So Miyamoto began writing about his frustrating experiences inside the bureaucracy, where change is anathema and expanding regulatory power is a prerequisite for success. His book, Straitjacket Society, has sold over 400,000 copies in its Japanese version and his second book may do just as well--a sign, he believes, of how fed up people are with their government- sponsored conformity.

His flawless English and lively tone are as striking as his choice of attire: green steel-rimmed glasses, a bright orange shirt--loosely buttoned so that his chest hairs can breathe--and black pants adorned with a swank leather belt. As he talks about his adventures, one can see why--for the mandarins who cling so tenaciously to the status-quo--there was little choice but to fire Miyamoto. As the embodiment of revolution and unbridled reform, he was a threat to everything they stood for.

What led you to become a doctor?
Both my father and my grandfather were physicians and there was the usual pressure to carry on the family tradition. But I switched from the main trend in my family by becoming a psychiatrist.

What was medical school like?
It was easy. I didn't study that hard, but I was always able to handle it. It was more memorization than anything. What was difficult for me was passing the requirements to study medicine in America. That took two years of hard study.

Why did you choose America?
During my fifth year of medical school, I heard that post-med training was better in America. Also, after you graduate from med school in Japan, you don't get paid for a while. You basically earn your certificate by devoting yourself to your professor. They give you two days a week off, but you have to moonlight in order to survive. I didn't want to work for free for anyone and I wanted my own private time. At least in the U.S. they pay you during your internship, however meager it may be.

How did your time in America change you?
Well, it was the '70s and I was taken by the whole me-generation thing. Also, the competitiveness in the States was impressive; undoubtedly more fierce than in Japan. At Cornell, you really had to fight against brilliant people. In Japan, people at the top don't necessarily have to be that bright, which is clear from the lifetime employment system. Knowing how to brown-nose your superiors is more important than in other countries. America was a tough world.

How well did you adapt?
The language factor was particularly difficult for me because I was studying psychology and had to learn specific terminology. But I never hung out with any Japanese and so I was able to absorb a lot on my own.

How long did you live in the U.S.?
From the age of 26 to 37; close to 11 years.

Did you miss Japan during that time?
It was more a sense of nostalgia. I ultimately had to return to Japan because my mother needed help with my grandmother, who was becoming senile. I was interested in using my studies in the field of social psychology and cross-cultural issues, but had no choice but to return to Japan.

What ultimately led you into the bureaucracy?
I wasn't interested in becoming a psychiatrist at a local hospital because the field of psychology isn't very developed in Japan and people with psychological problems are often looked at as crazies who need to be institutionalized. I didn't want the role of a jail warden, so to speak. So my professor suggested the Ministry of Health and Welfare, where his friend could help me get a job.

Did you have to take any entrance exam?
I went through about seven interviews. In the MHW, you can attain a career bureaucrat's rank if you have a medical degree.

Were there any signs during the interviews about what lay ahead?
Not at all. We talked about medical education in Japan and America and how I could employ my experiences. They were all high ranking officials with very nice offices. I thought I would have my own private office, but I ended up in a large room stuffed with desks. I accepted it at first; what I couldn't take was the work hours. I knew that Japanese worked hard and all that, but I never thought they stayed in the office until ten or eleven. Bentos would be delivered to our office and everyone would stay around, eating their dinners, or watching TV.

Watching TV?
Yeah. And drinking beer. People would stay out of compassion for those who were still working: what is called compassionate overtime. The first couple of weeks were all right because I had a lot to learn, but then I began to comprehend that staying late was a regular practice. I realized that coming back was a mistake. But I had to stay because of my grandmother; and I thought I should at least give it a couple of years.

Give us some characteristic bureaucratic aspects of the work.
The decision-making process, for example. Just because ideas are good, it doesn't mean that they will be accepted, because everyone's opinion has to be incorporated. The Director of the Disease Control Division whom I worked with had many good ideas, but he was ultimately moved out of the mainstream because he was too assertive. Also, I wondered why I had to draft laws. I had no legal experience whatsoever nor any interest in making laws.

So it really is the bureaucracy that makes law?
Yes. We also had to write both the questions and answers that were put forth by Diet members in the standing committees. There really is no parliamentary debate; the entire scenario is written beforehand.

What was involved in writing the scenarios?
We would ask the politicians who were scheduled to question the ministers what kind of issues they would question. We then allocated the questions among the related ministries. Questions that dealt with foreign affairs were channeled to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, for example. After that, we would allocate the health and welfare-related issues to the various MHW divisions.

How did the politicians strike you?
They're inept. They don't have vision, they don't have policy, and overall they don't have enough knowledge. There are people like Nakasone, who I think are brilliant and who know how to control bureaucrats. But politicians are basically brokers. They get to know various bureaucrats who control permits and regulations and put them together with business. They make it easier for businesses to function in the heavily regulated market, and, in turn, they get political donations.

What happens to businesses that approach the bureaucracy without a political introduction?
When I was the director in charge of a certain local hospital that needed to purchase medical equipment, like an MRI or a CATSCAN, Hewlett Packard-Yokokawa Denki's representative came over to make sure I wouldn't veto the planned purchase. They didn't mention anything about the deal, but instead asked me out for dinner.

So hospitals have to get permission to buy medical equipment?
If a hospital wants to buy an MRI machine, for example, it has to go through a slew of people. It can easily take 40 to 50 stamps of approval. It took me a string of approval stamps and ten days to get the air conditioning at the Kobe Quarantine turned on.

Is there a certain breeding process for bureaucrats?
First they pick the country's brightest people. Then there is a lot of time spent at different levels of the bureaucracy and weekend orientation trips. Throughout this period, they're undergoing a process of solidarity. There is never any time to think about what they're getting into. Ultimately they begin to resemble race horses with blinkers who can only see straight ahead. They become perfect bureaucrats; preserving the system, expanding its power and making Japan Inc. as powerful as possible. This is what leads to the style of decision making, where it all has to be collective.

It sounds almost like communism.
Exactly. From the outside, the Japanese system may appear like a capitalist society, but when you see the inside, it's communist. There are many similarities. In some ways, the entire communist structure is one that is driven by the concept of envy. What's interesting is that communism has generally collapsed, from Berlin to China, and Japan is seeing its foundations being shaken. The frightening part is that with the sarin attacks, the Kobe earthquake and so on, the bureaucrats have become further empowered. They can say, look, we want to try to take care of you. They can gain more power that way.

How powerful is the Ministry of Finance from the perspective of the MHW?
The Ministry of Finance basically decides the policies of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Every August, we would draft the MHW's budget, which would be sent over to MoF for approval. We would also need MoF's approval when we were writing committee hearing statements for politicians if there was the slightest mention of the following year's budget. Essentially, any policy needs money and any money matter needs the approval of MoF. So they generally have power over all issues.

Did you ever have to kowtow to MoF bureaucrats?
In a way. Every December, after our budget was approved, we would go over to MoF, and express our thanks for getting an extra billion yen for our budget by presenting them with fancy bottles of brandy or whisky. I realize that it was a formality, but it was a waste of time; it took over an hour.

Who paid for the brandy?
It was taken from the stock we had at the MHW. Whenever some private business came to ask for favors, they would bring liquor. But in the end you could say it came from the taxpayers.

What finally made you cross the line between loyal bureaucrat and bureaucratic rebel?
It was after the fourth year at the ministry. Although I wanted to climb the bureaucratic ladder, I began realizing how much the senior-level officials were sacrificing their private lives. Don't misunderstand me, I don't want to come off like some kind of labor union member or something.

Well, you certainly don't dress like one!
[Laughter] I didn't think it was right to simply give up your personal time. I was very much against having to show up on Sundays just because other people were coming to work. For a while, I went through the motions, but then I began taking off early and going to my sports club.

Are much of the long hours just wasted time?
Definitely. All the qualitative work we did could have been finished between 9am and noon. What took up so much time was writing the question and answers that politicians ask at committee hearings. This took up around eight hours a day. Usually, questions that the politicians wanted to ask would come out around three o'clock in the afternoon. Then we had to prepare the answers by going through everything that was said on that issue in the past. We had to look into all past records by hand.

No computers?
No. In fact, the whole process could be handled in five minutes if the ministries were linked up by one super computer. There is a distinct style of stating the questions and answers presented at committee hearings by Diet members. All you would have to do is input the questions and the computer could be programmed to pull up all related statements from the past and formulate the correct answers.

The statements are that simple?
Oh, without a doubt! All the answers to the questions are based on avoiding responsibility. So being vague is a key point.

Did you ever propose using computers?
No, because I think it's the politicians' responsibility to debate various issues. Bureaucrats should not be involved at all.

So you took out your frustrations by writing articles.
I consulted one of my friends who was a journalist and he recommended I write. When my first article was published in the Asahi Journal, it was a big hit and I began writing more and more. Then my book became a bestseller and I began to realize that I was fighting for freedom in Japan. Freedom was something that wasn't appreciated in the bureaucracy and it's very much like that in Japan overall. It seems like many Japanese people feel the same way: my book has sold nearly 500,000 copies since it was released.

You wear flashy clothes, date an American woman whom you refer to as your lifetime companion and drive a Porsche. In the conservative environment of the MHW, weren't these factors like waving a red flag?
Having a lifetime companion who happens to be American is not going to be a positive thing in a Japanese bureaucracy. I thought it really wasn't any of their business to tell me how to conduct my lifestyle. Sure, I like to wear nice clothes, but I usually buy clothes in Italy, where I can pick up a suit for around Y50,000. My colleagues at the ministry would say "You're very fashionable," but what they actually meant was that I should not wear clothes that would make me stick out.

Did they know about the Porsche?
People knew. They would express their disdain by saying things like, "Wow, you drive a nice car." But I got a good deal on my Porsche and to me, it was a matter of choice. I kept it quiet but people eventually found out because I drove it around on the weekends.

Do you think it might have been better not to lead such a flashy lifestyle, considering the feelings of your colleagues?
You only have one life and if I like Italian clothes that I can buy cheaply, what's wrong with that? One of the director generals in my department said that it would be better if I could tone things down, since I am a bureaucrat. I told him that his somber clothes looked like he was going to a funeral. He got very angry and ended up sending me to work in the MHW's Quarantine Office.

You wrote that you became upset when colleagues were watching pornography and talking about sex one weekend. Didn't you ever talk about girls at school?
Sure, but I didn't like the crude manner in which my colleagues were doing it. If I had to, I'd prefer discussing things like bondage in The Story of O, or anecdotes from "Death in Venice." I enjoy discussing the psychological aspects of sex. But to get together with a bunch of 40- to 50-year-old guys and watch pornography doesn't really turn me on. Maybe if I were with my girlfriend instead . . .

What exactly led to your demise at the MHW?
I was the Deputy Director at the Disease Control Division and I started to have trouble with people. They insisted that I stay late at work, until ten or eleven at night, so I began taking two to three-hour lunch breaks. I told them I was spending time with friends that I couldn't meet after work because I was working so late. But the last straw for them came when I went away to Tahiti with my girlfriend over Golden Week. They were absolutely furious!

Why?
Because coming back from Tahiti with a tan really shows that you're enjoying yourself. Bureaucrats are supposed to sacrifice their lives for the country and showing how much you suffer helps the group identity. The Director General put me where he said I could cool off and contemplate the way I conducted myself at work. He wanted me to repent. Since there was hardly anything for me to do, I had more free time and decided to take another vacation, this time to Europe. I was allowed to take 23 days off of work a year.

But not at once, right?
No, not at once. They said that there was no hope for me at the MHW and put me in the Quarantine Office. After that, I really had nothing to do so I complained to my boss. He said, look, we didn't send you there to work, we sent you there to think about your situation and repent. Why don't you read some books or something? So I read some books.

How much were you getting paid at the time?
Around Y8 or Y9 million a year.

Why didn't you quit?
Well, around this time I began writing more about my experiences and felt that I should stay and fight, because this was really an issue of repressing the freedom of expression.

You were on a mission to expose the undemocratic ways of the government?
Once I began publishing my articles the issues of democracy and freedom of expression became an increasingly important issue.

What ultimately led to your firing?
Well, at the Kobe Quarantine Office my superiors started to wage psychological warfare. They would have me do things like deliver quarantine papers to ships at the dock, things that an 18-year-old could have done. My boss told me he would destroy any non-work related faxes that came in, and added that I was not allowed to take any personal phone calls at work either. I demanded that they apologize. But it began to feel like I was in jail.

Were they trying to get you to resign?
Oh yes, that was clear.

So you consciously tried to get them to fire you?
Well, partly so, but I really wanted to stay and fight. My mother in Tokyo was sick and needed me to take care of her and they sent me to work in Kobe. I also had a bad back and wanted to be treated by my doctor in Tokyo. My lawyer told me that I definitely had a case against them on the grounds of human rights infringements. Then I became sick and had to go back to Tokyo for treatment right when the Kobe earthquake struck. The Kobe Quarantine Office was closed and there was no work for me to do anyway. Then, I got a request to speak at the National Press Club in Washington. It was just after the incidents where the bureaucrats weren't accepting relief from American doctors and all that. I wanted to talk about how the bureaucracy was not only an impediment to imports to Japan, but to the Japanese people as well. So I went to Washington. That was the last straw.

How were you fired?
I was supposed to fill out a form before leaving, but I simply sent them a fax after arriving in Washington. I guess that really blew their minds. They sent me a fax the next day telling me to return immediately. Of course, I disregarded that. Finally, the Minister of Health and Welfare gave a press conference and said that I should be punished for what I had done. It was very controversial. But the Kobe port had been completely destroyed and there was no work to do anyway. In fact, when I did go back, I even suggested that it might be a good idea if I set up a trauma center and gave psychological examinations. Of course, they didn't want me to do anything like that because it would make me look good.

And then?
In late February they called me into my boss's office, where there were five people waiting, and handed me a notice that said I was fired. I held a press conference the next day and the day after that my second book was released. The Minister thought it would be good to fire me before my book came out--that people wouldn't buy the book after seeing what an unworthy official I was. But it backfired.

You seem at times like an American trapped inside of a Japanese body.
[Laughter] Maybe so. My boss at the MHW often told me I had spent too much time in America. But it could have something to do with me being an only child, having spent time in America and having an American girlfriend. She helps me a lot with my writing, helping me develop my thoughts. She's something like my conscience. But in general, I just don't like being in a world of conformity. I respect everyone else's lifestyles. Why should I be told how to live my life?