Paper short abstract:

This paper argues that in cultural politics in Japan, opposing definitions of culture emerged together with two different types of "policy expertise" in the context of the making of the Basic Law for the Promotion of Culture and the Arts and analyzes how they are reflected in the law.

Paper long abstract:

Culture is a delicate policy field, where the state should secure and promote creative freedom of various stakeholders in the society. However, the concept of culture is contested. This paper argues that in cultural politics in Japan, it oscillates along a continuum between two poles: national and profit-making culture led by the central government and professional organizations and more anti-authoritarian nonprofit culture initiated by local governments and grassroots organizations. These two poles emerged together with two different types of "policy expertise" in the context of the making of the Basic Law for the Promotion of Culture and the Arts (BLPCA). Thus, this paper tackles the question of how the different concepts of culture, culture's role in society and different views on citizens' relations to culture are reflected in the BLPCA. The Diet passed the BLPCA in 2001. Two groups of concerned experts where involved in the law-making process: experts from 16 professional organizations of actors and musicians who later founded the Arts and Culture Forum (AC-Forum) on the one hand and from the Cultural Policy Proposal Network (CP-NET) on the other. The AC-Forum developed into a large lobbying organization closely connected to politicians and its definition of culture is oriented towards rather commercial and government-supported activities with the main goal of generating profits. The CP-NET, on the other hand, consists mainly of scholars, local government bureaucrats and artists interested in cultural rights and cultural democracy. The dominance of the 16 professional organizations and later AC-Forum members in the policy-making process helped to create and pass the law in an astonishingly short time. However, the CP-Net criticized that the policy-making process was undemocratic and lacked any in-depth discussion on the concept of culture and its role in society. Based on the case of the BLPCA, I will discuss the overlap of expert knowledge and interest groups and its implication on policy-making and the promotion of culture in Japan.