During the last two years, the Japanese political scene witnessed a series of drastic changes, including the end of the 38 year long reign of the Liberal Democratic Party and the establishment of the LDP-Socialist Coalition government. These changes have not only provided different political environments surrounding the Japanese prime minister, but also have significantly increased public interest in his political leadership.

Numerous political resources appear to be available to a Japanese prime minister. As head of the cabinet that is vested with executive power, the prime minister is at the top of the executive branch. He leads the political party or a coalition of parties that holds the majority seats in the powerful lower house. The prime minister handles both administrative and political affairs as the leader of the government and the ruling party or coalition.

In spite of his many responsibilities and authorities, the prime minister is often considered weak. Lack of leadership is a reoccurring theme in many analyses of Japanese politics. Japan scholars have long argued that political leaders depend on Japan's strong bureaucracy for the formulation and execution of policies. Some argue that the bureaucracy is so strong that political leaders, including the prime minister, have a very limited role in policymaking. Karel van Wolferen, for example, describes the Japanese policymaking mechanism as "The System," which is made up of elites in the political, bureaucratic, and business world who as a unit somehow make decisions. According to Wolferen, Japan's system has no political peak and thus no political leadership.1

Is the Japanese prime minister an ineffective national leader as Wolferen suggests? This study provides an answer to this question by first examining just how limited his legal authority is. Then, the focus shifts to the two dimensions of fractions within the government and the ruling party that the prime minister must face -- factions in the ruling party and sectionalism in the government. To overcome his legal limitation and these fractions, the prime minister must rely on informal sources of power to effectively utilize legal authority. The second half of this paper introduces various informal sources of power, and presents four kinds of leadership style. Which leadership style a prime minister adapts is dependent on what informal sources of power available to him and how he utilizes them.

Legal Authority

The executive power of the Japanese prime minister is not precisely defined by the Constitution. It states that executive power is vested in the cabinet (Article 65) and that the prime minister represents the cabinet (Article 72). Article 2 of the Cabinet Law, as well as Article 6 of the Constitution, defines the prime minister as head of the cabinet. This status is supported by his constitutional authority to appoint and dismiss cabinet members (Article 68) and his authority to protect cabinet members from legal actions during their tenure (Article 75).2 However, his role as a representative and head of the cabinet is ambiguous. For example, Article 72, which defines the job of the prime minister, reads: "The Prime Minister, representing the Cabinet, submits bills, reports on general national affairs and foreign relations to the Diet and exercises control and supervision over various administrative branches." The wording has created an ongoing debate over whether the prime minister represents the cabinet only when he submits bills or when he conducts all the duties described in the article. This is an important question. If "representing the cabinet" applies only to the submission of bills, the prime minister would have the authority to exercise control and supervision over the executive branch independent from the cabinet. This was indeed the intent of Article 64 in the original English language draft proposed by the American Occupation authorities.3 Article 66 of the current Constitution, however, implies limitations to the prime minister's authorities by referring to the cabinet's responsibilities: "The Cabinet, in the exercise of executive power, shall be collectively responsible to the Diet." The Cabinet Law more clearly limits the prime minister's executive power.

First, Article 5 defines his role as a cabinet representative when he "reports on general national affairs and foreign relations" to the Diet as well as when he submits bills. Second, according to Article 3, the authority and responsibility of executive power is divided among cabinet members. This provides direct authority over administrative operations to relevant ministers, not the prime minister. The prime minister legally holds direct authority only over the agencies under the Prime Minister's Office, such as the Defense Agency and the National Land Agency. Over most administrative branches, he has indirect authority. As Masaharu Gotoda states: "The prime minister has no legal authority to control or supervise each minister. Ministers do not receive individual directions from the prime minister unless his direction meets certain conditions."4

The prime minister can block administrative operations with the authority given by Article 8 of the Cabinet Law, but the final decision on operations is decided in cabinet meetings. Furthermore, even his indirect authority is limited. Article 6 of the Cabinet Law does not allow him to hold executive power independent from decisions made in the cabinet. Thus, he can control or supervise the executive branch only to the extent that he is authorized by the cabinet meeting. In other words, to influence administrative operations, the prime minister theoretically must go through the cabinet, which requires unanimous consent to approve any cabinet decision. The prime minister's control over the cabinet, therefore, determines his influence over the government.

Factionalism in the Party and Sectionalism in the Government

Although the prime minister has constitutional authority to appoint and dismiss cabinet members, the political reality is that he does not have a free hand in forming his cabinet. The long-time ruling Liberal Democratic Party was a coalition of several different groups with different political goals. To become prime minister, a candidate had to first form a coalition of factions that would support him, and then maintain that support to be an effective leader. The appointment of cabinet members from each of the inner groups of the government party was the minimum condition necessary to gain support from the entire party organization. Powerful prime ministers have enjoyed relative freedom over appointments, but even they have not been able to totally ignore the wishes of the other factions. Ignoring the factional balance can create a severe split within the party. If this happens, the prime minister no longer has support from a majority in the Diet, which can lead to a vote of no-confidence forcing him out of office. The appointment of cabinet members is a tool whereby the prime minister can hold the party together to pursue his policies.

Among the legal authorities of the prime minister, the appointment and dismissal authority is the only one given to him independent of the cabinet. Factionalism within the ruling party, however, has meant that a prime minister cannot freely exercise his sole appointive power. Cabinet members, although formally appointed by the prime minister, maintain strong loyalty to their faction leaders and often have acted as representatives of their groups to the administration. This factionalism has weakened the leadership of the prime minister in the cabinet.

According to a sociology scholar, Chie Nakane, factions within political parties are the product of the characteristics of a Japanese society which puts more emphasis on vertical relations, such as leader-follower and superior-junior relations, than on horizontal relations among colleagues. In Nakane's view, Japanese communities are usually organized in a pyramid- shape hierarchy of ranks which consists of many very personal, man-to-man relations between superiors and juniors, the basis of human relations in Japan. Japanese leaders, therefore, are directly supported by sub-leaders who themselves have their own followers.5 Formal, institutional group organizations are often eroded and subsumed by the unity of sub-groups with the traditional values of human relations. Nakane's description of the way the Japanese organize themselves fits perfectly with the structure of Japanese political parties with a formal party leader and members grouped into factions. Prime Minister Masayoshi Ohira once said: "When there are three politicians, there will be at least two factions." As far as this cultural heritage remains, factionalism within Japanese political parties is likely to remain even under the new single-seat electoral system.

In addition to factionalism within the government party, the prime minister must deal with another kind of fraction within the government -- inter- agency rivalry. Each section of the bureaucracy has its own interest and client industry that it must protect.

Although the prime minister is the central figure in the government, he cannot micro-manage the many different issues he must deal with due to time constraints and other limitations. Because of his central role in the larger political scene, the majority of his day-to-day administrative actions are handled by ministries and government agencies. Although the indirectly elected prime minister and his cabinet hold all the executive power, the nonelected civil servants in the bureaucracy play an influential role in policymaking in Japanese politics.

Throughout their careers, elite bureaucrats learn to design, draft, and implement legislation in the jurisdiction of their ministries. Their major interest is to protect their ministry's interests and expand its authority: they tend to put their ministerial interest over national interest. In the postwar era, individual ministries have created their jurisdiction and become empowered themselves through various laws. The Ministry of International Trade and Industry, for example, worked to have a multitude of functions assigned to it by 109 separate laws in the late 1970s.

Knowledge of the complicated network of laws is a great asset to the elite bureaucrats who can cite various legal restrictions to block policy initiatives of other political actors. Such sectionalism backed by expertise often becomes a major obstacle for the prime minister and his cabinet in initiating major policies.

Although ministries are technically subordinate to the cabinet, bureaucrats are responsible only to their ministers. Because Japan's postwar ruling party has reshuffled the cabinet almost once a year, an individual serving as minister generally has little time to accumulate the experience and knowledge necessary to become influential in actual decision making within his ministry. Given this lack of experience and expertise, many ministers have had to completely rely on the civil servants in their ministry. All their official statements in the Diet are prepared in advance by career bureaucrats. When ministers cannot answer the questions of other Diet members, the high-level bureaucratic officials answer them on behalf of the minister. This is quite different from the situation in the British Parliament where no nonelected government officials can attend a session. The Japanese system has allowed even incompetent ruling party members to be appointed as cabinet members, and this has weakened the influence of the minister vis-a-vis civil servants over the long run.

Career bureaucrats spend their entire careers in a single ministry and resist policy changes that negatively affect their clients. LDP zoku members, who increased their power in the issue-specific policymaking process in the 1970s and the 1980s, often allied with the related ministries to protect their client industries. In return for such protection, the client industries provided them with financial and other assistance. Such sectionalism has continued to strengthen since the 1970s and has been an issue facing each prime minister. According to a former assistant to the prime minister, the leadership of the prime minister depends on his will and his ability to "crush the walls of [such sectionalism]. . . . Otherwise, they can do nothing during their tenure."6

Recent prime ministers have faced these two types of fractions: intraparty factionalism and issue-specific sectionalism. Prime ministers who successfully contained the fractions within the ruling party and the government were effective leaders, while those who lost control over the party and the government and allowed the fractions to stop their policies were ineffective.

Informal Sources of Power

Executive power is vested in the cabinet and not in the prime minister. The legal authority vested in the post of the prime ministership is limited. The prime minister's effectiveness in pursuing his policies, therefore, depends in good measure on various informal sources of power. His leadership style is determined by the political resources available to him and by how he utilizes them. Informal sources can be divided in two major categories resources as a political insider and support from outside political circles.

Among the most important "internal" political resources under the LDP government was the prime minister's status as leader of the ruling party. Obviously, a prime minister with a strong support base within the party has a strong administration. LDP factions would form a coalition that made up more than a majority of the LDP Diet members to choose the president -- thus the prime minister -- because no faction was large enough to single- handedly appoint their leader. If the prime minister's faction formed a majority within the coalition, he was able to take the initiative in deciding policies. If the unity of the coalition was strong, the prime minister held considerable control over the policymaking process in the party. Prime Ministers Eisaku Sato, Kakuei Tanaka, and Noboru Takeshita enjoyed their status as leaders of the largest LDP factions. The size of their factions and the unity of their interfactional coalitions were important sources of power for these national leaders.

The size of his faction and the unity of the coalition became more important over the past two decades because the prime minister's control over the party has weakened. From the mid 1950s to the end of the Tanaka Administration in 1974, prime ministers usually appointed one of their faction members as LDP secretary general, the number-two party post that handles the day-to-day party affairs. Since 1974, in an attempt to avoid too much concentration of power, the party divided the presidency and the post of secretary general between two factions. The prime minister had to delegate most of the authority over party affairs to a senior LDP member of a different faction. With his weaker direct control over the party, keeping the party unity became a prime minister's primary concern.

While support from within the ruling party helps the prime minister exercise his leadership, staff support from the bureaucracy is essential for him to execute any policy decision. Diet members and the cabinet, who have a very limited number of personal staffers, have long relied on the bureaucracy for drafting bills, supervising the implementation of policies, and interpreting existing laws for administrative operations. As discussed earlier, the prime minister does not have direct authority over the bureaucracy, and bureaucrats tend to protect their sectional interests. Opposition from the bureaucracy often becomes a major obstacle in the prime minister's pursuit of his policies.

Powerful prime ministers have found a way to reach and then effectively control the bureaucracy. Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka built extensive personal connections with many bureaucrats in various agencies, which he utilized to pursue his policies. Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita, who served as the finance minister for four consecutive terms under the Nakasone Administration, used his personal ties with finance ministry officials in his efforts to introduce a new consumption tax in 1988. After a policy decision is made within the government and the ruling party, most major policies go through the legislative process. Here, relations with the opposition parties can be a determining factor in the enactment of the prime minister's policies. The prime minister's ability to persuade the opposition parties is often crucial in legislative actions. Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita successfully passed his tax reform in the Diet by accommodating the requests from two opposition parties; Takeshita utilized channels to the opposition parties that he had built before becoming prime minister.

Informal sources of power are not limited to political circles. "External" support is also important. Popularity, for example, plays an increasingly important role in Japanese politics. Although popularity alone cannot bring a politician to the post of the prime minister, it can significantly affect his leadership within the party and the cabinet. High popularity, for example, helped Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone pursue administrative reforms in 1982-86 and maintain his administration for five years, the third longest term for a postwar prime minister. Low popularity, on the other hand, was a factor in forcing Prime Ministers Shigeru Yoshida, Nobusuke Kishi, Kakuei Tanaka, Sosuke Uno, and Noboru Takeshita out of office.

Because public support plays an important role, many prime ministers have emphasized public relations activities. In the television age, a major part of public image is formulated by appearance and eloquence on the air. Prime Minister Takeo Miki, Yasuhiro Nakasone and Toshiki Kaifu used their eloquence to their advantage. Morihiro Hosokawa has extensively used this medium, using television in much in the same way as an American president. At the same time, however, the prime minister's high visibility can work against him. The most extreme example of this is Shigeru Yoshida, who called an opposition party member an "idiot," which forced the prime minister to dissolve the lower house.

Support from the business community and the United States often plays an important role in helping the prime minister maintain stability in his administration. Their disapproval may lead to his resignation. Shigeru Yoshida, Ichiro Hatoyama, Kakuei Tanaka, and Takeo Miki left office soon after the business community requested their resignations. Zenko Suzuki's poor handling of relations with the United States led to the anti-Suzuki movement within the party, which resulted in his resignation. Prime Ministers Yasuhiro Nakasone and Kaifu Toshiki had friendly relations with American presidents, which contributed their popularity at home.

These informal sources of power, both internal and external, help the prime minister exercise his institutional power in pursuing his policies. His effectiveness as a national leader, therefore, depends on the kinds of informal sources of power he as an individual can muster and his ability to utilize them. These sources are not consistent with each administration but vary depending on the political climate, the issues at hand, and the individual who is the prime minister.

Four Styles of Leadership

The Japanese prime ministers leadership style can be classified into four groups by informal sources of power, which they have and utilize: The Political Insider, the Grandstander, the Kamikaze Fighter; and the Peace Lover. The Political Insider is a leader with abundant internal sources of power who enjoys stable support within the ruling party and close ties with the bureaucracy and the opposition parties. The other three leadership styles lack internal sources. The Grandstander directly seeks external support from the public and the media for his policy goals to supplement his lack of internal sources of power. The Kamikaze Fighter tries to achieve an unpopular policy by sacrificing his political leadership role. The Peace Lover is an indecisive leader who fails to achieve a controversial policy goal because he tries to please all the actors.

The Political Insider

Among recent prime ministers, Noboru Takeshita exemplifies the typical "Political Insider." In his tax reform attempts of 1988, he vigorously took advantage of his stable power base within the party. His faction also boasted the largest number of LDP zoku members, who were effective in their specific policy fields. Further, he had strong control over the bureaucracy. Takeshita, in short, had abundant political resources to avoid fractions.

In recent LDP history, Eisaku Sato and Kakuei Tanaka are prime ministers who effectively used their resources as political insiders. Both were the leader of the largest LDP faction. At the same time, Sato and Tanaka had strong ties with bureaucrats. Their political power enabled to achieve major foreign policy goals: Sato's reversion of Okinawa policy and Tanaka's normalization of relations with China. It is interesting that all three prime ministers who enjoyed strong support from within the government and the party -- Sato, Tanaka, and Takeshita -- could not maintain external support. During the last days of his administration, Sato's popularity fell, and pro- China business leaders openly requested the resignation of the prime minister who maintained his pro-Taiwan stance. After Sato achieved his top priority, the reversion of the Okinawa islands in 1972, he announced his resignation.

Kakuei Tanaka succeeded Sato as premier and faction leader. He had strong control over the party and the bureaucracy and close ties with the opposition parties. He successfully normalized relations with China. However, Tanaka was forced to resign in 1974 when the media and the public strongly criticized his financial wrong doings. Similarly, the revelation of the Recruit scandal created intense resentment against the Takeshita Cabinet and lowered its public support to a record low. Takeshita thus had no choice but to resign. These prime ministers who had strong internal sources of power drastically lost their external support.

The Grandstander

A prime minister with less internal support must be a "Grandstander" to seek external support from the public and the media. Prime Minister Nakasone Yasuhiro, for example, whose faction was the second smallest of the five LDP factions, was well aware of the importance of public support. Nakasone once compared his efforts in administrative reform to a glider, saying "As long as the wind of public and mass-media support continues to blow, the glider can fly. If the wind of support diminishes, it will stall and crash."

Public support has been essential to prime ministers who faced internal conflict within the ruling party. For example, Shigeru Yoshida, who was asked to lead the Liberal Party by Ichiro Hatoyama in 1946, did not have strong control over the party. However, his image as a charismatic leader and hard negotiator with the American Occupation authority attracted public support and allowed him to become an effective leader in reconstructing the Japanese economy and concluding the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty.

Hayato Ikeda was another prime minister who effectively took advantage of public support. In an attempt to change the gloomy mood created by the turmoil over the revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty in 1960, Ikeda introduced an optimistic economic policy. His "income doubling plan" was attractive to a public who desired a higher standard of living. The public's enthusiastic support of his administration helped Ikeda to be elected to the LDP presidency and thus to be the prime minister for three consecutive times. Yoshida and Ikeda as well as Nakasone had a clear political vision and directly sought public support to suppress potentially volatile opposition within the ruling party and the opposition parties.

Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa may belong to this category, at least, for his achievement of political reform. From the beginning of his term, he publicly declared that political reform to introduce a single-seat electoral system, and the public strongly supported him. Hosokawa received an unprecedented 70 percent of public support. Even with this enormous popularity, it was not easy for Hosokawa to pass the political reform bills, which were controversial within the political community. The leftist faction of the Japan Socialist Party effectively killed the political reform bills by voting against them in the upper house, thereby breaking the agreement reached among the party leaders in the coalition government. Prime Minister Hosokawa publicly restated his willingness to sacrifice his post for political reform, and he called for a meeting with LDP President Yohei Kohno. Although many LDP members opposed the political reform, they did not want to be blamed for blocking bills that were popular with the public. An agreement was reached, and it enabled the Hosokawa coalition government to enact the political reform bills.

The Kamikaze Fighter

While the Grandstander takes advantage of public support, the "Kamikaze Fighter" sacrifices public support and his political career to pursue a politically unpopular or controversial policy. For a prime minister with limited internal political resources, failure to attract external support can be detrimental to his fight against fractions within the government and the ruling party. The most typical example of this type is Nobusuke Kishi. Kishi did not spend much effort on public relations when he introduced his top priority issue, the revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, in 1960. As a result, massive student groups began protest movements against revision of the treaty, which would assure Japan's security commitment with the United States. Reflecting such reactions, an anti-Kishi movement rose within the LDP. After the treaty revision passed the Diet, Kishi had to resign as prime minister.

Kishi was not the only prime minister who, lacking external support, had to sacrifice his premiership for policy achievement. When Ichir* Hatoyama tried to normalize relations with the Soviet Union, he met strong opposition from business leaders. This accelerated an anti-Hatoyama movement within the LDP. To suppress the opposition within the party, Hatoyama had to promise he would resign so that the Soviet-Japan diplomatic relation could be restored.

Prime ministers with less internal political resources, like Kishi and Hatoyama, are more likely to invite fierce interfactional struggles without receiving strong external support.

The Peace Lover

While kamikaze fighters sacrifice their post for a policy goal, others are not willing to take chances. These are the "Peace Lovers." Zenko Suzuki, who was known for his emphasis on party harmony, was a typical peace lover. After the fierce interfactional conflicts in the 1970s, the party wanted a party president who had a wider support base within the party in order to avoid serious conflicts. Suzuki knew exactly why he was chosen for the post and repeatedly emphasized his role in keeping party harmony.

Emphasizing party harmony as the top priority, however, is no way to handle politically difficult tasks like administrative reform, which the Suzuki Administration initiated. The public, the media and business leaders criticized Suzuki for his indecisiveness, and political pressure began to mount against him. Suzuki believed that if he remained as prime minister , he would create party disharmony, so he decided to resign in the midst of administrative reform efforts.

Prime ministers with limited internal resources must seek support from the public, the media and the business groups to pursue their major policies. Without such support, prime ministers are likely to face dissent from the ruling party and the government by those who emphasize factional or sectional interests over national interests. Some prime ministers with strong determination sacrificed their internal support to promote their policy objectives.

Others, like Suzuki, lacked this determination, and they failed to achieve their policy goals. When Toshiki Kaifu's top priority issue, the political reform proposal, died in the Diet in 1991, Kaifu wanted to dissolve the lower house to gain public support for the reform effort. However, he could not turn a deaf ear to opposition of the largest LDP faction led by Noboru Takeshita. This underscored Kaifu's weakness, accelerated an anti-Kaifu movement already brewing within the party and led to his resignation. More recently, Kiichi Miyazawa's lack of determination in political reform allowed the party secretary general to kill the political reform in 1993. Disappointed reformists within the LDP broke off from the ruling party and joined the opposition parties to show their disapproval of the Miyazawa Cabinet. This leadership failure even brought an end to the LDP's 38-year reign.

* * *

With limited legal authority, the prime minister must depend on informal sources of power to shape his leadership style and to determine the effectiveness of his effort. The Political Insider employs his abundant power within the ruling party, the bureaucracy, and the opposition parties to influence policy. Having less internal sources, the Grandstander relies on his ability to attract considerable support from the public and the media. The Kamikaze Fighter sacrifices his political career. The Peace Lover tries to avoid serious confrontations at all costs.

Of the four leadership styles, the Political Insider is least likely to emerge in the near future. Since the breakup of the long predominant LDP, no one faction or party is a dominant power on the political scene. With limited internal political resources to command, a prime minister must attract considerable public and media support to effectively maintain a fractious coalition government in achieving his policies. A popular prime minister can achieve his goal as a Grandstander. A leader who does not possess outside support may choose to sacrifice his political career as a Kamikaze Fighter, or he may decide to sacrifice his policy objective as a Peace Lover. The prime minister's will and ability to attract public support are the determining factors in defining his leadership style.

Japan has undergone a series of tremendous political changes in the postwar period. Contrary to Karel van Wolferen's view of Japan as lacking a political center, there has been a center throughout changes -- the prime minister: Yoshida's conclusion of the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty; Hatoyama's normalization of relations with the Soviet Union in 1955; Kishi's revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty in 1960; Ikeda's introduction of the 1960 Income Doubling Plan; Sato's successful negotiation of the 1971 reversion of Okinawa islands; Tanaka's normalization of China- Japan relations in 1972; Miki's pursuit of the Lockheed scandal in 1976; Nakasone's administrative reform efforts in 1982-86; Takeshita's introduction of the 1988 consumption tax; and Hosokawa's 1994 political reform. These prime ministers' commitment to achieving policies by utilizing available personal sources of power are undeniable, and their role has been imperative to the successful outcome of each policy.

*Tomohito Shinoda is Assistant Professor at the International University of Japan. This paper is an excerpt from his Ph.D. dissertation (the Johns Hopkins University), Struggle to Lead: The Japanese Prime Minister's Power and His Conduct of Economic Policy (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University Microfilm International, 1994).

1) Karel G. van Wolferen, The Enigma of Japanese Power (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989). 2) Article 75 reads: "The Ministers of State, during their tenure of office, shall not be subject to legal action without the consent of the Prime Minister. However, the right to take action is not impaired hereby." This was intended to be a safeguard in case the Public Prosecutor's Office attempted to overthrow the existing cabinet. 3) Article 64 of the American draft reads, "The Prime Minister introduces bills on behalf of the Cabinet, reports to the Diet on general affairs of State and the status of foreign relations, and exercises control and supervision over the several executive departments and agencies." 4) Gotoda Masaharu, Seiji towa Nanika [What is politics?] (Tokyo: Kodan- sha, 1988), 90. 5) Chie Nakane, Human Relations in Japan: Summary Translation of "Tate Shakai no Ningen Kankei" (Tokyo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1972), 57-84. 6) Raisuke Miyawaki, "Difference in the Governing Style between Nakasone and Takeshita," paper presented at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, December 3, 1992.