Is there really a relationship between movies and politics?

Rashomon and Japanese politics

As I was watching the trailer of Rashomon, I was wondering why the images and the plot itself were familiar to me. Then I realized that Rashomon was inspired by the short story (“In a Grove” written by Ryunosuke Akutagawa) we read and analyzed once in my literature class. Looking back during that class, my initial thought was that the story was very Japanese in nature. The characters had this tendency to beat around the bush, and the confessions of the people involved were designed to protect their honor. At the end of my literature class we were made to ponder about the real killer of Kanazawa no Takehiko. I tried to read the story a few more times and still as a whole the testimonies do not make any sense. Looking at the testimonies individually was a different matter though, and each story points to a different suspect and gives us different clear views/perceptions as to what has really happened.

Thinking about how Rashomon is connected to Japanese politics is somewhat a Herculean task if only because at first glance there seems to be no connection at all. I skimmed through the syllabus again as if to look for an answer, and then suddenly the fact that we wouldn’t be asked irrelevant questions dawned on me. I realized that it isn’t exactly about the story and its characters, but the plot as a whole. Japanese politics is similar to Rashomon because of the different angles we can look from in order to understand Japanese politics fully.

Looking from various angles

Going back my story about the syllabus, I saw that there were four approaches in our pursuit to study Japanese politics. These four approaches are the Historical Approach, Socio-cultural approach, Institutional Approach, and the Rational Choice Approach. For me, these four approaches represent the different confessions of the witnesses in Rashomon. I believe that each approach provides a different story and a different understanding of the nature of Japanese politics.

Historical Approach

This approach offers a look at how Japanese Politics developed and emerged. Looking at the Historical Perspective helps people understand Japan based on the actual events that transpired throughout their history. Looking at historical data can provide a better look as to how political situations came to be. A hypothetical situation would be the low number of imports during the present day and Japan's isolationist policy during the Tokugawa period can be considered to have a cause-effect relationship.
(Example of work: Japanese Political History since the Meiji Renovation, 1868-2000 By Richard Sims)

Socio-cultural Approach

This approach is very useful in the sense that people interested in studying Japanese Politics can look at how the character of the Japanese people affects their decision-making and political structure. More importantly, it is essential to know how the Japanese think and feel about certain things such as their views on peace, structure, and other socio-cultural concepts in order to understand why the Japanese act the way they do now and the implications of these on their political decisions.
(Example of work: Japanese Political Culture by Takeshi Ishida)

Institutional Approach

From the root word, institution, this approach focuses on the structure of specific institutions, in this case political structures. I believe that this approach is useful in order to see how different structures operate and how effective are the policies and decisions that are rooted from the said institution. Sometimes this approach is used to compare two different institutions in order to see the effectiveness and merits of each type of institution, it isn't really a secret that different types of systems garner different types of actions from it leaders and servers...

(check out this book on google books)
(Example of work: Structure and Policy in Japan and the United States by Peter F. Cowhey, Mathew Daniel)

Rational Choice Approach

The final approach, I believe focuses on the leaders people select to be in office. The choices of people are important because this can show the trends as to which party is most favorable to win majority seats during the elections, or what kind of leaders people elect. In the Japanese case, this approach could be useful to know why the people have consistently supported the LDP.

(example of work: Institutions, Incentives and Electoral Participation in Japan by Yusaku Horiuchi)

Say what?!
All these approaches in studying politics are legitimate and quite insightful. The biggest contribution of Rashomon in politics is that it provided the concept that frameworks completely different from one another can be used to analyze political natures, events, and situations. These frameworks need not coincide or cooperate, it does not need to agree either. Each approach has its own merits, and can stand alone as a basis for analysis. Lastly, I believe that as much as possible all these approaches should really be used to study Japanese politics so that our knowledge on the subject matter wouldn't be enclosed into just one type of analysis.

The utilization and digestion of the knowledge we are about to gain in looking from various lenses is up to us, we should not have any biases but instead we should keep our minds open to the different approaches Japanese Politics will be presented to us...