What I saw in Japan, over that time, was a decline in the use of English on signs, menus, listings, local postings and the declining use of American models in advertising. The exceptions to my observations have been tourist locations where signage has steadily gotten better.
I saw a nearly similar phenomenon in Israel.
The Japanese pattern of decline began in the mid-1980s as the American Congress held an annual “Japan bashing festival” every January to April. The decline in public English usage has continued to this day.
The same seems to have happened in Israel except that the use of English grew until the mid-2006. It has been in decline since then (the beginning of the Condi Rice peace process) and probably much more so with the rise of Jew attacks by the Obama White House.
I have tried to be careful in my sampling in both countries.
Two things to note in this phenomenon. First, I am referring to autonomous citizen based forces. In neither Japan or Israel is there a change in government policy. Second, this is contrary to the explosive use of English in the world, especially in business... where we now have English as the lingua anglais.
This probably occurs because of the change in attitudes toward America by ordinary people.