In September 2021, Japan set the ball rolling with its digital policy as the new Digital Agency took office in Tokyo. While the country steps up to transform itself digitally, let us try to understand why it continues to be identified as digitally backward despite being distinctly technologically more advanced than the rest of the world. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Digital Economy Outlook 2020 put Japan at the lowest rank amongst 31 countries in online procedures. As opposed to European countries like Estonia, Denmark, and Iceland where nearly 70 percent of the population utilises digital applications at public offices, Japan is barely at 5.4 percent. In 2001, Japan launched the e-government strategy in an attempt to carry out information technology reforms. However, two decades later, paper-based administrative services and usage of FAX continue to be widespread. The Japanese government not only failed to provide relief from the pandemic by delaying the delivery of one-off cash-handouts worth 100,000 yen per individual last year, but also received criticism for major glitches in its COVID-19 contact tracking app—Contact Confirming Application (COCOA). For better or for worse, the COVID-19 pandemic exposed Japan’s digital backwardness. A Tokyo based think-tank, Asia-Pacific Initiative (API), in a convention of experts called Japan’s response to COVID-19 a “Digital Defeat”. Owing to that, earlier in May this year, the Japan Diet passed the Digital Agency Law to establish a new government agency called Digital Agency to ramp up its digitalisation ambitions. The agency that kicked off its operation this September consists of 600 officials, including one-third from the private sector. This is about four times more than its predecessor, the IT Strategic Headquarters. If compared, Singapore’s Government Technology Agency had nearly three times more, i.e., 1,800 officials, at its inception in 2016. The Agency was the pet project of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. However, with the sudden announcement of PM Suga’s resignation well before the Agency delivered any notable results, the government leadership for this massive project is under scrutiny. Under newly appointed Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida’s leadership, Karen Makishima is currently steering the Digital Agency. Interestingly, Kishida, who led the LDP to an early General Election on the 31 st of October, has an average approval rating of just above 50 percent—much lower than his predecessors. Having lost one of two by-elections for the upper house, the honeymoon period of Kishida’s leadership might have come to an early end. However, as he continues to head the nation, there had been little conversation in pre-poll debates and party manifesto about his visions of the Digital Agency. While Fumio’s ambitions of a “new capitalism” model shift from ‘Abenomics’, and better handling of the coronavirus have taken precedence in media coverage, the discussion on means to achieve these goals via active digitalisation has been scarce. As none of the leading parties have created conversations around the Agency, it is easier then to assume that digitalisation might take a backseat amongst other policy decisions.
- Published in
- India
