ABSTRACT
English version of a lecture delivered at Doshisha University, Tokyo, as part of the 1998 Neesima Lectures Series (Joseph Hardy Neesima, 1843-90, was Doshisha’s founder)
THE POLITICS and structures of government in Japan and Britain have often been compared, while each has on occasion been put forward as a model for the other. For Japan, the government and politics of Britain has been regarded as the key model of parliamentary democracy, and as such, an object of emulation by those in Japan who think seriously about politics. For Britain, although the idea that positive political lessons may be learned from Japan is perhaps less common than the other way round, there has been a great deal of interest from the 1960s onwards in the ability of Japan to produce rapid economic growth.
