| Asia's Calling, Europe's Falling |
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| October 2005 | |
| Written by Andrew Olson | |
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Japan Goes Postal, Germany Misses Der Mark From an American perspective the idea that politicians might reschedule elections seems rather a vicious affront to the very nature of liberal democracy. Yet many heads of state have this power and use their discretion to schedule elections which will renew their mandate. In extraordinary circumstances, however, they may call elections because they have lost the ability to govern effectively. Such circumstances resulted in early elections last month in both Japan and Germany.  Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi of the Liberal
Democratic Party (LDP) has made it his personal crusade to privatize
Japan Post. The government-run Japan Post combines the national postal
service with banking and insurance services, making it Japan’s single
largest employer and giving it control of the world’s largest deposit
of personal savings. The privatization bill would split Japan Post into
four private companies by 2017 to stimulate the Japanese economy by
forcing these government-protected services to become competitive on
the open market. With an LDP-New Komeito coalition majority in both
Houses of the National Diet, the bill narrowly passed the House of
Representatives in July, but seemed headed for defeat in the House of
Councillors. As the Councillors deliberated, Koizumi threatened to
dissolve the House of Representatives and call for new elections if
they did not support privatization. This did not impress the
Councillors, however, as twenty-two LDP Councillors voted against the
bill, causing it to fail on August 8th. On the same day, Koizumi
dissolved the lower House and scheduled elections for September 11th.
Germany has also experienced a lagging economy in recent years under Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). Elected in 1998 with a promise to reduce the unemployment rate, Schröder’s chancellorship has instead seen unemployment top twelve percent and an almost stagnant economy for the past five years. After unemployment rates reached record levels in March and the SPD lost the state elections in its home territory Nordrhein-Westfalen for the first time since 1966, Schröder forced a Vote of No Confidence, resulting in the dissolution of the Bundestag and new elections on September 18th. Here the stories diverge. Koizumi’s popularity immediately jumped about twenty points when he called for new elections, while initial polls after the Vote of No Confidence showed the SPD trailing the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU) by more than twenty points. The CDU candidate for Chancellor, Angela Merkel, campaigned on a platform of hard and overdue reform to stimulate the economy. Despite her promise of necessary change and Schröder’s record of failure, the electorate produced no winner in the election with the major parties receiving almost equal numbers of seats. Furthermore, because of the strong showing of the three minor parties, neither the CDU nor the SPD can form a coalition with its preferred partner. In Japan, however, Koizumi’s LDP won in a landslide. Instead of the simple majority Koizumi’s coalition commanded before the election, the LDP won a large majority by itself, even after Koizumi kicked the 37 LDP members who had voted against privatization out of his party, and with the New Komeito seats, Koizumi now controls a two-thirds supermajority. Many Councillors who defected on the first vote for privatization have already said they will change their vote because of Koizumi’s electoral victory when he reintroduces the bill. Even if they do not, the supermajority would allow the lower House to overrule the Councillors. Many have argued that Western Europe has become so comfortable with social welfare that it cannot move confidently into the future, while the dynamic economies of Asia present the markets of tomorrow. The recent elections in Japan and Germany prove these generalizations only too true. The Western European post-modern, post-reality social welfare ideal remains so strong that even when faced with economic collapse, the Europeans cannot decide whether or not real reform of their welfare state makes sense. Presented with an opportunity for momentous change, the Japanese gave Koizumi a mandate for reform, while the Germans, torn between continuing their nanny-state and fixing their economy, tried to do both by electing the CDU and the SPD. The resulting “Grand Coalition,” paralyzed by fundamental disagreements over the nature and role of the state, will undoubtedly fail to pass any meaningful reforms, while the Japanese economy, invigorated by a popular mandate for privatization, will leave the Germans increasingly far behind. Andrew Olson is a sophmore in Branford College and Business Manager of The Yale Free Press. |
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