Category: comparative politics

The forty-fifth session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on February 1, 2024. Amy Catalinac (New York University) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Jiajia Zhou (University of Toronto) presented her paper which investigates the role of parties in shaping the populist vote. Responding to the literature on growth in electoral support for populism, the author focuses on how parties mediate this phenomenon. Building on theories of local party organizational strength and party-voter linkage, she uses municipal-level data in the case of Japan to tests the place-related hypotheses of populist support. In particular, the author looks at how support for the dominant party, the Liberal Democratic Party, varied during the 2005 Lower House election that received a populist framing as a de facto referendum on a bill struck down in the Upper House. The author finds support for the role of local party organizational strength but mixed results for clientelist party-voter linkage. Upon accounting for urban-rural differences, the results suggest a possible depolarizing role of party organizational strength in reconciling support for the geographically divisive policy.

Paul D. Kenny (Australian Catholic University) and Charles T. McClean (Yale University) offered insightful comments ranging from the concept of populism to framing, theory, and measurement considerations. During the Q&A session, participants furthered the discussion on other confounding factors and alternative sources of data to consider.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS:  https://jposs.org/.

The forty-fourth session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on December 7, 2023. Christina L. Davis (Harvard University) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Matthew Morris (University of Nottingham) presented his paper examining the effects of deindustrialization on changing voting patterns over the course of three decades in Japan from 1983 to 2012. Drawing from the literature on economic voting, Morris considers the effect of Japan’s transition from a manufacturing economy to a service economy on shifting patterns of ideological voting. Specifically, he tests his theory at two levels of analyses, the prefectural level and the individual level. At the prefectural level, Morris constructs outcome measures by combining measures of ideological positions from the Manifesto Project with a weighted vote share of parties at the prefectural level. His findings suggest a positive relationship between a decline in manufacturing and support for autarchy. At the individual level, his analysis finds age variations in voting patterns.

Maeda Ko (University of North Texas) and Stephen Weymouth (Georgetown University) offered suggestions on ways to improve the validity of the measures and the statistical model used in the study as well as shared their thoughts on the underlying theory and mechanisms driving the outcomes. During the Q&A session, participants furthered discussions on alternative sources of data and dynamic changes to parties and voters during the period analyzed.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/.

The forty-third session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on November 9, 2023. Amy Catalinac (New York University) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Patricia Maclachlan (University of Austin at Texas) presented her paper examining why postal privatization has largely stalled since the beginning of its implementation in 2007. Maclachlan revisits one of the hallmark pursuits of the Junichiro Koizumi government in the 2000s and examines why reforms that were initially expected to be transformational have shown lackluster outcomes. She advances a theory about informal institutions, specifically identifying three practices that continue to exert power in resisting a fulfillment of the privatization agenda. These practices are the private ownership of post offices by postmasters, a range of tacit re-employment arrangements involving public, private, and political positions collectively referred to as amakudari, and the use of employee quotas. Maclachlan shows how each of these practices have been left intact by the reforms and continue to exert power in resisting further reforms on the privatization agenda.

Daniel M. Brinks (University of Texas at Austin) and Steven Vogel (University of California, Berkeley) offered suggestions to clarify and expand the contributions of the paper. During the Q&A session, participants furthered discussions on alternative mechanisms and sources of empirical evidence.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/.

The forty-first session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on August 24, 2023. Phillip Y. Lipscy (University of Toronto) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Takaharu Saito (Nagoya University of Commerce and Business) presented his paper examining the impact of divided governments on unilateral policymaking by executive power. Utilizing a dataset of 790 city governments in Japan, which operate under a presidential framework led by mayors, Saito uses the regression discontinuity method to probe the causal relationship. Specifically, he examines the frequency of unilateral action undertaken by mayors⁠—referred to as “senketsu shobun” in accordance with Article 179 of the Local Autonomy Law⁠—and leverages the as-if random occurrence of divided government measured by the alignment of party affiliations between mayors and city assembly chairs who were elected through narrow winning margins. His analysis finds no significant effect of divided government on unilateral policymaking.

Alex Bolton (Emory University) and Charles McClean (Yale University) offered insightful comments on the meaning of unilateralism and divided government in the context of local governments in Japan, the role of assembly chairs, and electoral rules. During the Q&A session, participants furthered discussions on the concept of partisanship and the relationship between national parties and local politics, and provided additional suggestions for improvement.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/

The thirty-ninth session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on June 8, 2023. Yusaku Horiuchi (Dartmouth College) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Boyoon Lee (Vanderbilt University) presented a paper which examines the role of country-of-origin stereotypes on immigration preferences. Contrary to existing studies in North America and Western Europe which have not found countries of origin to matter in shaping these preferences, Lee utilizes the context of Japan where perceptions of nationality are more pronounced and finds evidence for the moderating effect of negative country-of-origin stereotypes. Lee adopts a choice-based conjoint experiment to examine the effect of stereotypes, measured along two dimensions of warmth and competence, on immigration preferences. Her experiment considers 11 countries of origin across five continents (Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, and South America), which are used in measuring both respondents’ pre-existing beliefs and immigration preferences. Lee’s analysis finds asymmetric effects along both dimensions of the measure for country-of-origin stereotypes: above-median beliefs are not associated with differences in immigration preferences while below-median beliefs are associated with weaker preferences. In other words, only negative country-of-origin stereotypes are found to have a moderating effect on immigration preferences.

Jeremy Ferwerda (Dartmouth College) and Michael Strausz (Texas Christian University) offered insightful comments on the framing of the study’s contributions and case selection, suggestions for relevant literature, and ideas for alternative analyses. During the Q&A session, participants offered additional suggestions for interpretations of the study’s findings as well as its policy implications.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS:  https://jposs.org/

The thirty-eighth session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on May 18, 2023. Charles Crabtree (Dartmouth College) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Keely McNeme (Southern Methodist University) presented a paper co-authored with Hiroki Takeuchi (Southern Methodist University) examining the different trajectories of party adaptation from positions of single-party rule by the Liberal Ruling Party (LDP) in Japan and the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in Mexico. The authors argue that the party structure and clientelist strategy in each case incentivized different patterns of behavior when conditions became less conducive for clientelism. Whereas PRI’s use of electoral manipulation to sustain an overwhelming majority led to its downfall, LDP’s turn to coalition-building to sustain a slim majority led to a path of strength through sustained moderation of its policies.

Masaaki Higashijima (University of Tokyo) and Len Schoppa (University of Virginia) offered insightful comments on alternative theories and case selection. During the Q&A session, participants furthered suggestions on literature, theory, and possible extensions to the paper.

The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/

The thirty-seventh session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on April 20, 2023. Daniel M. Smith  (Columbia University) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Etienne Gagnon (University of Tokyo) presented a paper co-authored with Kenneth McElwain (University of Tokyo) and Yuya Shibuya (University of Tokyo) where they offer a theory on “political bandwagoning,” politicians’ opportunistic behavior in response to events that present irrelevant cues to evaluate political competence. Their study focuses on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, an event that presents a crucial case to test their theory. Existing studies on the effects of politically irrelevant cues focus on the passive occurrence of events that are both unpoliticized and unambiguously positive or negative. In contrast, the Tokyo Olympics was especially controversial due to its occurrence in the midst of a pandemic, not to mention the event had coincided with a pending election, which presumably accentuated strategic considerations for bandwagoning. Thus, the sports event presented favorable conditions for opportunistic behavior while remaining a politically irrelevant cue. To test their theory, the authors use a difference-in-differences approach to examine politicians’ social messaging behavior after an athlete from the politicians’ respective hometown wins a medal. They find evidence for an increase in positive messaging by ruling party politicians and no observable difference for opposition party politicians.

Neil Malhotra (Stanford University) and Eunji Kim (Columbia University) offered insightful comments on the framing of the study as well as the interpretation of its findings. During the Q&A session, participants furthered discussions on research design and provided suggestions on alternative sources of data for analysis.

This event attracted around 23 participants and produced an engaging Q&A session. The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/

The thirty-sixth session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on March 2, 2023. Amy Catalinac (New York University) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Austin Mitchell (Tohoku University) and Weiwen Yin (University of Macau) presented a paper co-authored with Minzhao Wang (Peking University), looking at the motivations behind the development of fiscal capacity. They focus on the case of 16th-century Japan where the state under Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s rule observed surprising levels of centralization of power in its implementation of cadastral surveys. According to the authors, this act of overcoming asymmetric information between central and local governments is a crucial step toward developing fiscal capacity in the state-building process. Their study probes the case using a number of theories, namely the presence of external threat, domestic power competition, and revenue maximization. Using a logistic regression model on provincial-level data, the authors show that the implementation of surveys was driven by agricultural output, specifically rice production, thereby showing support for revenue maximization as a driver of fiscal capacity building. They find no evidence for the effect of external threat faced by the provinces as well as internal threat posed by the presence of powerful domestic rivals in these provinces.

David Stasavage (New York University) and Junichi Yamasaki (Kobe University) offered insightful comments on the theoretical framework, untapped contributions of the study, and suggestions for improvements to the research design. During the Q&A session, participants expanded on discussions of research design and endogeneity concerns, and provided suggestions for alternative measures as well as ways to circumvent these issues.

This event attracted around 16 participants and produced an engaging Q&A session. The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS: https://jposs.org/

The thirty-second session of the Japanese Politics Online Seminar Series (JPOSS) took place on October 6, 2022. Charles Crabtree (Dartmouth College) chaired the seminar and moderated the Q&A session.

Reo Matsuzaki (Trinity College) presented a paper co-authored with Fabian Drixler (Yale University), which looks at an alternative understanding of failure in law enforcement that emerges from tacit cooperation between the state and its subjects. The authors identify a puzzling lack of enforcement of infanticides during the Meiji period in Japan despite apparent state capacity. The authors propose the theory of omote-naishō to explain how state actors reconciled the conflicting demands of domestic pressures to uphold the legal protection of newborns and the need to respond to people’s desire for autonomy in order to maintain state-society relations. They argue that not only does the bottom-up construction of falsified statistics on stillbirths constitute an omote performance — “a fictional reality that manifests the outward-facing norms of society” — but the performance also diverges from existing concepts with the presence of naishō. Unlike concepts of performance that emphasize elements of deception between the state and its subjects, naishō is a form of tacit cooperation that is enabled by shared values in society and occurs specifically when these values conflict with formal laws.

Iza Yue Ding (University of Pittsburgh) and Dan Mattingly (Yale University) offered insightful comments on the theory and its translation, as well as important distinctions from similar concepts. During the Q&A session, participants raised questions about the applicability of the theory to other cases and made suggestions for comparative study.

This event attracted around 25 participants and produced an engaging Q&A session. The organizers would like to thank the presenters, discussants, and participants, as well as the staff at the Harvard Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, who provided administrative support. We look forward to seeing you at the next session of JPOSS:  https://jposs.org/