INTERVIEW: Japan Document Scandals Related to Level of Maturity in Democracy

July 15, 2018

Tokyo- National Archives of Japan President Takeo Kato has raised an alarm over a series of public document-linked scandals involving Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's administration, saying, "It's a matter relating to the degree of the maturity of democracy."

"With only seven years having passed since Japan's public records management law was enforced, the idea that public documents are part of democracy's key infrastructure has yet to thoroughly penetrate among public workers," Kato said in an interview with Jiji Press.

The scandals include the Ministry of Finance's manipulation of documents related to a controversial discount state land sale to school operator Moritomo Gakuen and the Defense Ministry's cover-up of reports written by Ground Self-Defense Force teams sent abroad under U.N. peacekeeping operations.

Kato noted that the Watergate scandal in the United States occurred over 40 years ago and that the country's public document-related rules gradually became well-established based on lessons learned from repeated failures.

"Japan needs to do, in only 10 years, what the United States and Europe did over 100 years," he said.

The Japanese government is considering devising preventive measures. Still, Kato said they are expected to be merely stopgap measures worked out as a result of being criticized by the media.

There are calls for strengthening penalties, Kato said. But he added, "It remains to be seen if introducing penalties would be effective while there is no sufficient understanding about what producing public documents means."

Kato stressed the need to change the mindset of public workers about the handling of documents.

Current bureau-chief-level officials at central government ministries and agencies had no opportunities to learn about document management when they were young, because there was no related legislation at the time, he said.

"On this occasion, public workers of all levels need to receive training and learn the philosophy," he said.

Regarding an argument that all emails written by public workers should be stored, Kato said, "Discussions on the idea of storing everything would be meaningless unless public workers have the awareness that what they write are public documents."

While archivists, in charge of the management of public records, are an esteemed profession in the United State and Europe, there is even no definition of the occupation in Japan, he said.

"Fostering archivists is a pressing issue in Japan," Kato said, adding that he is ready to help establish a reliable qualification system for the profession.

"We'll hopefully have around 150 archivists by around the time the new building for the National Archives of Japan is completed" in fiscal 2026 as planned by the government, he said. Jiji Press