A church-state debate in Japan?

ARTICLE 20 OF THE JAPANESE CONSTITUTION was written to disassociate State Shinto (in contrast to Shrine Shinto) from the government and eliminate emperor worship. The concept of State Shinto was formalized in 1868 when the government proclaimed “the unity of religious ritual and government administration”. Douglas MacArthur ended all that in 1945 with a flick of the wrist.

Article 20
Freedom of religion is guaranteed to all. No religious organization shall receive any privileges from the State, nor exercise any political authority.
2) No person shall be compelled to take part in any religious acts, celebration, rite or practice.
3) The State and its organs shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity.

The Constitutional provision had the intended effect: the issue of State Shinto is a dead letter in contemporary Japan. Yet Article 20 might still have consequences unanticipated when the Constitution was written during the Allied occupation.

Kan Naoto, the Acting President of the Democratic Party of Japan, the country’s primary opposition group, referred to Article 20 in a press conference on the 9th:

“One idea would be to conduct a focused inquiry with the people involved, if necessary…the Cabinet Legislation Bureau states that if the relationship between a religious group and a political party is (that of being) the same legal entity, it would constitute the propagation of religion through the exercise of political authority, and that would be unconstitutional. That doesn’t necessarily mean being the same legal entity in a formal sense only. If a religious group has selected the executives of a political party, that political party would be the same as the religious group.”

Mr. Kan is referring to the suspected ties between the lay Buddhist group, Soka Gakkai (sometimes accused of cult-like behavior), and the political party New Komeito, which is the junior coalition partner of the government, led by the Liberal Democratic Party. Soka Gakkai hotly denies any formal connection and aggressively challenges anyone who makes that claim. New Komeito makes the same assertion. Here’s what they say on their website:

The issue of Komeito’s relations with the Soka Gakkai, the Buddhist organization, has been the subject of as much serious debate as it has been a tool of political expedience by the party’s rivals and critics. In summary, the Soka Gakkai is a constituency that has provided electoral endorsement to the party until today. The relation between the two entities is no different from that of a political party and any civil group–such as a labor union, for example–that endorses the party, and it has been established as being constitutionally legitimate.

The propriety of any connection between the two was not a front-burner issue until former New Komeito leader Yano Junya filed a suit against Soka Gakkai in Tokyo District Court claiming that the organization tried to force him to stop his activities as a political pundit/critic. The DPJ then started talking about bringing Yano to the Diet to testify as an unsworn witness.

Why is this important? First, Soka Gakkai members constitute a significant portion of the campaign workers who turn out to support the governing coalition, in the same way that labor unions back the efforts of the DPJ, as New Komeito dryly notes in the quote above. The DPJ therefore stands to benefit from any problems it might cause for the junior coalition partner and its allies.

Second, the DPJ strategy is to force a lower house election as soon as possible, without waiting for the current term to expire next summer. The LDP/NK coalition wanted to delay the election as long as possible, but speculation grew that New Komeito pressed the LDP to conduct the balloting sooner. Their ostensible intention was to concentrate on next summer’s Tokyo municipal elections, but others suggested another reason was that the party thought a lower house election might dissipate the attention on Yano’s suit.

Pitching Woo While Making Threats

Several subtle forces are at work here, and all of them are operating in the shadows. On the one hand, it’s natural for the DPJ to try to discredit the party that contributes so much to keeping the LDP in power. Yet the DPJ’s approach has some carrots dangling at the end of the stick. One of DPJ boss Ozawa Ichiro’s political talents is cobbling together political alliances from seemingly incompatible elements. (Of course they don’t last long, but that’s another story.) Some in Japan suspect that Mr. Ozawa would like to flip New Komeito from governing in concert with the LDP to governing in partnership with his side.

The DPJ has the stated policy goal of allowing non-citizen permanent residents in Japan to vote in local elections. It goes without saying that the DPJ doesn’t give a fig about the random scattering of foreigners in the country with permanent resident permits (of which I am one). That policy was crafted to give the vote to ethnic Koreans who were born and reared in Japan, but have chosen to retain Korean citizenship rather than become naturalized. The Soka Gakkai membership is said by some to have a relatively high proportion of these so-called zainichi kankokujin. Thus, the DPJ policy would seem to be designed to attract New Komeito rather than repel it.

There have also been recent signs of New Komeito dissatisfaction with the LDP. Rumors circulated that Soka Gakkai made the removal of Fukuda Yasuo as prime minister a condition of continued partnership. Party members at the local level have been more open to associating with DPJ delegates in municipal and prefectural assemblies than they were in the past. Also, New Komeito did not extend its usual cooperation to the LDP in the Okinawa prefectural assembly election held in June, which resulted in an electoral victory for the DPJ. The LDP/NK coalition lost its majority in the Okinawan assembly—but New Komeito maintained its strength in delegate totals and won more total votes than in the previous election.

Another one of the intrigues within the intrigues are the whisperings that the LDP and the DPJ are continuing talks on a grand coalition on the QT, despite the uproar such discussions caused last fall. One item they are supposedly considering is eliminating the proportional representation seats in the lower house of the Diet. That would vitiate the political strength of the smaller parties, few of whose members can win elections in their districts outright. In addition to New Komeito, it would also marginalize such parties as the Social Democrats (former Socialists), who ally with the DPJ. This would serve to enhance the formation of a two-party system, albeit in the lower house only.

Let’s also remember that Mr. Kan has a valid point. (Insert joke here about the blind pig finding the occasional root.) If it can be shown that Soka Gakkai does in fact have input for selecting New Komeito executive personnel, that would indeed seem to be a violation of Article 20. No one so far has had the stomach for a serious challenge to Soka Gakkai, but now the DPJ is threatening to do just that.

Whether the DPJ follows through on its threat, either in the opposition or as the head of a ruling coalition, and severely weakens New Komeito as a political force, or whether they coax New Komeito into bed with them and agree to kiss, make up, and forget the unpleasantness, remains to be seen.

Afterwords: Constitutional reform in Japan is not focused exclusively on Article 9, the so-called peace clause. There is sentiment for eliminating Article 20.2 as shown above. Shrine Shinto in Japan is not a doctrinal religion that seeks converts, but is rather based largely on ancient ceremonies that are a part of the daily life of the people. For example, Shinto ceremonies are held before construction work begins on homes or other buildings, and ceremonies held when the work is completed and an enterprise is about to start operating. (I’ve been to several of these, including the one conducted before they started work on our house.)

Traditionalists argue that these ceremonies have always been a part of Japanese life and don’t have anything to do with State Shinto. Others, such as Japanese Christians and the non-religious left, choose to disagree and make it an issue, even though they must surely realize the traditionalists are correct.