[ch4s3]

Norway, Finland, Denmark, and Estonia all rank higher in economic freedom than the US and have more direct democracies. The US literally wrote Japan's constitution. France stands out as having the most powerful executive branch of any of these countries.

[jariel]

That the US 'wrote' Japanese constitution is a technical artifact.

99% of their culture is not based on the cultural vestiges as we articulate then 'in law'.

They technically have some institutions which mirror 'Western Liberal Democracy' but they are not remotely like Western nations in that sense.

Taiwan, Singapore are also technically a lot like 'Western Liberal Democracies' but we can see they absolutely are not, right there in their COVID responses.

They are indeed noteworthily 'different'.

[ch4s3]

I think that's misses my point a bit. What I'm trying to say is that Japan has strong protection for freedom of speech, assembly, and general civil liberties especially as compared to Singapore. I don't know very much about Taiwan. While culturally quite different, Japan has a fairly familiar government from a western perspective, and civic life that seem roughly comparable(IMHO).