The reason this today is such a big deal is that this emperor is the first emperor who has actually transformed the institution by performing his role as the symbol of the people. He has actually changed the performance of the role.
He has changed it in accordance with the constitution, which he always mentions. He stays completely away from politics, and is utterly prudent and cautious about the constitutional fulfillment of his duties. And I think this is the most important thing: He has used his role to do things symbolically that the government never did. He has made statements about war memory repeatedly. When he mourns the war dead, he says that Japan must never forget what we did to your country, whether it is the Philippines or Palau. He even said that Japan had to remember the war starting with the [Japanese invasion of] Manchuria in 1931. They never start the war there. He did things for the polity in terms of war memory that the government has refused to do. Pretty impressive. [...]
The connection is very interesting because in fact this particular regime doesn’t feel about the constitution the way that the emperor does. The emperor repeatedly evokes the constitution. And that does have a political valence. He says he supports the peace constitution and is trying to live up to it. It definitely puts Abe in a harder spot, because he is a nationalist, and the right wing of his party—many of them are emperorists: “The imperial institution is the heart of our identity” and stuff like that. The emperor himself has been consistent over the years, but the meaning of it is different when you have a regime which is as conservative and nationalist as this prime minister.
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