“Consolidating Constitutional Legitimacy in Japan: Paths Forward” – Presented by Jackson School Japan Studies Program

Join us for the 2025 Griffith and Patricia Way Lecture for a presentation by Professor Kenneth Mori McElwain of the Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo. Amidst global challenges to established institutions, rights, and norms, the role of constitutions in preserving democratic governance has become ever more vital.

Japan offers a compelling case: its constitution, the world’s oldest unamended national charter, faces growing elite-driven calls for fundamental revision. However, public support for these changes remains uncertain, and reforms lacking legitimacy risk weakening the constitution’s ability to constrain government overreach. This talk develops a framework for understanding and assessing constitutional legitimacy.

Kenneth Mori McElwain is a Professor of Comparative Politics at the Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo. His research focuses on comparative institutions and Japanese politics, with an emphasis on constitutional design and change. His 2022 book, 日本国憲法の普遍と特異―その軌跡と定量的考察』千倉書房 – The Universality and Originality of the Japanese Constitution in Quantitative Perspective (Chikura Shobō 2022), won the Ishibashi Tanzan Award and the Asia-Pacific Award Special Prize.

He is Editor-in-Chief of ‘Social Science Japan Journal’ and a 2024–25 Visiting Professor of Japanese Politics at Columbia University. He received his BA at Princeton University, obtained a PhD in political science from Stanford, and taught at both Stanford and Michigan before returning to Japan in 2015.