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Kabuki Democracy by Lomazoq Steven,Fettmann Eric Pdf
In this agenda-setting essay, journalist and historian Eric Alterman explains what is really happening with the Obama presidency. While Obama's many compromises have disappointed liberals, Alterman argues that these concessions are largely due to ...
In this “agenda-setting” polemic, journalist and historian Eric Alterman explains what is really happening with the Obama presidency. While Obama’s many compromises have disappointed liberals, Alterman argues that these concessions are largely due to a political system that is rigged against progressive change. These structural impediments to democracy have made the keeping of Obama’s campaign promises all but impossible. Brilliantly blending incisive political analysis with a clear agenda for change, Kabuki Democracy cuts through the clichés of conservative propaganda and lazy mainstream media analysis to demonstrate that genuine “change” will come to America only when people care enough to challenge the system.
Japanese politics now, with seven prime ministers appointed within this decade and the second major political party turnover taken place within the last two decades, is undergoing a great transition. This book explores the gradual shift from what the editors call karaoke democracy to kabuki democracy.
Democracy in Eastern Asia by Edmund S. K. Fung,Steven Drakeley Pdf
With the ‘Asian Century’ now upon us, bringing with it many profound economic and political changes to the world order, it is very timely to assess the state of democracy in the Asian region. Focusing on Eastern Asia, this book provides such a review, highlighting lines of connections between the states and peoples of this complex and dynamic region. Featuring chapters on China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Cambodia, and Myanmar, this book provides a detailed analysis of the state of democracy in each country or territory, and shows how each is different and distinctive, whilst simultaneously drawing out important similarities. Further, it provides up to date analysis of political changes in the region relating to the processes of democratization, and, in some cases, to the ongoing quest for democracy. Critically examining the current state of political development in the region, the chapters explore the issues and problems that challenge the region’s governments in terms of democratic transition, democratic consolidation, democratic improvement and good governance. With contributions from leading international scholars, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars interested in Asian politics, and politics and democratization studies more broadly.
Japan's Multilayered Democracy by Sigal Ben-Rafael Galanti,Nissim Otmazgin,Alon Levkowitz Pdf
This book introduces a multilayered approach to the study of democracy, combining specific knowledge of Japan with theoretical insights from the literature on democratization. It examines different aspects of Japanese democracy—historical, institutional, and sociocultural—to provide a conscious understanding of the nature and practice of democracy, both in Japan and beyond. The book's chapters give testimony to the dynamic nature and continuity of Japanese democracy and analyze its strengths and weaknesses. The central argument of this book is that Japan’s democratization should be seen as a multilayered experience shaped by the gradual process of absorbing democratic ideas, forming democratic institutions, and practicing democratic behaviors and rituals at various levels of society. As the case of Japan shows, democracy is neither a structured formula nor only a set of democratic laws and institutions, but a continuous, gradual process.
Between Democracy and Technocracy by Franklin Barr Lebo Pdf
Classically, studies of the Japanese government are both tantalizing and frustrating as scholars standing outside of the system draw conclusions from significant events like crises, disasters, and moments of reform. This has led to a sense of mystery as scholars have developed sophisticated competing theories about how the system actually operates often with resigned comments that there is a black curtain (kuromaku) drawn over the system. The primary challenge is gaining access to the actual process of policymaking on a daily basis given the seemingly impenetrable nature of the bureaucracy. This study is unusual as it cracks open the curtain to see the wheels and rotating gears along with those pulling the levers. Specifically, through the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Fellowship program, the only congressionally authorized opportunity allowing American officials to be placed directly inside a foreign government, the reader is given a firsthand account of these machinations. Through their eyes, readers will be introduced to Japan’s messy policymaking process in telecommunications regulation, pharmaceutical approvals, diplomatic relations, and much more. This approach also allows the author to refine existing theories of Japan’s bureaucratic elite and assess the weak system of control exercised over them by the National Personnel Authority (NPA). This understudied agency is the last vestige of MacArthur’s legacy as the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers in Japan following World War II. Thus, this study ambitiously hopes to lend a realistic glimpse into the only developed, non-western, industrialized democratic state in the world. More boldly, this study intends to lend a greater appreciation of the complex tug-of-war between democracy and technocracy in other national contexts.
Author : James R. Brandon Publisher : University of Hawaii Press Page : 482 pages File Size : 49,8 Mb Release : 2008-10-31 Category : Art ISBN : 9780824832001
According to a myth constructed after Japan’s surrender to the Allied Forces in 1945, kabuki was a pure, classical art form with no real place in modern Japanese society. In Kabuki’s Forgotten War, senior theater scholar James R. Brandon calls this view into question and makes a compelling case that, up to the very end of the Pacific War, kabuki was a living theater and, as an institution, an active participant in contemporary events, rising and falling in consonance with Japan’s imperial adventures. Drawing extensively from Japanese sources—books, newspapers, magazines, war reports, speeches, scripts, and diaries—Brandon shows that kabuki played an important role in Japan’s Fifteen-Year Sacred War. He reveals, for example, that kabuki stars raised funds to buy fighter and bomber aircraft for the imperial forces and that pro-ducers arranged large-scale tours for kabuki troupes to entertain soldiers stationed in Manchuria, China, and Korea. Kabuki playwrights contributed no less than 160 new plays that dramatized frontline battles or rewrote history to propagate imperial ideology. Abridged by censors, molded by the Bureau of Information, and partially incorporated into the League of Touring Theaters, kabuki reached new audiences as it expanded along with the new Japanese empire. By the end of the war, however, it had fallen from government favor and in 1944–1946 it nearly expired when Japanese government decrees banished leading kabuki companies to minor urban theaters and the countryside. Kabuki’s Forgotten War includes more than a hundred illustrations, many of which have never been published in an English-language work. It is nothing less than a com-plete revision of kabuki’s recent history and as such goes beyond correcting a significant misconception. This new study remedies a historical absence that has distorted our understanding of Japan’s imperial enterprise and its aftermath.
As part of its program to promote democracy in Japan after World War II, the American Occupation, headed by General Douglas MacArthur, undertook to enforce rigid censorship policies aimed at eliminating all traces of feudal thought in media and entertainment, including kabuki. Faubion Bowers (1917-1999), who served as personal aide and interpreter to MacArthur during the Occupation, was appalled by the censorship policies and anticipated the extinction of a great theatrical art. He used his position in the Occupation administration and his knowledge of Japanese theatre in his tireless campaign to save kabuki. Largely through Bowers's efforts, censorship of kabuki had for the most part been eliminated by the time he left Japan in 1948. Although Bowers is at the center of the story, this lively and skillfully adapted translation from the original Japanese treats a critical period in the long history of kabuki as it was affected by a single individual who had a commanding influence over it. It offers fascinating and little-known details about Occupation censorship politics and kabuki performance while providing yet another perspective on the history of an enduring Japanese art form. Read Bowers' impressions of Gen. MacArthur on the Japanese-American Veterans' Association website.
Women and Political Inequality in Japan by Mikiko Eto Pdf
Why are there so few Japanese women involved in the political system? In 2019, Japanese women made up 10% of the national Lower House, 21% of the Upper House, and 14% of local assemblies. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, this places Japan 164th out of 193 countries when it comes to women’s representation in the legislature. The percentage of women in the Lower House has only increased by fewer than two percentage points since women gained full suffrage and the right to stand for election in Japan in 1946. Eto analyses the various factors that have led to women’s low presence in the Japanese legislature. She evaluates ways in which it might be possible for Japan to catch up and, in doing so, examines how Japanese society continues to perpetuate gender-rigid expectations of people. This text is a valuable study for scholars of Japanese politics and society, and for readers with an interest in the broader issue of the representation of women in politics.
America's Japan and Japan's Performing Arts by Barbara Thornbury Pdf
America’s Japan and Japan’s Performing Arts studies the images and myths that have shaped the reception of Japan-related theater, music, and dance in the United States since the 1950s. Soon after World War II, visits by Japanese performing artists to the United States emerged as a significant category of American cultural-exchange initiatives aimed at helping establish and build friendly ties with Japan. Barbara E. Thornbury explores how “Japan” and “Japanese culture” have been constructed, reconstructed, and transformed in response to the hundreds of productions that have taken place over the past sixty years in New York, the main entry point and defining cultural nexus in the United States for the global touring market in the performing arts. The author’s transdisciplinary approach makes the book appealing to those in the performing arts studies, Japanese studies, and cultural studies.
New Democracy and Autocratization in Asia by Kuyoun Chung,Wonbin Cho Pdf
This book examines the quality of democracies in Asia and determines why current democracies—especially during the so-called “new normal” era following the 2008 financial crisis—have become less stable and less resilient to increasing authoritarianism. Based on the assumption that the concept of democracy consists of three elements—procedure (participation, competition, and distribution of power); effectiveness (representation, accountability, and responsiveness); and performance (social welfare, inequality, and trust)—the contributors to this book determine which elements are responsible for diverging trajectories within the Asian democratic recession. Examining South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, India, Myanmar, and China, the authors employ different research methods—quantitative, comparative, or individual case studies—to explore the conditions under which democratic rules and norms erode over time, and which type of governance is preferred by citizens in this region as an ideal type. The book puts forward the argument that a procedure-oriented concept of democracy is not sufficient for understanding the source of democratic recession and develops a new concept of “new democracy” based on procedure, effectiveness, and performance. It also demonstrates to what extent the experience changes and how the countries respond to these changes. A novel contribution on the state of democracy in Asia written by experts from the region, this book will be of interest to academics in the field of political science, especially comparative politics and international relations, regional study of East and Southeast Asia, sociology, public policy, economics, and social science methods. Also, this book will appeal to think tanks and policy-oriented researchers.
Historical Dictionary of Democracy by Norman Abjorensen Pdf
Democracy is easy to talk about but hard to define in other than broad generalizations; its history is a long, complex, and contested subject. What this volume seeks to do is to explore the general evolution of political and social thinking that would eventually coalesce into what we now know as democracy, for all its imperfections and shortcomings. The question of just why some societies evolved into a democratic trajectory and others did not continues to engage the interest of historians, political scientists, sociologists, and anthropologists. Much conjecture surrounds the rise of certain elements we now recognize if not as democratic, then proto-democratic, such as collective decision-making, constraints on the exercise of power and a degree of accountability of the ruler to the ruled. If democracy in the sense of “rule by the people” has two essential qualities – rule by the majority and the equal treatment of free citizens - then its origins, however feeble, are to be found in these early examples of government. Historical Dictionary of Democracy contains a chronology, an introduction, a glossary, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 600 cross-referenced entries. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about democracy.
Why Democracies Flounder and Fail by Michael Haas Pdf
Democracy is in crisis because voices of the people are ignored due to a politics of mass society. After demonstrating how the French Fourth Republic failed, wherein Singapore’s totalitarianism is a dangerous model, Washington is enmeshed in gridlock, and there is a global democracy deficit, solutions are offered to revitalize democracy as the best form of government. The book demonstrates how mass society politics operates, with intermediate institutions of civil society (media, pressure groups, political parties) no longer transmitting the will of the people to government but instead are concerned with corporate interests and have developed oligarchical mindsets. Rather than micro-remedy bandaids, the author focuses on the need to transform governing philosophies from pragmatic to humanistic solutions.
In The Twilight of the Social, Henry A. Giroux looks at the decline of social spaces which enable grievances to be dealt with and considers new ways in which citizens can create social spaces today. After decades of neoliberalism, today's young people lack a voice and are saddled with economic, political, and social conditions that have rendered them marginalised and ultimately disposable. Giroux covers a broad range of topics - from youth and the promise of new media technologies, the economic Darwinism of globalisation, and the need for a renewed democratic culture. The Twilight of the Social is a compelling account of the erosion in recent decades of the very idea of 'the social' in America and other societies.
