Political Hazard

When we go to a foreign country regardless of whether it’s for pleasure or business, the first thing we have to care about is political hazards. As veteran travelers may know well, this kind of hazards directly affect you. In a politically unstable country, for example, even the safety of your travels can’t be secured. Especially if it’s a government ruled by the military or a country which has the potential of civil wars, you might get exposed to the rains of bullets in the country, despite of its temporary political stability for a while. Not leading to the worst case, there are still many countries that change the rules soon. Under the circumstances, not only travelers but also native people often get into troubles.

In this sense, understanding political hazards is very significant and fundamental in the first stage. Rather familiar in word is “political risk” than political hazard. As the explanations of risks in the previous chapter, Political hazard is the fundamental factor of so called “political risk”.

What is political hazard? This is the hazard that has much to do with one country’s authority. Concretely saying, there are the fast changing government’s policies, unstable cabinet foundations, increasing military power, hatreds from foreign countries and so on. These hazards could drive one country to the devastating situation to such an extent that there is almost anarchy. Unfortunately if we were in such a country as travelers or native inhabitants, neither your rights not life itself would be secured. We can easily recognize such devastating situation before we go there or obviously perceive the potential factors leading to it in many cases. Occasionally we could overlook very small signs of political hazards. If so, we would be exposed to too much risk.

Let's go to the main subject of Japanese political hazards. It had been said until recently that the Japanese economy is first-rate, contrarily its politics is third-rate. This critical remark comes from the comparison with the second-largest economy. The focus in the expression is definitely on Japan’s political sides. Historically Japan experienced the rapid economic expansion in sixties and as the symbolic word of Japan Inc, Japanese companies particularly in the industries of manufactures and banks started to explore the global markets. In comparison with the successful faces of business, the politics has lacked a leadership over the nations in the world since the last war. Although it's a sensitive issue especially in Asia, there must be roles suitable for its economy.

There seems to have been hollow in the politics recently. Especially in the past decade the Japanese prime ministers have changed so often that the country has not been able to be administrated stably as the world No 2 economy. Exactly saying more than ten prime ministers have been in tenure from 1990 to 2000. The basic policies may have been succeeded to the next Prime Minister because the leading political party has not changed during most of the period. From the economic point of view, however, the second largest country has been run wrongly in the last ten years. It’s easy to find it if you see what has been happening to the economy.

As for the Japanese economy, it’s no longer a domestic matter. The economy gives big impacts to many countries in the world to such an extent that only the singe nation might trigger the world depression. In this sense, politics particularly in the field of economic administrations is significantly indispensable.

From the global point of view, there is another political hazard in Japan. Because of the mal-functions on both of political and economic sides, there is an expression to describe this, “Japan nothing”. When the Japanese economy was in full swing and its companies hunted for foreign assets, Japan was bashed(Japan bashing). And when Asian countries such as China stared growing economically at double-digit rates, western countries tried to pass through Japan(Japan passing) to trade with hopeful Asian Tigers. This time Japan has become so powerless not only politically but economically that there is an atmosphere that no country cares about. This kind of expression or “Japan nothing” is only a partial voice from particular countries. It may be that the expression comes from domestically as self-criticized opinions.

Despite of the criticism on the Japanese political sides, Japan is one of the successful countries recovering from the last war. No county is more politically stable that Japan regardless of some political failures in the past. Nevertheless, Japan has been in a very sensitive position in the world. Namely, Japan has had strong ties with most of the politically powerful Western countries while it belongs to the Asian region. There are still an accumulated amount of problems with some Asian countries such as China or South Korea especially over the disposal of the last war. Furthermore, there are uncertain factors like North Korea, which launched a dubious satellite rocket overhead Japan. Even in the long lasting pact of the Japan-US Security Treaty, problems between the American soldiers and the civil people on Okinawa are incessant. Japan might become a military base in time of emergency in Asia. In this sense, even though Japan looks politically stable, we can't deny that those politician hazards could lead to some worst scenarios.

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