Contenu du sommaire : L'administration au Japon

Japan's Administration : Past and Future The history of Japan's modern administration dates from the “Meiji Restauration” which starts the new imperial regime in 1867. As far as the State is concerned, the first step of occidentalisation was the “Constitution of the Empire of Japan” of 1899, entered into force in 1890, which established a prussian type of constitutional regime with the aim of limiting the rights and liberties of individuals through parliament's action. The new Constitution of 1946 did not lead to the total elimination of the former bureaucracy. Nevertheless it stresses the people's sovereignty, the primacy of parliament and the autonomy of local administration and suppresses the administrative courts. Japan's administration holds an important role in policy formulation since a long time. This role should not diminish albeit the important effort to reduce the weight of Japan's administration in society.

Japan's Administration and the Fall of the Liberal-Democratic Party Three forces which constitute the “brass” triangle try to monopolise decision-making power : bureaucracy, the Liberal-Democratic Party (LDP) and big business. During the last years, the two first ones were dominating. For some commentators the bureaucracy holds the decision-making power despite of the political domination of the LDP. For others on the contrary it is the LDP which had the means to manipulate administration. At the beginning of the eighties, the LDP launched an important struggle against bureaucrats. Deregulation, decentralisation and the recovery of decision making power by citizens show that political power was taking the lead. But at the beginning of the nineties the LDP was driven away by the neo-conservatives. The administration took advantage of these political troubles. Fighting bureaucracy quickly presents three advantages for political parties : to hide their own problems, to overshadow the major issues, and to allow for being easily popular. Eventually, a change in economical policy driven by the crisis and supported by the liberals is undermining the traditional interventionism of public administration in its mere principle.

The MITI and Deregulation : Dilemma and Stakes The MITI, a symbol of the influence of bureaucracy on politics and economy, has to face a reorganisation of govemment by deregulation. Internationalisation of the economy, the budgetary crisis, the influence of anglo-saxon neo-conservatism make this evolution inescapable. But it encounters many resistances, amongst others from the professions which are dwelling in the shadow of regulations and consumer groups. Far from sticking to its traditional positions, the MITI seems to take advantage of this crisis of govemment by becoming a defensor of deregulations which it sees as only a step towards more radical reforms of the national economic System.

The Civil Service : at the Interface between Public Authorities and Citizens The post-war reforms of the civil service have changed their members from holders of authority to servants “of the entire nation”. The Higher Authority of the Civil Service (HACS) got a twofold mission of rationalisation and democratisation of the empire's civil service System. In practice the HACS has mainly privileged rationalisation, which was leading to independence. The objective of democratisation, making civil servants “servants of the entire nation”, has not been realised ; furthermore, the System of HACS recommendations is undergoing a crisis since the beginning of the eighties. The activities of local authorities have increased more than ever, leading to disparities between local officials. On the whole, the latter are becoming more open to society than the officials of ministerial departments.

The Twists and Turns of Local Administration Reform As a “monster of Loch Ness” of administrative reform, decentralisation has constantly been mentioned in several reports since the beginning of the fifties. They have remained unimplemented and it is only in the nineties that government has made a priority of decentralisation. However it seems that the statements made by govemment and the reforms which have been started encounter resistance in central govemment departments. One can only remain astonished when looking at the gap between proposais and realisations in the field of decentralisation. A lot of potential remains unexploited whereas the local level is still the most appropriate for a reactivation of the idea of citizenship and the reconstruction of a political consciousness which has been alienated by the political games of the centre.

Public Finances : Procedures and Structures Japan's public finances function on the principle of yearly budgeting. The State's budget is usually adopted by both houses of parliament, and by the only low chamber in case of disagreement between them. The budget project is elaborated by cabinet and approved in the council of ministers at the end of a very long preparatory process due to several arbitrations between the demands of different ministries, local authorities and professional organisations. The execution of the budget is controlled each year by the court of auditing which publishes a report in order for the cabinet to establish a settling budget which is presented to parliament for examination and decision. The japanese tax System includes a national level (income tax, tax on commercial societies, death duties, land tax, consumption tax) and a local level, which represents about 40% of districts' and municipalities' income. Nowadays the main issues related to Japan's public finances concem the importance of the public sector, the financing of expenses and the relationships between State and local authorities.

Formal and Informal Processes of Administrative Action Administrative action is nowadays submitted to the rule of law. Therefore all its processes have to lay on a legal foundation. Indeed there are legally defined processes in Japan which are largely regulated. However, the specificity of japanese administration lies in the fact that, parallel to these legally defined processes, other less informal ones have been developped in order to ensure controlling and regulatory functions. These informal processes (mainly administrative directives) undermine the principle of the rule of law and form a problem from the point of view of citizens' rights' protection. Nevertheless, these negative aspects should not hide the positive side of informal procedures : a better optimisation of control, which results from their fine tuning and their ability to be adapted to circumstances.

Transparency and Neutrality of Administration For a long time secrecy has been the functioning rule of japanese administration. The progress made during the last years in matters of transparency are to be found at two levels : that of local autorities which have created mechanisms for transparency and the protection of administrative data ; and that of legislation with the act n° 93-88 of november 1993 on administrative procedures establishing general rules at national level, which entered into force in october 1994. This act normally applies to all State decisions having an individual impact, to certain measures taken by local authorities and to administrative incitements. It makes it mandatory for administration to publish the reasons of a decision with negative impact on the individual and allows the interested person to present her observations.

Judicial and Non-judicial Controls Judicial control is exercised by ordinary courts since administrative tribunals have disappeared in 1946, but are submitted to a specific legislation. Judicial control is a control of legality, appropriateness being only checked through the obligation to motivate decisions. Stay of execution is generally impossible. Non-judicial Controls are the result of administrative remedies (appeal to the decision makers themselves, hierarchical control and revision) and different mediation procedures. From a western point of view, the control of administration is limited in practice because japanese people do not like to intervene in public matters.

Administrative Law facing Diversification of Administrative Activity At university teaching administrative law is mainly oriented towards general principles whereas specialized study fields which can be linked to it (environment, town-planning, education...) are often not taught due to lack of time. The general principles of administrative law do not represent a codified body. This leads to diverging interpretations. The most recent one is rejecting the distinction between public law and private law and tries to find the specificities of law as applied to administration rather than to define its content in order to establish a corpus of rules. Administrative activity has been considerably diversified, using other methods than authority decisions : contracts, general administrative directives... Recently an act on administrative procedure has been adopted by parliament, which officialised amongst others the mechanism of administrative directives. This illustrates a more pragmatic approach to administrative law.

Administrative Science : Towards a Reappraisal of the Structural Approach ? Japanese administrative science tries to replace the traditional representations of bureaucracy (planifying and implementing decisions ; redistributing wealth and participating to economic development) which stresses the hold of administrative power on society by a more dynamic concept underlying the role of social forces in activating administrative dynamics. Resorting to political economy and policy analysis have led to new theories which refine structural analysis.