Comparative Legal Analysis of the Systems of Executive Power in Russia and Japan

Abstract

The paper is devoted to the comparative legal aspects of the study of executive power systems in Russia and Japan. These states, despite the significant difference in both the political and legal historical path and modern forms of government and state structure, have a number of common constitutional and legal features. Both countries have chosen a legal strategy aimed at the full-fledged building of a democratic rule of law. Comparison of executive-power systems reveals both serious similarities and significant differences in the statics and dynamics of their daily functioning. If in Russia ministers perform rather an administrative and managerial function and are actually deprived of many of their own political prerogatives, in Japan the top officials of ministries are, as a rule, public politicians. The difference also lies in the procedure for appointing heads of executive departments — in Russia in this process, the primary role is assigned to the personal will of the elected head of state, in Japan — to the collective will of the elite, self-organizing and legitimized through parliamentary elections. At the same time, a number of common features correspond to the governments of these countries, both in terms of their legal nature and in terms of their functions. These circumstances indicate the need to intensify comparative legal research in this direction in order to clarify questions about the further expediency of the mutual reception of norms and institutions related to the corresponding public law orders.