# The cycle of resistance to change in Japan

- Author: Joichi Ito
- Date: 2003-01-05T13:23:04Z



Had brunch with Yu Serizawa of the World Economic Forum and Oki Matsumoto of Monex and talked about the Blueprint for Japan 2020 and the panel in Davos. Oki drew a pretty interesting picture based on the discussions we've been having and I doodled it on my Mac. There are a lot of missing components, but the story goes like this.
We have efficiency problems because the markets that traditionally allocation resources efficiently are dysfunctional. One of the reasons that they are dysfunctional are because of the dysfunctional democracy which causes the inefficient insider circles which act in their self-interest without check. The dysfunctional democracy is driven by the lack of diversity. The public are educated to be risk adverse and obedient, the media are huge and controlled and speak with almost a single voice and the judiciary do not have an ethics of independence and are part of the "group". This cycle perpetuates the central harmony and concentration of power. Even if once piece of the cycle changes momentarily, the cycles co-opts or ejects diversity and everything continues along the same path. We need some sort of external influence which is more resistant to this cycle which can break the loop. Also, I think the idea is that things like "values" and "spirit" of the people are probably more important than specific rules and laws. It's probably a combination of social changes, pressure from the outside and some leaders (the governors?) that might be able to break this cycle and cause change and a more democratic ethic. One thing to focus on is that we have a legal (albeit not enforced) framework for a democracy and it's probably the ethics of each of the organs and individuals which makes it dysfunctional rather than the structure. Thus, it's probably a deeper issue...




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Reforming Japanese Democracy