Once he became the retired emperor, he made an active effort to become a (high-ranking) courtier allowed into the Imperial Palace, as a court noble (traditionally, people who served an emperor would stay with him after his reign) in order to reform the system of the cloister government; he was ready to take forceful action against the Kamakura government, which had started to behave conspicuously.
上皇になると殿上人を整理（旧来は天皇在位中の殿上人はそのまま院の殿上人となる慣例であった）して院政機構の改革を行うなどの積極的な政策を採って、台頭する鎌倉幕府に対しても強硬的な路線を採った。