Japan's Regime Research Articles

The effectiveness of vocational secondary education on entry‐level job outcomes in Japan: Safety net for low‐educated youth in a vocationally weak educational system

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to analyze the sociodemographic compositions and labor market entry of low‐educated youth in Japan. The paper specifically focuses on whether vocational education provides a safety net for labor market insecurities during an era of educational expansion. While past literature has shown that vocational education contributes to occupationally specific skills and a smooth transition from school to work, less is known about its effectiveness when low‐educated youth become a minority group. The case of Japan provides a unique perspective, given its historically low youth unemployment rate and strong connections between schools and employers, despite its academically oriented high school education system. The 2015 Social Stratification and Social Mobility Survey in Japan is used to evaluate trends in vocational education and their impact on employment. The key variables under examination are entry‐level job outcomes. The results show that, over the past decades, high school graduates in Japan have become a more disadvantaged group than university graduates. Among high school graduates, those from general schools tend to have more advantageous sociodemographic backgrounds than their counterparts from vocational schools. Despite the limitations, vocational high school graduates have been better rewarded in the transition to work throughout recent decades. Furthermore, the labor market premium for vocational school graduates remains stable even after accounting for the influence of school networks. Sensitivity analysis confirms the robustness of these effects. The implications of the findings are discussed within the context of the skill formation regime in Japan.

Disaster Risk Reduction Regime in Japan: An Analysis in the Perspective of Open Data, Open Governance

This paper addresses open data, open governance, and disruptive/emerging technologies from the perspectives of disaster risk reduction (DRR). With an in-depth literature review of open governance, the paper identifies five principles for open data adopted in the disaster risk reduction field: (1) open by default, (2) accessible, licensed and documented, (3) co-created, (4) locally owned, and (5) communicated in ways that meet the needs of diverse users. The paper also analyzes the evolution of emerging technologies and their application in Japan. The four-phased evolution in the disaster risk reduction is mentioned as DRR 1.0 (Isewan typhoon, 1959), DRR 2.0 (the Great Hanshin Awaji Earthquake, 1995), DRR 3.0 (the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami: GEJE, 2011) and DRR 4.0 (post GEJE). After the GEJE of 2011, different initiatives have emerged in open data, as well as collaboration/partnership with tech firms for emerging technologies in DRR. This paper analyzes the lessons from the July 2021 landslide in Atami, and draws some lessons based on the above-mentioned five principles. Some of the key lessons for open data movement include characterizing open and usable data, local governance systems, co-creating to co-delivering solutions, data democratization, and interpreting de-segregated data with community engagement. These lessons are useful for outside Japan in terms of data licensing, adaptive governance, stakeholder usage, and community engagement. However, as governance systems are rooted in local decision-making and cultural contexts, some of these lessons need to be customized based on the local conditions. Open governance is still an evolving culture in many countries, and open data is considered as an important tool for that. While there is a trend to develop open data for geo-spatial information, it emerged from the discussion in the paper that it is important to have customized open data for people, wellbeing, health care, and for keeping the balance of data privacy. The evolution of emerging technologies and their usage is proceeding at a higher speed than ever, while the governance system employed to support and use emerging technologies needs time to change and adapt. Therefore, it is very important to properly synchronize and customize open data, open governance and emerging/disruptive technologies for their effective use in disaster risk reduction.

Making reform and stability compatible with each other: elite redeployment in Meiji Japan

AbstractNineteenth-century Japan remains a void in the literature on institutions and growth. Developmental institutions evolved in Japan after the Meiji Restoration despite the absence of political participation. Authoritarian change agents usually face a trade-off between reform and stability: they have coercive power to remove underproductive institutions, but at the risk of inviting instability, as politically influential deprivileged elites may engage in counteraction to recover what they perceive as their entitlement. Many authoritarian regimes, thus, coopt elites by allowing them access to rent, but such buying-off inevitably compromises institutional improvement. How did Meiji Japan overcome this dilemma and liberate major fiscal and administrative spaces for productive players who generate wealth and increase the size of the economic pie for society? This article presents a model that it calls ‘elite redeployment’ to answer this puzzle. In lieu of elite bargains in participatory polities in Europe, the revolutionary authoritarian regime in Japan coercively deprivileged traditional elites and redeployed those with financial or human capital among them in productive institutions. By doing so, the Japanese authoritarian change agents dismantled the incumbent institutions in an irreversible manner and swiftly built new institutions such as modern administrative, educational, financial, and commercial sectors, while maintaining stability.

On the Origin of Baekje MILITARY MARTIAL ARTS and the Path and Inflow of Japanese Military Martial Arts

Purpose: This study examined the origin of Baekje military martial arts and the path and inflow of Japanese military martial arts from various angles, which were concluded as follows. Method: This study examined the origin of Baekje military martial arts and the path and inflow of Japanese military martial arts in depth, and grasped the current situation and problems of Baekje military aspect, pre-sented Baekje military form and Japanese military form, and sought identity. Results: At that time, the left-wing was the first of the 16 official positions of Baekje, and it was an im-portant position to be selected from the nobles and to replace the king in case of emergency. At that time, about 3,000 people came to Baekje, or Japan, and the brilliant culture of Baekje s Aska culture was passed on to Japan. In addition, the longevity of Baekje s nobles, the head of the government, led the country as the mainstay of Japan. In addition, Baekje s Musa forces expanded to mark the era of Musa regime in Japan, be-came Emperor in the first year of Emperor Munmu, and made Fujiwara no Miyako a wife. The Emperor of the 45th Emperor of the Holy Moo was crowned in 724, and the Emperor of the Baekje system tried to protect his comfort through Baekje people who moved the military as well as the cabinet. The outbreak of Japanese warri-ors was founded by the warrior forces in the fall of Baekje by the attack of the Allied forces in 663.,In other words, at the end of the Edo period, the warriors were practically disappeared by Saigou Takamori, who lost his battle and self-determination, and the beginning and end were made by Baekje. Conclusion: As mentioned above, reestablishing the history of ancient Baekje that went to Japan is a way to establish our national view and history. This is because Baekje was destroyed in the past, but its descendants are re-creating new history in Japan, so we should revive our culture once again as a god of law.

Extraterritoriality in Japanese Competition Law: Reaching Foreign Entities in the Face of Changing Global Norms

The Japanese Antimonopoly Act (AMA, 1947) does not state how far its provisions reach internationally, and the Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) has been very cautious about applying the AMA to actions taken abroad. Instead, there is a special provision, Article 6, that prohibits enterprises from being parties to anticompetitive international agreements, and the JFTC applied this to Japanese companies for a few decades after the AMA was enacted. ... Changes in international norms prompted the JFTC to engage in a gradual shift from partial enforcement of the AMA to extraterritorial application to foreign entities. The Supreme Court’s Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) judgement (2017) is a milestone case, as the court finally pronounced that the AMA was applicable to foreign companies’ actions abroad if those actions affect the free competition regime in Japan. In the paper, the historical development of the JFTC’s decisional practice, focusing on Article 6, is examined first, and the paper considers what prompted it to change. The CRT case is then examined, and the remaining issues and future directions that Japan should take, particularly regarding the regulation of export cartels, are explored.

Die Rechtswissenschaft unter dem Kriegsregime in Japan: 1931–1952

Abstract The Jurisprudence under the wartime regime in Japan: 1931–1952. In 2016, a book was published in Tokyo with the title “Senji-taisei to Hōgakusha: 1931–1952” (The Wartime Regime and Legal Scholars: 1931–1952) as the first collective work about sixteen diverse legal scholars under the economic and political system of total war in Japan. This invited article summarizes the main points of the book from the viewpoint of one of its editors and explains why it was written now, and why not until now.

How do monetary transmission channels influence inflation in the short and long run? Evidence from the QQE regime in Japan

This paper investigates the effectiveness of the monetary transmission channels of QQE in stimulating the Japan inflation rate in the short and long run. Using monthly data from 2013 to 2018, our results show evidence of asymmetry effect, in which the impact of each channel on the inflation rate is different in the short and long run. Firstly, Tobin’s q and foreign exchange rate channels yield higher and positive impact on the inflation rate in the long run relative to short run; Secondly, the inflationary effect of interest rate channel is more significant in the short run; Thirdly, the portfolio rebalance channel is found to have a deflationary effect on inflation rate in both the short and long run, in which the deflationary effect is more pronounced in the long run. These empirical findings highlight the importance of the monetary base, capacity utilization ratio and foreign exchange rate in helping the Japanese economy to achieve the inflation target in the short and long run.

No-arbitrage determinants of credit spread curves under the unconventional monetary policy regime in Japan

We introduce an affine term structure model with observed macroeconomic factors for credit spread curves under the unconventional monetary policy regime in Japan. Empirical results based on the model selection using Japanese data demonstrate that the credit spread curves are dominated by the monetary policy and suggest that global economic forces, such as the U.S. Treasury yield and Baa-Aaa credit spread, play a major role in the dynamics of credit spread curves, complementing a growing body of literature explaining what drives credit spread curves. Our contemporaneous response and historical decomposition analyses find that monetary policy and global economic and financial forces have large impacts on credit spread curves at all maturities and rating classes.

Requirement of succession of employers in qualified merger & corporate division – Focusing on comparison with corporate restructuring tax regime in Japan –

Requirement of succession of employers in qualified merger & corporate division – Focusing on comparison with corporate restructuring tax regime in Japan –

A transdisciplinary research of coastal fisheries co-management: the case of the hairtail Trichiurus japonicus trolling line fishery around the Bungo Channel, Japan

Under the coastal fisheries co-management regime in Japan, local fishers play important roles in deciding on and implementing local management measures. Therefore, using the case study of a hairtail trolling line fishery, we conducted a transdisciplinary research with fishers, processors, government officers, etc. Taking social and biological factors into account, we defined management criteria and targets (resource, economic, human community, and local food culture) in collaboration with local fishers. We chartered local fishing vessels to determine parameters that were easily understood by local fishers. We established a local consultative committee comprising fishers, processors, and distributors, and developed a fish distribution strategy to nurture the local hairtail food culture. The integrated effects of various management scenarios were evaluated by the operating model. We found that co-ordinated management by both the trolling line fishery and purse seiners in the neighbouring prefecture was required to achieve targets. Two realistic scenarios are recommended: a conservative scenario that could achieve targets even with few strong year classes, and an adaptive scenario that protects strong year classes, but relies on a higher frequency of these. We shared these results with the local fishers and government officers, which led to actual improvements in management measures.

戦時体制下における体育・スポーツ政策の展開と学生野球「弾圧」

戦時体制下における体育・スポーツ政策の展開と学生野球「弾圧」

Price and nominal wage Phillips curves and the dynamics of distribution in Japan

This study estimates two types of Phillips curves – the price Phillips curve and nominal wage Phillips curve – for the Japanese economy and analyses the institutional structure of the dynamics of effective demand and income distribution in each period from 1977 to 2007. The estimated results allow us to make the following three findings. First, the Japanese economy was a profit-led regime and a counter-cyclical wage share regime. The combination of regimes can make the dynamics of effective demand and income distribution unstable. Second, the dynamics of price and nominal wage do not reflect each other in Japan by labour–management cooperation. Finally, after 1997, the distributive regime in Japan switched from a counter-cyclical wage share to a pro-cyclical wage share regime because Japanese firms quickened their speeds of employment adjustment. As a result, the dynamics of effective demand and income distribution were stabilised.

歯科医療と法政学(医療政策と法-医療を取り巻く諸政策を中心として-,【連続シンポジウム】岡山発「わが国の政策課題への処方箋」)

歯科医療と法政学(医療政策と法-医療を取り巻く諸政策を中心として-,【連続シンポジウム】岡山発「わが国の政策課題への処方箋」)

Abenomics: Why was it so successful in changing market expectations?

‘Abenomics’ refers to a new unconventional economic policy regime in Japan since late 2012. It consists of three arrows: unconventional monetary policy (the first arrow), expansionary fiscal policy (the second arrow), and economic growth strategies to encourage private investment (the third arrow). After the new regime started, both the stock and the foreign exchange markets reacted very favorably. The purpose of this paper is to investigate why the markets reacted to the new regime so favorably. Unlike orthodox arguments, we focus on asymmetric behavior between local and foreign investors after December 2012. We show that under the new regime, foreign investors were aggressive in purchasing Japanese stocks and in selling the Japanese yen, while local investors were not. By using high frequency intra-daily data, both structural break tests and regression analysis show that various news shocks had more significant impacts on the stock prices and exchange rates in nighttime than in daytime even if they were revealed in daytime. Noting that local investors tend to trade in daytime, while foreign investors tend to trade in nighttime, this implies that more dramatic market responses to the new regime happened in time zones when foreign investors were active. However, the asymmetry became less significant after the market crash on May 23, 2013.

Materializing the ‘non-Western’: two stories of Japanese philosophers on culture and politics in the inter-war period

This paper investigates the risk presumably involved in the narratives of non-Western international relations theory (IRT) by focusing on a similar historical case in Japan. It reveals the risk of uncritically accepted geographical division, and particularly focuses on the discourses of the Kyoto School's theory of world history as an example of non-Western narratives in the past, which was to ‘overcome’ the Western civilization similar to the contemporary non-Western IRT. However, they are also infamous for providing justification for the wartime regime in Japan for their aggression in the Asian continent. What is the connection between their philosophy and support for the imperialist regime? If there is a connection between them, is there any possibility of the resurrection of the same results in the case of non-Western IRT? To answer these questions, the article introduces the philosophy of Tosaka Jun who was critical of the School but, unlike Kyoto School philosophers, stubbornly fought against the mainstream politics of the time.

Evolving corporate governance and the dividends behaviour regime in Japan

This study investigates empirically the implications which the changing ownership structure and control transfers in the Japanese corporate market may have for the dividend policy of listed firms. The results show that firms with more concentrated ownership may distribute fewer dividends, as ownership concentration reduces distribution pressure from the capital market. Moreover, we show that institutional shareholding, both financial and non-financial, enables corporations to pay lesser dividends and also that the unwinding of the cross-shareholdings allows for efficiency gain and provides impetus to pay higher dividends. The recent pattern of increasing individual shareholding, both of domestic and foreign private individuals, is consistently associated with a higher dividend payment. Furthermore, managerial ownership has negative effects on dividends payouts and is not associated with the earnings of firms. The results suggest that government ownership does not have any significant impact on the payment of dividends. Moreover, our results support the principle of the dividends relevancy and the choice of an appropriate dividends policy affects the value of the firm.

The Transformation of Growth Regime and De-industrialization in Japan

This study analyzes the long-term transformation of growth regime and the process of de-industrialization in Japan, taking account of domestic institutional changes and international economic relations. Influenced by the structural changes in the manufacturing industry and the long-lasting recession, de-industrialization has accelerated in the Japanese economy since the 1990s. In particular, linkages between the export-goods manufacturing industry and the business-related service industry are analyzed to understand the characteristics of de-industrialization. In this study, we have attempted to extend the theoretical framework of the growth regime in the régulation theory, taking account of long-term industrial structural changes. Both the macroeconomic analysis of growth and distribution and Input-Output Analysis are conducted on the basis of institutional analysis. This study employs the régulationist perspective to consider the possibility of a new growth regime in Japan.

Evolving Ownership and the Capital Structure Regime in Japan

This study is an attempt to investigate the implications of changes in ownership structure and control transfer in the Japanese corporate market—a trend attributed mainly to the government’s increasing liberalization policies during the 1990s. Our results show that firms characterized by more concentrated ownership are likely to prefer less debt as ownership concentration reduces the extent of agency costs between managers and shareholders and facilitates equity issues. The main bank system enables corporations to obtain funds easily through the debt market. Additionally, unwinding cross-shareholding between banks and corporations provides impetus for investment in relatively risky projects. The ownership pattern of private and foreign individuals is consistently associated with a shift from bank debt to equity financing. Moreover, managerial ownership reduces the risk of wasting free cash flows. Managers make fewer decisions that may have a negative effect on the firm’s value because the part of costs that they will absorb as shareholders increases as their share of capital rises. The results suggest that government ownership is associated with more pressure on management and enforces the efficient use of cash flows. Changes in ultimate ownership will likely lead to major asset and capital restructuring in the coming years.

The Tsunami of March 2011 and the Subsequent Nuclear Incident at Fukushima: Who Compensates the Victims?

The tsunami which took place on 2011.3.11 before the coast of Japan and the subsequent nuclear incident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant have shocked the world and raised many questions. One of the questions is to what extent victims of the tsunami and of the nuclear incident can receive adequate compensation. We focus on the compensation system for earthquakes in Japan and show that Japan relies on an interesting private-public partnership whereby earthquake insurance is added to fire insurance and supplemented with a government guarantee in the re-insurance scheme. Since the earthquake coverage is, however, limited substantial government aid is still provided as well which raises questions on the influence of this government compensation on incentives of victims to take preventive measures and to purchase insurance coverage. Interestingly Japan has a detailed system of risk differentiation, e.g., rewarding victims for choosing earthquake proof constructions. After a critical analysis of the earthquake system we move to the compensation for nuclear damage in Japan, showing that, strikingly, Japan has a system of unlimited liability. However, given limited liability of the nuclear operator liability may de facto still be limited and should therefore be supplemented with financial guarantees. These are provided by the Japan Atomic Energy Insurance Pool. In case the damage is caused by an uninsurable risk like a natural disaster insurance coverage does not intervene, but the liability of the operator is covered via an indemnity agreement with the government. The indemnity is not a subsidy (like in many other legal systems) but the operator has to pay a fee for the indemnity provided by government. Only when the nuclear incident would be caused by a natural disaster of an exceptional character would liability of the operator be excluded. We show that the government is reluctant to admit the 3.11 tsunami as such a “natural disaster of an exceptional character” and the liable operator (TEPCO) takes up his financial responsibility. However, even though the operator in Japan pays a fee for the indemnity agreement also the compensation regime for nuclear disasters in Japan has substantial subsidies. This is also made clear by the recent act which is supposed to deal with the damage caused by the Fukushima incident via a Nuclear Damage Compensation Facilitation Corporation. The damage to be paid via this corporation will be financed not only by the liable operator TEPCO, but also via financial interventions from other nuclear operators and via the government. We examine the way in which the nuclear liability regime in Japan has been applied to two well-known incidents, being the Tokai-mura incident of 1999 and of course the recent Fukushima incident of March 2011. Moreover, we examine how the compensation regime for earthquakes and nuclear incidents in Japan compares to international tendencies and developments in the US. We argue that there are important lessons to be learned from the Fukushima disaster. An important lesson can be related to the fact that many hold that the incident was due to a construction failure for which most likely not the operator (TEPCO) was liable (or at least not only), but the constructor General Electric. This raises important questions concerning the efficiency of the so-called channeling of liability to the nuclear operator (meaning that only the operator can be held liable, excluding all other parties from liability) as it is incorporated in the international conventions.

A study on the Changing Welfare Regime in Japan during the Economic Recession: Applying the Perspective of Varieties of Capitalism

A study on the Changing Welfare Regime in Japan during the Economic Recession: Applying the Perspective of Varieties of Capitalism