Balancing Continuity and Change: Japan’s Pursuit of a ‘Small and Strong’ State Within the Neo-Weberian State Framework

This paper discusses the development of Japanese public administration within its historical and socio-political context, focusing on the question, “How well does the neo-Weberian State (NWS) travel outside Europe?” In the late 19th century, Japan established a Weberian public administration based on the German model. Since the late 1940s, it has consistently pursued the goal of “small and strong government”, but its strategy for achieving has changed over time. It was first driven by a bureaucracy fragmentally allied with the ruling party and business. From the 1980s, it promoted various NPM-type reforms, and since the 1990s, political control has been centralised, depriving the bureaucracy of its ministerial autonomy. Nevertheless, the anticipated shift in public attitudes has not materialized. While the demand for infallible protection by the administration persists, the vulnerabilities in implementation caused by these reforms have become evident during crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings show that the NWS has a normative affinity with traditional Japanese values, including expectations that the state realises the public good and ensures security. The Japanese case also implies that the collective memory of past successes driven by hierarchy can simultaneously hinder the NWS by creating unrealistic expectations. Whether the NWS will become a sustainable model for future reforms depends on whether the public confronts the reality of resource constraints.