New PM Shigeru Ishiba: Don't expect instant results
Just when I had got used to the previous Prime Minister (enough to allow him to drop off my radar) they go and replace him with another guy!
Like most people here, I try to take as little interest in politics as possible, as I'm pretty sure that it doesn't make much difference to the Deep State strata of the permanent civil service, big business, and links with America that really decide things. But changing the PM is still kind of a big deal, or at least enough to wake me temporarily out of my political torpor.
So, who is the new guy and is he any different from the other still relatively new guy they just got rid off?
Japan's last PM was Fumio Kishida who managed to last just under three years in the post. The new guy is Shigeru Ishiba, who looks like a two-year prospect. Both of them are exactly the same age -- 67.
Western analysts will pick up on the fact that they are both members of Nippon Kaigi, a supposedly "ultraconservative and ultranationalist far-right non-governmental organisation and lobbying group." Some of them might even talk about the Japanese government being run by "fascists," etc.
This is all laughable. Japan is a non-confrontational society, and nobody gets excited by the fact that there is a group pushing to revise a few history textbooks and present a more "upbeat" image of Japan's past. The fact is anyone who becomes leader of Japan is just a dull pragmatist, which is why everybody is just bored or cynical about politics.
Under Kishida, we saw the supposedly "ultranationalist far-right" Japanese government moving towards a low yen, a flood of foreign tourists, and a continued up-creep in the number of foreign residents, or "New Japanese" as I call them.
This graph shows a "Covid plateau" and doesn't have any data for 2023 and 2024, but I'm pretty sure the gradual rise will continue, maybe not so gradually.
Japan can no longer do the "export dragon" model that typified it in the 1970s and 80s, because China is now doing that, so it is more focused on an eclectic mixed economy of post-industrial services, cultural products, super high tech, super low tech, and becoming a big, messy tourist destination.
Demographics are a worry among all Japanese, but not enough to do too much about it, and there is a continuing belief that foreign workers can be "managed" better than they are in the West.
Japan is sort of half-way between the British mass immigration model, where migrants are totally emboldened by a culture of "anti-racism" and "human rights," and the Dubai one, where they have zero rights, are treated like serfs, and can easily be kicked out.
The new guy Ishiba will go along with all this, sucking up to big business, dog-whistling to reactionary "racist" oldies, while also turning a blind eye to the continuing uptick in Third Worlders needed to look after them and do other low status jobs. He will also try to be nice to China while ensuring that Japan stays in bed with America, because if push comes to shove, Japan needs either America or real ultranationalism, which nobody, even in Nippon Kaigi, really wants.
The secret of keeping Japan going is to avoid its incredibly powerful autism taking a militaristic route. We saw where that led in the 1930s. That is the ultimate value of Japan's relationship with America and what some naive critics call its "infantilism." It isn't infantile at all; it is a highly sophisticated piece of psychic vampirism.
Like most people here, I try to take as little interest in politics as possible, as I'm pretty sure that it doesn't make much difference to the Deep State strata of the permanent civil service, big business, and links with America that really decide things. But changing the PM is still kind of a big deal, or at least enough to wake me temporarily out of my political torpor.
So, who is the new guy and is he any different from the other still relatively new guy they just got rid off?
Japan's last PM was Fumio Kishida who managed to last just under three years in the post. The new guy is Shigeru Ishiba, who looks like a two-year prospect. Both of them are exactly the same age -- 67.
Western analysts will pick up on the fact that they are both members of Nippon Kaigi, a supposedly "ultraconservative and ultranationalist far-right non-governmental organisation and lobbying group." Some of them might even talk about the Japanese government being run by "fascists," etc.
This is all laughable. Japan is a non-confrontational society, and nobody gets excited by the fact that there is a group pushing to revise a few history textbooks and present a more "upbeat" image of Japan's past. The fact is anyone who becomes leader of Japan is just a dull pragmatist, which is why everybody is just bored or cynical about politics.
Under Kishida, we saw the supposedly "ultranationalist far-right" Japanese government moving towards a low yen, a flood of foreign tourists, and a continued up-creep in the number of foreign residents, or "New Japanese" as I call them.
This graph shows a "Covid plateau" and doesn't have any data for 2023 and 2024, but I'm pretty sure the gradual rise will continue, maybe not so gradually.
Japan can no longer do the "export dragon" model that typified it in the 1970s and 80s, because China is now doing that, so it is more focused on an eclectic mixed economy of post-industrial services, cultural products, super high tech, super low tech, and becoming a big, messy tourist destination.
Demographics are a worry among all Japanese, but not enough to do too much about it, and there is a continuing belief that foreign workers can be "managed" better than they are in the West.
Japan is sort of half-way between the British mass immigration model, where migrants are totally emboldened by a culture of "anti-racism" and "human rights," and the Dubai one, where they have zero rights, are treated like serfs, and can easily be kicked out.
The new guy Ishiba will go along with all this, sucking up to big business, dog-whistling to reactionary "racist" oldies, while also turning a blind eye to the continuing uptick in Third Worlders needed to look after them and do other low status jobs. He will also try to be nice to China while ensuring that Japan stays in bed with America, because if push comes to shove, Japan needs either America or real ultranationalism, which nobody, even in Nippon Kaigi, really wants.
The secret of keeping Japan going is to avoid its incredibly powerful autism taking a militaristic route. We saw where that led in the 1930s. That is the ultimate value of Japan's relationship with America and what some naive critics call its "infantilism." It isn't infantile at all; it is a highly sophisticated piece of psychic vampirism.
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