Are we witnessing the rise of a participatory society in Japan? Ayano Takeuchi sends a dispatch from Tokyo.

The Japanese people are faced with a decision of choosing the kind of society they wish to live in. For decades, the state has been the driving force in determining the nation’s goals and economic agenda, while ordinary citizens occasionally have their voices heard through the ballot box. As in the case of liberal democracies around the world, such approach to governance is no longer enough. We live at a time when people’s opinions and interests are increasingly becoming diverse and dynamic. New ways of collective decision-making need to be explored.

In response to these changes, local governments in Japan have sought to engage with citizens to take part in public administration. This move is articulated in Japan’s Plan for Dynamic Engagement of All Citizens published in 2016 and the Regional Circular and Ecological Sphere in the Fifth Basic Environment Plan where concepts like shimin sanka (community involvement) are deployed.

These initiatives, however, would not take off if citizens are not willing and able to take part in cogovernance. Thankfully, Japan has also caught what the OECD refers to as the ‘deliberative wave’ to produce a group of citizens capable of collaborating with the local administration.

Japanese-style Planning Cells

The practice of minipublics in Japan may have a long history, but one could argue that the introduction of planning cells in the book Shimin-no Seijigaku (Citizens’ Political Studies) by professor Hajime Shinohara in 2004 was a milestone. Politicians and the government policy committee within the Junior Chamber International Tokyo became interested in bringing the German planning cells to Japan. They consulted professor Akinori Shinoto who learned the concept directly from professor Peter Dienel, the founder of planning cells himself. Under the collaboration between the JC and academics, the shimin-togikai (Japanese planning cell) was developed.

The core members of JC adapted the shimin-togikai into the Japanese context through a pilot minipublic that the JC Chiyoda Ward Committee convened in 2005. Professor Shinoto recognised that the Japanese are not used to this type of deliberation and will not spend four days to engage in a civic activity, as in the case of the original planning cells. The duration of shimin-togikai was adjusted to one or two days. The KJ technique, developed by the Japanese ethnologist Jiro Kawakita, is used as the inspiration for the process of deliberation.

The main features of shimin-togikai follow the design of a deliberative minipublic: (1) participants are selected through random selection; (2) all participants are compensated for their time; (3) information is given to participants before deliberation; (4) there are small-group discussions with five to six people each; and (5) summaries of the deliberation are presented, synthesised and voted by all participants.

The Increasing Popularity of Citizens’ Councils

In recent years, new types of minipublics were increasingly convened in the rest of the country, as more observers learned lessons from shimin-togikai. In 2014, the think tank Japan Initiatives developed jumin-kyogikai (citizens’ council) in collaboration with local municipalities. This became a popular form of minipublics and was convened 34 times in 22 municipalities as of March 2019. About 10,000 Japanese citizens have been part of this process thus far.

The purpose of the citizens’ council is to encourage citizens to solve local problems instead of leaving them to the local government. Self-help, mutual assistance and public assistance are some options for collective problem-solving. The program of a citizens’ council is divided into three phases, usually over four days, within six months. Participants are randomly sampled and the citizens who reply to participate will all be included. While this method slightly diverges from the standard recruitment of minipublics, participants who end up participating often come from diverse backgrounds.

The Tachiarai Town, with a population of about 16,000, in Fukuoka Prefecture is an exemplary case of a citizens’ council. The citizens’ council is institutionalised through the Ordinance on Tachiarai Town Affiliated Organisations and has been held every year since 2014. There is a wide range of topics discussed in the citizens’ council, including waste management, community-based integrated care system, proper role sharing between autonomous organisations and local government, childcare, disaster management, railroads and healthcare. Because the town’s population is small, most of the citizens received a letter from the administration office about the citizens’ council. After six years of the program, it has become well-known throughout the town. A participants’ alumni network was established, and active citizens kept working and communicating about the local issues.

Meanwhile, in Ohta City in Gunma Prefecture, a citizens’ council started in 2017 and continues to run today. Although Ohta’s population sits at 220,000 (much larger than that of Tachiarai Town), the issues raised are quite similar: waste management, provision of administrative information and the creation of worker-friendly city environments. In some instances, proposals were immediately taken up or promoted by local governments, as in the case of the citizens’ council on healthcare where a section of the local government started to open a salon for elderly people.

A Participatory Society?

As the Japanese government seeks to engage more citizens for participatory governance, the experience of running deliberative minipublics provides the government an idea on the kinds of citizens that are attracted by the prospect of public engagement. Japan Initiatives, for example, has started reflecting on whether citizens who take part in citizens’ councils also participate in local elections. Minipublics, of course, offer something different from elections. While elections decide who leads the country, minipublics reshape how citizens relate to their leaders. Several questions remain: Are we witnessing the rise of a participatory society in Japan? Or are we witnessing the amplification of voices of citizens who are already active in politics? How can we make sense of the minipublic ‘alumni’ who spearhead community activities after experiencing the power and promise of deliberations themselves? In Japan, as in the rest of the world, the future of deliberative minipublics is yet to be determined.

About the Author

Ayano Takeuchi is a junior associate professor at the department of environmental science, faculty of science of Toho University, Japan since 2016. Prior to that, she gained three years of working experience as a project manager for a renewable energy developer in Germany. Her research is on citizen participation and human development.