Glenn Hook is Director of the Graduate School of East Asian Studies and Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Sheffield, UK.

"Contested Governance in Japan" extends the analysis of governance in contemporary Japan by exploring both the sites and issues of governance above and below the state as well as within it. All contributors share a common perspective on governance as taking place in different sites of activity, and as involving a range of issues related to the norms and rules for the management, coordination and regulation of order, whether within Japan or on the regional or global levels. This volume discusses the contested nature of governance in Japan and the ways in which a range of actors are involved in different sites and issues of governance at home, in the region and the globe. Including chapters on global governance, local policy-making, democracy, environmental governance, the Japanese financial system, corruption, the family and corporate governance, this collection will be of interest to anyone studying Japanese politics and governance.

Introduction - Contested Governance in Japan: Modes, sites and issues Part 1 Sites of Governance 1. Global Governance, the G7/8 Summit and Japan 2. Japan's Role in Emerging East Asian Governance: Regional and national implications 3. Governance, Democracy and the Political Economy of the Japanese State 4. Local Governance: The role of referenda and the rise of independent governors 5. Governance, Globalization and the Japanese Financial System: Resistance or restructuring? 6. Koizumi's 'Robust Policy': Governance, the Japanese welfare employment regime and comparative gender studies Part 2 Issues of Governance 7. Japan and Global Environmental Governance 8. Governance, Asian Migrants and the role of Civil Society 9. Corruption and Governance in Japan 10. Whose Problem? Japan's homeless people as an issue of local and central governance 11. The Political Economy of Japanese 'Corporate Governance': A metaphor for capitalist rationalization 12. Governance though the Family: The political function of the domestic in Japan