Routledge Focus on Asia, no.1. London; New York: Routledge, 2018. vi, 116 pp. US$70.00, cloth. ISBN 978-1-138-10587-4.
Few recent Japanese prime ministers have stayed in office long enough for authors to evaluate their records of leadership and get the book into print before they were out of power. With Abe Shinzō now entering his eighth year in office, he has given scholars a rare opportunity to do just this, and Aurelia George Mulgan delivers.
She argues that Abe has taken full advantage of institutional changes in the structure of the Prime Minister’s Office (the Kantei) that were initiated in the late 1990s to offer decisive and effective leadership, pushing through important changes in policy relating to security, trade, agriculture, and tax, over opposition from traditionally powerful bureaucrats and clientelist politicians. “No longer does [Japan] deserve the label of a ‘leaderless state,’” she argues. “The Abe prime ministership unequivocally demonstrates the ‘politics of decision’” (1).
The strongest feature of the book is its detailed accounts of how Abe has exercised his leadership (chapter 3). Mulgan explains how Abe used the Kantei’s powers to appoint senior bureaucrats, cabinet members, and the senior executives of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to make sure bureaucrats and clientelist politicians (zoku giin) could not get in his way. He found a senior official at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) who was sympathetic to his plans to reform the system of agricultural co-ops and promoted him to administrative vice-minister at the key moment when his ability to keep MAFF subordinates in line was critical to getting the deal across the finish line. He appointed influential LDP politicians who were not dependent on the co-ops for votes to cabinet and party positions with the ability to block or delay legislation. And he was even able to appoint to the leadership of the LDP’s agricultural policy division a member of the farm caucus who “converted a pro-reform stance” (60) at the moment Abe named him chair. By making careful use of strategic appointments, Abe was able to achieve his goal of abolishing the peak organization of the farm co-ops (Zenchū) and joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership, with its commitments to further liberalize farm markets.
Mulgan appropriately credits Abe’s chief cabinet secretary, Suga Yoshihide, for being the mastermind behind much of the maneuvering that delivered these policy changes, as well as those in security and tax policy that she points to as cases in which Abe exercised effective leadership. In order to turn the prime minister’s power to appoint 670 senior bureaucrats into real leverage, the Kantei needed to know who was moving up within the ranks of all of the ministries, and who was most reliably in support of the prime minister’s plans. Suga operated the “intelligence network across the various ministries” (46) that provided the Kantei with this information and kept close tabs on all members of the LDP as well in order to ensure backbenchers remained loyal to the prime minister.
While recognizing that having Suga as his right-hand man, and learning how to exercise power by making mistakes during his first relatively unsuccessful stint as prime minister in 2006–2007, were important factors in helping Abe emerge a strong prime minister since his return to office in 2012, Mulgan stresses that structural changes in the powers of the office in the period since 2001 were the necessary precondition. Prime ministers prior to that year had to depend on cabinet ministers to initiate legislation in their respective domains. After changes to the Cabinet Law that went into effect in 2001, the prime minister could initiate policy in areas in which he had strong preferences. Changes during this era dramatically grew the size of the staff available to support the prime minister’s ability to plan and propose; allowed him to bring in outside experts to provide guidance on economic and security policy; and gave him the ability to appoint ministers of state for special missions. Abe has made full use of all of these tools.
While Mulgan is clearly impressed with Abe’s exercise of leadership, her account is not uncritical. She describes how he has used his power to appoint friends and supporters to the chairmanship and board of the national television network (NHK) to discourage negative coverage of his administration. She also notes that many critics of Abe, including some members of the LDP, have criticized him for accumulating too much power and railroading legislation through the parliament without sufficient discussion. She quotes one critic (Iinuma Yoshisuke) who argues that Abe represents “cold totalitarianism that is quietly strengthening control from the top down” (65).
As she does in this case, Mulgan often relies on other authors to provide the words (in quotes) that pass judgement on Abe’s leadership. However, as a result the reader is left uncertain as to which of these authors she agrees with. Is Abe’s strong leadership something we should admire, as many of those she quotes imply, or has he accumulated so much power that we should be worried? I think she favours the former evaluation, but her accounts of how Abe and Suga have succeeded in accumulating power to the point that they have marginalized, not only the opposition parties, but even the LDP and the bureaucracy, offers a good reason to read the book and start drawing your own conclusions.
Leonard Schoppa
University of Virginia, Charlottesville, USA