Efforts to Be Undertaken Nationally
Third, I think you can already surmise that it will be necessary for these efforts to be undertaken nationally throughout Japan.
The question arises of what exactly we need to do for Japanese TV dramas to be gsold,h so to speak, to other countries around the world. Expanding across the globe the number of people who have a friendly feeling toward Japanese through increases in person-to-person interactions is what we might call the ultimate goal of cultural diplomacy. But in order to achieve this, what sort of relationship should the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have with relevant people in local governments, NPOs, and NGOs.
This is clearly not a task that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs can tackle on its own, and attempts to take this on through a traditional strict division of labor, inevitably resulting in a lack of concerted effort, represents the ultimate in inefficiency.
For example, recently, major Japanese corporations are almost without exception making social contributions in the countries in which they operate. Would you not agree that we should be creating networks and establishing good public-private partnerships, polishing the brand of Japan together?
I expect that the Overseas Exchange Council will be acting as a catalyst in this area and providing its wisdom and experience to us. In terms of implications for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, I believe that in the future we need to give serious consideration to how we can go about building teamwork with people involved in pop culture, anime, and other such areas.