Co-Governance by Local Government and Civil Society Groups in Japan: Balancing Equity and Efficiency for Trust in Public Institutions

The significant rise of distrust in public institutions is a disturbing trend in advanced democracies. There are two emerging world-wide patterns of government reform to address this: promoting greater equity and producing an economically efficient government. But equity and efficiency are often considered as a trade off against each other. By exploring the experience of Japan, this article argues that local governments can make considerable progress towards democratic benefits-oriented partnership models of conciliation with economic efficiency by engaging civil society groups in co-governing partnership arrangements and, as such, positively contribute to building social capital and trust.