POLITICS IN JAPAN.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 90, 3 May 1937, Page 6

POLITICS IN JAPAN.

A Tokio mesgage, although the returns are not yet complete, forecasts wjth apparent confidence that the result of last week's general election in Japan will leave the position in tbe Diet very much as it was, the only iikely change being an inerease in the relatively small representation df the Socialist Party. It is little more than fourteen months since the last previous general election was held, then as now decreed by the Emperor at the instance of the militarist junta, which, despite a strong majority against them in the Diet, are stil lable to rule the roost with the army behind them* • A situation such as this is, of conrse, difficult to underr stand in a country underr really democratic government. What we have to realise is that in Japan democra,cy has ypt gained bnt a shadow of control in the guidanee of the country 's policy. Very great authority in many respects remains vested in the sacred person of the Emperor, who is very much under the dominant influence of the militarist section. It is in this that we find an explanatipn of the fae| that Japan has a Government in power to which 30 per cent. of the membership of the elective Diet is in general opposed As was said of the Cabinet formed after last year'.s election, the particular retreat frQm the substanpe of parliamentary government that it exemplified was the fact that the army -and navy had been given the right to nominate the defence portfolios in the Cabinet This is, of course, altogether contrary to parliamentary or Cabinet practice. All members in a Cabinet subject to parliament owe allegiance to the Prime Minister; otherwise there would be no object in calling that official a prime minister* But this change in Japan is a distlnction without much difference, for the defenee ministers have always been in, rather than of, the Cabinet, Though there are indications that the active authority of the Mikado is gradually waning, fpr the present at any rate the army 's ability to use the Emperor for its own ends makes its position impregnable, and Japanese democracy looks like fighting a losing bottle. In the second place, recent developments mark the first introduction in Japan of the Fascist technique of government. Hitherto the army has been content to influence the Cabinet by indirect means, the chief of them being its exclusive control over military estimutes and expenditure; it has not, with the exception of occasionai "explanatory" pamphlets, appealed direct to the public. The new National Party is presumably destined to become the offcial party, bearlng something the same rela-tion to the executive as the National Socialist Party bears to the German executive.

• It can thus b6 understood why it is said that the decree for the present electioft was met with apathy by the people, who regarded the professiou of making appeal to them as being entirely artificial. There could not be very much enthusiasm about the casting of votes when it was felt that the #expression of public opinion thus to be gained would receive but scant recognition in practice* Outside of Japan the chief canse for regret at the maintenance of militarist domination is to be found in Sino- Japanese relations. Among the Japanese, and especially the industriad and commercial sections, a strong incliiiation has developed towards placing these relations on a more friendly fobting* ,This is, to some extent at any rate, born of a conviction that Ghina is in a much stronger position now than for very many yearg to offer resistance to Japanese military incursions. By most it is recognised^hat further attempts to secure control there by force of arms can entail only vast expense with little prospect of any really compensating economic gain,