Title: Rupturing the cycle: Japan's leadership vacuum

Authors: Yinghui Xu

Addresses: Department of Economics, Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, Japan

Abstract: Faced with the rise of China, the weakening of the Japanese economy, strained US relations over the Okinawa Base and Sino-Japan territorial disputes in the South China Sea, Japan needs strong and decisive leadership more than ever before. Yet, there is widespread apathy and disillusionment with the government, where popularity ratings of both the ruling and opposition parties were a miserable 17% and 15% in 2011. Global opinion of Japan's government has been further undermined by repeated political reshuffles of six prime ministers in six years. In order to restore public confidence, we must first map out the complexity of the system and identify the social, political and structural factors that are fundamental to this systemic failure. Only then can we identify the leverage points to rupture this cycle, to create motion and hopefully, momentum for change.

Keywords: Japan; leadership vacuum; political apathy; systemic government failure; iceberg model; structural reforms; political system evolution; public confidence.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCLM.2013.057551

International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, 2013 Vol.2 No.3, pp.213 - 223

Published online: 02 Jul 2014 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article