Hi, I need help on a school project, I am in dire needs for articles/papers and so on regarding these questions: * Does Japans constitution represent a strong or a weak: * constitutionalism * popular sovereignty * efficiency Thank you.
Japanese constitutional theory is built on the proposition that pacifism, popular sovereignty, and the guarantee of fundamental human rights are the foundations of the Constitution. This article shows that these principles lie at the heart of an understanding of both the Japanese Constitution and Japan's democracy. For four decades, Japan has witnessed no constitutional crisis; that is, no political, governmental, or social issue has appeared that has either threatened the constitutional order or revealed a serious defect in it. The proof of this statement is that there has been no constitutional amendment, although many have been proposed. There has been constitutional controversy but no crisis. This stability demonstrates much about the actual operation of Japan's constitutionalism and provides a basis for a reading of the state of democracy in Japan in this last decade of the twentieth century. This article examines the role of these three principles in Japanese constitutional culture. In addition, it illustrates how the principles have affected the course of the Constitution in action. Finally, the article shows how the principles serve as a guide for speculation about the future of the Japanese Constitution. As important as pacifism is as a constitutional principle, popular sovereignty and the guarantee of fundamental human rights determine the essential nature of Japan's democracy. These two principles place Japan squarely in the company of the older democracies of the West to which belongs the honor of having developed the theory, content, and practice of one of the major patterns of government and politics in the modern world. Popular sovereignty was a concept absent from Japan's historical experience. It is not surprising that it was missing from the Meiji Constitution since its drafters were concerned with making the people the objects of gove.nment under imperial sovereignty, not participants in or molders of government and politics. In order for Japan to become a democracy, it was necessary to devise a fundamental law that would guarantee the people the broadest possible participation in government. The general principle is stated, without the use of the term, in the preamble to the Constitution: Government is a sacred trust of the people, the authority for which is derived from the people, the powers of which are exercised by the representatives of the people, and the benefits of which are enjoyed by the people. This is a universal principle of mankind upon which this Constitution is founded. 5 It is not surprising that this passage looks as though it were translated from a foreign language, as it appeared to both Japanese and foreigners in 1946. The thoughts were indeed strange, even revolutionary, in terms of the history of Japanese political thought. Strictly speaking, however, the preamble's language is mere rhetoric. The principle of popular sovereignty was stated in the text of the Constitution simply as a subordinate clause in Article 1: "The Emperor shall be the symbol of the State and of the unity of the people, deriving his position from the will of the people with whom resides sovereign power." A revolution was embodied in those brief thirty words. In the Meiji Constitution the emperor was sovereign. From that constitution stemmed the system-authoritarian in 1889 and through almost all the first half of the twentieth century-that made the Japanese people subjects of a godlike emperor. CONCLUSION Pacifism, popular sovereignty, and the guarantee of fundamental human rights have served the nation well. Pacifism, coupled with powerful assistance from an international situation that has not produced a credible threat to Japan's security, has spared the country involvement in war and the staggering costs of becoming a military superpower, thus freeing resources for the betterment of national life. Popular sovereignty has resulted in a system of government and politics that has maintained domestic tranquillity, enabled the government to work effectively, if not perfectly, in addressing domestic and foreign problems, and spared the country from the debilitating effects of political instability. Fundamental human rights have permitted both individuals and groups to function with an unprecedented degree of political, social, and economic freedom. The rhetoric, surely not empty in this instance, of the preamble provides the means for a broader evaluation of the three principles. The Japanese people have not been "visited with the horror of war through the action of government" for virtually half a century. They have preserved their "security and existence" and in the process have come to "occupy an honoured place in international society." Government has been treated as "a sacred trust of the people," in spite of a far from flawless performance, through the firm rejection of revision of its constitutional basis. Political parties, competition among them, and free elections have assured that the government and its leaders have derived "their authority from the people," that the powers of government "are exercised by representatives of the people," and that beyond challenge the benefits of such a government have been "enjoyed by the people." http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4024&context=lcp&sei-redir=1&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fscholar.google.com%2Fscholar%3Fq%3DJapan%2527s%2Bconstitution%2B%2B%2Bpopular%2Bsovereignty%26btnG%3D%26hl%3Den%26as_sdt%3D0%252C5#search=%22Japans%20constitution%20popular%20sovereignty%22
