Who is a typical PM would be difficult to answer, I think even in the British
case. Macmillan? Wilson? Heath? Certainly not Thatcher, I assume. And if we
regard Macmillan and Sato-Ikeda years as "typical" that might be the result of
things fading into history.

Coming off the top of my head, another way to address the question in the
Japanese context might be to ask what happens if the PM tries to introduce his
"personal" policies against bureaucratic reluctance/opposition, as opposed to
the PM carrying out bureaucratic agendas. Apart from Nakasone's educational
reform, Sato's Okinawa, Tanaka's China, Miki's Anti-monopoly law come to mind.
The relation between Thatcher and the Treasury in the early 1980s might be a
good comparison. The problem is differenes in historical context, but the merit
is there are studies on each of the Japanese cases listed above.

Nobuhiro Hiwatari