Crisis narratives, institutional change, and the transformation of the Japanese state

• Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies
• GGP: Global Governance Programme

At this event, established specialists in a variety of areas such as sociology, public policy, and political science and international relations, will discuss the discrepancies between official rhetoric and policy practice, and actual perceptions of decline and crisis, in contemporary Japan.

Mired in national crises since the early 1990s, Japan has had to respond to a rapid population decline; the Asian and global financial crises; the 2011 triple disaster of earthquake, tsunami, and the Fukushima nuclear meltdowns; the COVID-19 pandemic; China’s economic rise; threats from North Korea; and massive public debt. 

At this event, established specialists in a variety of areas such as sociology, public policy, and political science and international relations, will discuss the discrepancies between official rhetoric and policy practice, and actual perceptions of decline and crisis, in contemporary Japan. 

They will gauge the effectiveness and the implications of political responses through analyses of how crises are narrated and used to justify policy interventions. Transcending boundaries between issue areas and domestic and international politics, these contributions paint a dynamic picture of the contested but changing nature of social, economic, and, ultimately, political institutions as they constitute the transforming Japanese state.