarding against ideological threats to the imperial state, whether posed by nationalists or Communists, by Koreans or Japanese. Here we see the background to Imperial Japan's prewar anti-Communism, which would form the basis for collaboration between the United States and former members of Japanese army intelligence during the Cold War years.1 The discussion of Japan's anti-Communist ideology during the 1920s and 1930s rightfully places Japanese history in the context of twentieth-century imperialism and patterns of global power relations. One interesting example, reminiscent of patterns in modern global power behavior up to the present, is the prewar collaboration between the French and Japanese Foreign Ministry offices, which exchanged information about political opposition groups, including Vietnamese nationalists, in the case...

Among the large cities in Japan, the City of Fukuoka in Fukuoka Prefecture is the nearest city from Busan, Korea. From the colonial period, Fukuoka Prefecture had been the important labor market for Koreans due to scattered coal mine and munitions industry. The City of Fukuoka was a more commerce city than other places in Fukuoka Prefecture so that there is little room for Koreans who couldn’t compete with Japanese merchants and the city was not populated with Koreans. After the war, Hakata Port in Fukuoka was designated major repatriation port which made Fukuoka one of the most crowded city with Koreans and Japanese returnees. However, the waiting for repatriation not smooth and temporary residence became settlement with several reasons. During this period, they built ‘barrack village’ surrounding both banks of Ishido River, Naka River and near the port areas. And also, they were looking for jobs and food in black markets. Some of the residents of ‘barrack village’ run group dorms for the blue-collar workers, hired harbor workers, and worked mainly in the manufacture of illicit liquor, raising pigs, collecting waste articles and secondhand goods. These occupations were the representative jobs of Koreans in Japan(Zainichi) who worked at the lowest part of economic hierarchy. Since the early 1950s, the black market had disappeared and Koreans faced more desperate situation. Fukuoka’s ‘barrak village’ reflected such reality of Koreans in Japan who were in poor environment regardless the prosperity of the Japanese economy after the war. In addition, these slums were introduced to Korean society in the form of “disastrous reality of Koreans in Japan” and became the targets of ‘Korean bashing’ in Japan. On the other hand, ‘barrak village’ displayed the reality of the division of Korea Peninsula. The banks of the river are divided into Chongryon(총련) and Mindan(민단). Residents who supported Chongryon were very zctive for demolitiond and relocation of ‘barrak village’ from earlier stage. And as a result, they were able to move out of ‘barrak village’ and settled in a new neighborhood in the 1960s. So-called ‘Kanehira Complex’ had become a representative place which showed the life styles and political characters of Koreans in Japan of Fukuoka. Since the complex was formed around Chongryon, it showed a clear tendency to use Korean lanuage and expressd its political views and actions. The development and relocation of other ‘barrak villages’ took more than a decade, because the interests and opinions of the residents of the villagers were different. However, as the political environment between the two Koreas and the generation changes, the characteristics of the complex vary according to the periods. This reflects the reality of ethnic groups whose attributes eventually fade over time.

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency, which will be abbreviated as JAEA hereafter, was assigned as a designated public institution under the Disaster Countermeasures Basic Act and under the Armed Attack Situations Response Act. Based on these Acts, the JAEA has the responsibility of providing technical support to the National government and/or local governments in case of disaster responses or response in the event of a military attack, etc. In order to fulfill the tasks, the JAEA has established the Emergency Action Plan and the Civil Protection Action Plan. In case of a nuclear emergency, the Nuclear Emergency Assistance and Training Center (NEAT) of JAEA provides technical support activities to an Off-Site Center in any prefecture. Specifically, NEAT dispatches specialists, supplies the National Government and local governments with emergency equipment and materials, and gives technical advice and information. In normal time, NEAT provides various exercises and training courses concerning nuclear disaster prevention to those personnel taking an active part in emergency response institutions of the national and local governments, police, fire fighters, self-defense forces, etc. in addition to the JAEA itself. The NEAT also researches nuclear disaster preparedness and response, and cooperates with international organizations. In the FY2012, the NEAT accomplished the following tasks: (1) Technical support activities as a designated public institution in cooperation with the national and local governments, etc. (2) Human resource development, exercise and training of nuclear emergency response personnel for the national and local governments, etc. (3) Researches on nuclear disaster preparedness and response, and sending useful information. (4) International contributions to Asian countries on nuclear disaster preparedness and response in collaboration with the international organizations. The responses of the JAEA to the accident of TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, which will be called Fukushima Accident hereafter, occurred on March 11, 2011, which had been initiated by the NEAT, were transferred to the Headquarters of Fukushima Partnership Operations. The tasks of NEAT, with its past experiences as a designated public institution including the first responses to the Fukushima Accident, have been shifted to technical supports to the national government for strengthening its abilities to emergency responses; the NEAT therefore focused on maintenance and operation of its functions, and strengthening its response abilities in cooperation with the national government. (author)

No AccessOct 2022IntroductionAuthors/Editors: Mihaly Kopanyi, Abdu MuwongeMihaly KopanyiSearch for more papers by this author, Abdu MuwongeSearch for more papers by this authorhttps://doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-1880-6_introAboutView ChaptersFull TextPDF (0.5 MB) ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareFacebookTwitterLinked In Abstract: Suggests that public assets form the largest part of the national wealth in many countries, and local governments often possess the single largest body of wealth in their jurisdiction. The state of Kenya’s asset management underscores, with specific examples, the reality that modern asset and liability management not only proves an urgent need but also applies in Kenya and in many developing countries. The COVID-19 global pandemic has had unprecedented negative impacts on cities and citizens’ livelihood, as well as on economic performance, health, education, and all sorts of life factors, and has challenged the management and financial capacities of national and local governments alike. Kenya started a big-bang devolution in March 2013, when it dissolved more than 1,500 former local entities and formed 47 counties with elected local governments. The country has achieved significant results on the bumpy road of devolution and the transfer of assets and liabilities to the devolved county governments (local governments). ReferencesBolva, Elva, Robert Dippelsman, Kara Rideout, and Andrea Schaechter. 2013. “Another Look at Governments’ Balance Sheets: The Role of Nonfinancial Assets,” IMF Working Paper WP/13/95. International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC. Google ScholarDetter, D and S Fölster. 2015. The Public Wealth of Nations—How Management of Public Assets Can Boost Economic Growth. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Google ScholarDetter, D and S Fölster. 2018. “Unlocking Public Wealth: Governments Could Do a Better Job Managing Their Assets.” Finance and Development, International Monetary Fund: March 2018, pp 44–48. https://www.imf.org/Publications/fandd/issues/2018/03/detter. Google ScholarIMF (International Monetary Fund). 2020. “Policies for the Recovery.” Fiscal Monitor, October 2020. Washington, DC: IMF. Google ScholarKaganova, O 2020. “How American Cities Can Benefit from ‘Land Value Capture’ Instruments in the Time of COVID-19 and Beyond.” Real Estate Issues 44 (18). https://cre.org/real-estate-issues/how-american-cities-can-benefit-from-land-value-capture-instruments-in-the-time-of-covid-19-and-beyond/. Google ScholarKaganova, O and R Nayyar-Stone. 2000. “Municipal Real Property Asset Management: An Overview of World Experience, Trends and Financial Implications.” Journal of Real Estate Portfolio Management 6 (4) 308–26. https://doi.org/10.1080/10835547.2000.12089624. Google ScholarKaganova, O and J Telgarsky. 2018. “Management of Capital Assets by Local Governments: An Assessment and Benchmarking Survey.” International Journal of Strategic Property Management 22 (2): 143–156. doi:10.3846/ijspm.2018.445. Google ScholarLall, S and S Wahba. 2020. “No Urban Myth: Building Inclusive and Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Recovery.” World Bank, Washington, DC. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/immersive-story/2020/06/18/no-urban-myth-building-inclusive-and-sustainable-cities-in-the-pandemic-recovery. Google ScholarNotice 858. 2017. Gazette Notice no. 858, January 8, 2017: Intergovernmental Relations Act no. 2 of 2012. https://gazettes.africa/gazettes/ke-government-gazette-dated-2017-01-27-no-13. Google ScholarNotice 2701. 2017. Gazette Notice no. 2701, March 24, 2017: Intergovernmental Relations Act no. 2 of 2012. https://gazettes.africa/archive/ke/2017/ke-government-gazette-dated-2017-03-24-no-37.pdf. Google ScholarPeteri, G 2003. From Usage to Ownership—Transfer of Public Property to Local Governments in Central Europe. Budapest: Local Government and Public Service Initiative, Open Society Institute. Google ScholarPFM. 2012. Public Finance Management Act, no. 18 of 2012. https://www.pcf.go.ke/index.php/public-financial-management-act. Google ScholarTDG. 2012. Transition to Devolved Government Act, no. 1 of 2012, enacted March 9, 2012. http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2017-05/TransitiontoDevolvedGovernmentActNo1of2012.pdf. Google ScholarUAC. 2011. Urban Areas and Cities Act, no. 13 of 2011. http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2017-05/UrbanAreasandCitiesAct_No13of2011.pdf. Google ScholarUN (United Nations). 2021. Managing Infrastructure Assets for Sustainable Development: A Handbook for Local and National Governments. New York, United Nations. https://www.un-ilibrary.org/content/books/9789210051880. Google Scholar Previous chapterNext chapter FiguresreferencesRecommendeddetails View Published: October 2022ISBN: 978-1-4648-1880-6 Copyright & Permissions Related CountriesKenyaRelated TopicsFinance and Financial Sector DevelopmentGovernance KeywordsNATIONAL WEALTHASSET MANAGEMENTASSET-LIABILITY MANAGEMENTALMCOVID-19 ECONOMIC IMPACTDEVOLUTION OF AUTHORITYLOCAL GOVERNMENTSUBNATIONAL GOVERNMENTSPUBLIC FINANCE PDF DownloadLoading ...

An investigation into teachers’ pedagogical skills and students’ learning of English Language in public secondary schools in Oruk Anam Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State was carried out. Three major variables namely; teachers’ classroom management skill, teachers’ lesson delivery skill, and teachers’ level of communication, were studied to show how it relates with students’ learning of English Language. Three research questions and three research hypotheses were raised. The research adopted a descriptive survey approach using a researchers’ designed questionnaire titled teachers’ Pedagogical Skills and Students’ Learning of English Language Questionnaire (TPSSLELQ) with reliability coefficient of 0.857 to collect data from 130 respondents from 10 secondary schools in Oruk Anam Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State. Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) was used to test all the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The result of the study revealed that teachers’ classroom management skill, teachers’ lesson delivery skills, and teachers’ level of communication, have a significant relationship on students’ learning of English Language. The study recommended among others that teachers should evaluate their lessons at every point as it provides feedback so that students’ misconceptions may be clarified. Also, educational stakeholders should take the training and retraining of teachers seriously to boast their competence and managerial skills as it is shown to have a positive relationship on students’ learning of English Language.

Reconstructing the City, Constructing the State: Government in Valparaíso after the Earthquake of 1906

The European Union’s promotion of the multilevel governance approach redefines the relationships between supranational, national and local governments. As countries like Albania undergo adaptations in the accession process, finding a balance between local and national government relations becomes crucial. The review aims to explore the complex interplay of governance levels in Albania, drawing insightful comparisons with successful cases in Europe, and offering valuable lessons for the policymaking process. To foster greater cooperation between national and subnational levels, it is imperative to define roles and responsibilities clearly, ensure proper financing while national government takes a more strategic role. In Albania, facilitating meaningful interaction can be achieved through the Consultative Council for local and central government, alongside associations of local authorities, though it necessitates legal changes and commitment from local governments. The Albanian Law on Local Self-Government, established in 2015, coincided with a new administrative-territorial reform in the same year, presenting various challenges, particularly for local governments. Through this article, we aim to present scientific research and concrete results concerning the Albanian experience of local government relations with the central government, while providing a comparative analysis with other European countries. Additionally, specific recommendations are proposed to strengthen government interrelations, given the high priority of the EU accession process in the country’s development agenda.

ABSTRACTThe national government determines vehicle emission standards in Japan with a bottom‐up approach based mainly on a technical perspective, which considers the state of automotive technologies and the cost–benefit trade‐offs of regulation. The regulatory result is a gradual change over the long term. Meanwhile, local governments – which must deal directly with citizens rallying against air pollution – demand bold and early regulation of vehicle emissions. Thus, standards eventually set by the national government may not satisfy local governments. To compare the policy decision‐making processes of the national and local governments, this paper examines the period 1976–1978, when the national government was strengthening nitrogen oxide emission standards, and the 1990s through the years after 2000, when it strengthened diesel emission standards. Nitrogen oxide regulations in Japan and the world were strict in 1970, but automakers had little incentive to respond proactively to them. Local governments in Japan did not trust the standards set by the national government, which had been determined based on data provided by automakers. Japanese regulatory standards for particulate matter in diesel emissions during the 1990s were weaker than in Europe and North America. With advances being made worldwide on the environmental front, Japanese automakers had less incentive to under‐report their state of technological development. Furthermore, because the technology became increasingly specialized, it became more difficult for local governments on their own to evaluate the actual state of technological development. Thus, rather than getting embroiled in debate about the quantitative standards themselves, local governments instead focused on fighting delays in implementation of the standards. Henceforth, the national government will likely play a stronger leading role in the establishment of vehicle emission standards, while the involvement of local governments diminishes even more as the trend moves toward international standards. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to make policy recommendations for the current fiscal decentralization discussion by examining the operating mechanisms of local taxes, unconditional grants, and conditional grants within the fiscal relationships between the national government and local governments in Korea.Design/methodology/approachAfter examining the current fiscal relationships between the national government and the local governments, this paper analyzes trends of local taxes, unconditional grants from both national and high-level local governments, and conditional grants from both national and high-level (or provincial level) local governments between 2002 and 2015. Local governments are classified into high-level local governments, and three types of low-level local governments are: si, kun, and ku.FindingsSince the structure of local government finances in Korea is very complicatedly intertwined, the present decentralization discussion regarding increasing the share of local tax revenues may not achieve its purpose of fiscal decentralization. The authorities in charge of revenue allocation should be first decentralized at high-level local governments; high-level local governments should then arrange unconditional and conditional grants from high-level local governments to low-level local governments while taking into consideration unconditional and conditional grants from the national government to low-level governments.Originality/valueThe dichotomy between the central government and local municipalities has been utilized in the existing discussion regarding fiscal decentralization in Korea, but this study highlights the important resource allocation roles of high-level local governments.

When people say that they trust local authorities, is it simply because they have generalized trust in national government? Or is trust in local government rooted in distinctive considerations, connected to the character of local communities and the balance of power across levels of government? We explore how trust in local and national government differs across individuals and across countries in western Europe. We find that people trust local government for different reasons than those that drive trust in national government. Cross-national differences in levels of trust in government reflect the character of national institutions. While both proportional representation systems and federal systems are power-sharing designs, each has distinctive consequences for trust. When opportunities for voice in local government are high, as in decentralized systems, people report greater trust in local government. When opportunities for voice in national government are limited, as in majoritarian systems, people report lower trust for national government and higher trust in local government.

The National-Local Cooperation Council Act is the “Act on the Composition and Operation between the National and Local Government Cooperation Council (hereinafter referred to as the National-Local Cooperation Council” in Korea, and the “Act on Place of consultation between National and Local Government” in Japan. The purpose of enacting the National-Local Government Cooperation Council Act in Korea is to determine matters necessary for the composition and operation between the National and Local Government Cooperation Council, which is established to strengthen communication and cooperation between the state and local governments and to deliberate on important policies related to balanced development between local autonomy and regions. The purpose of enacting the Act on the Place of Japanese Consultation is to promote effective and efficient national and local government policies in consultation with relevant ministers and local representatives on the planning, formulation and implementation of national policies affecting local autonomy. The venue for consultation in Japanese law means a place of opportunity for the state (National government) and provinces to exchange opinions on an equal footing, that is, a “place of joint decision” through mutual consultation (meeting), and does not refer to a specific administrative agency. Korea's National and Local Government Cooperation Council is used in the same sense as the venue for Japan's consultation. Comparing the purpose of enacting the two laws, Japan, as the legal name implies, focuses on the meaning that the National and Local governments consult to effectively and efficiently promote specific policies, while Korea includes balanced regional development beyond the scope of discussing other policies, including the purpose of Japan's enactment. It can be said that the purpose of enacting the law is much wider and more diverse. Although Korea and Japan have slightly different legal names, this study aims to analyze the pros and cons of the National and Local Government Cooperation Council Act, which has similar legislative objectives and contents, and derive suggestions for Korean law.