Political Nonsense

Bureaucracy in Japan

Bureaucrat, the word is almost a swear in America. You can imagine a protestor or grandmother alike frowning and spit out the phrase, "Bureaucrats". Why is this one might wonder?

The American system of government has a long history of having politicians passing bills with nearly hidden addendems for things like . . . a bridge to nowhere in Alaska, monuments erected for no one in particular, and for giant pools filled with money for the rich to have parties act.

I exaggerate, but the modern political system is a mess because everyone is trying to get a slice of the American Budget Pie. Huge organizations erupt from the ground just to deal with all the pork barrel spending.

One would not expect similar practices to occur in Japan. Japan is the land of the cute, the small, and the efficient (or so we would believe). It would come to reason that Japan would have a small and efficient government.

I cannot speak as an expert, but I have been talking with some people who study this, but apparently the bureaucracy is just as bad in Japan as it is in America. Huge orgnization set up to deal with, what one can only assume is, political nonsense.

Again I cannot speak as an expert, but I have had experiances with the bureaucracy of AIU, and been told by many people that it is fairly standard across Japan. Often times dealing with the AIU's administration is like dealing with customer services over the phone. I have a basic question, but I have to go through 5 people and 3 departments to get an answer, and more often then not I find myself more bewildered than I was at the begining. Not to say that American Bureaucracy is any better, what I find surprising is that they are actually about the same.

Now there is one key difference between the two countries. American bureaucracy is fueled by greed. Call it capitalism if you must, I call it greed. Everyone is out to get as much as they possibly can at the expense of everyone else. You look after yourself and your constituents and screw the rest.

This sense of greed is not nearly as prevalent in Japan. Japan is a very socialist nation, (and, for fans of capitalism, this has had it's drawbacks) and social unity and equity are a much bigger deal than in the Good 'ole U S of A.

So why? Why if there is no sense of greed in Japanese politics (or much less of a sense of greed)

Fear.

Ok so I like the theatrical lets-look-at-the-dark-side-of-the-human-pysche thing, but there is some truth to it. As my friend on the airplane pointed out, the Japanese are a very shy people. You apply this to a national setting and you have a population with a deep seated fear of conflict.

As it was described to me. A bill is put on the table. A commitee is set up. The committee comes to a stalemate. Another committee is set up to solve the stalemate. The stalematesolving committee needs a pen to write down votes, so they need a buget. The budget is put to a committee. However one politician in this situation ends up signing the wrong document and the whole thing is thrown out due to technical errors.

Nobody's fault, nobody shot down anyone, everyone was polite, everyone was proper, it just happened that due to technical problems they will have to reconvene on the topic later.

I don't know which system I like less.

America: Screw You Screw You Screw You Nothing Gets Done Screaming

Japan: I'll have to get the manager, who will get their manager, which is me


Perhaps a little cynical, there is something to be said for competition and something to be said for cooperation, I think a balanced approach is what I'd like to see.

But then again we're talking about political nonsense.

-Mack