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Systems, Organizations and People for

Sustainable Democracy :
Thinking of Democracy with Reference

to the Case of Japan

Masahiro Horie*

As is well known, Lord Acton said in the UK in the 19th century
“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
Nowadays, most of the countries in the world advocate democracy,
even though the specifics of the systems and practices are different.
For the democracy to function appropriately, it is necessary to prevent
the corruption of power and to ensure the appropriate roles and
functioning of organizations and people responsible for exercising
power.

In this paper, it is discussed how powers are allocated among
what kind of organizations at different level of governments in
democratic countries and how they are functioning. It is also
discussed what kind of conditions are necessary for the appropriate
functioning of systems, organizations and people to ensure democracy.

Specifically, with reference to cases in Japan, it is discussed how
legislative, executive and judicial powers are allocated among what
kind of organizations, with what kind of check and balance systems or
mechanisms. For the sustainable appropriate functioning of democracy,
having systems is not enough. There must be non-systemic, informal
conditions such as influential mass media and informed active citizens
as well as intellectuals for the well-functioning of democracy. In this
paper, as an example of such roles of mass media and people, the
case of avoidance of “the abuse of majority power” is discussed.
Understanding the importance of the role of minority and for fear of
the severe criticism by mass media and the general public, the ruling
majority party (parties) often avoids the excessive use of power, “the
abuse of majority power”. Another example to be discussed is the

* Senior Professor of Public Administration and Director of the Executive
Development Center for Global Leadership, National Graduate Institute for Policy
Studies (GRIPS)