This is the 70th year since the concept of local autonomy was introduced in Japan under the Constitution. Both the national and local governments should be reminded that local autonomy is an important and essential heritage of the postwar political and legal transformation. Serious efforts need to be made to bolster local governments financially and otherwise, and improve the well-being of their residents in the face of population flight and aging.
Chapter VIII of the postwar Constitution deals with "local self-government." The Local Autonomy Law took effect on the same day the Constitution entered into force on May 3, 1947. Under the preceding Meiji Constitution, which had no provision for local self-government, the national government appointed prefectural governors. The postwar system abolished that practice and introduced the direct election of governors and mayors while expanding the electorate, especially to include women, to vote on local assembly members.
Despite the reforms, the national government continued to have an upper hand over local administrations. This tendency started to gradually weaken after the Diet in 1993 adopted a resolution calling for promoting local autonomy. It was followed in 2000 by the enforcement of a law that abolished administrative duties that the national government was supposed to fulfill but instead imposed on local governments. In subsequent reforms from 2011 to 2014, more power was transferred from the national to local governments and restrictions placed on the latter were relaxed. In principle, the relationship between central and local governments has become one of cooperation among equal parties.