ABSTRACT
In the general election held in October 1996, all major parties in Japan used “administrative reform” as their main campaign slogan. And prime minister Ryutaro Hashimoto reiterated his determination to carry out fundamental reform of the administrative system by 2001 as the top priority for his new government. The administrative reform council completed a plan to streamline the administration by November of 1997. Then the government submitted bills concerning the reform to a 1999 diet session with the goal of achieving reform by 2001. The precise reason all parties gave high priority to administrative reform in the last election campaign in Japan was a series of scandals of high-ranking bureaucrats. After the land speculation-driven economic bubble came to an end, the scandalous irregularities of the political, business, and bureaucratic worlds have been exposed one after another. The key dimensions of administrative reform undergoing now are deregulation, decentralization, and downsizing.
