Japan's Liberal Research Articles

Party Strategy or Candidate Strategy

Under the single non-transferable vote (SNTV), political parties are faced with the strategic problem of matching the number of candidates to their vote total. Running either too many or too few candidates may lose a seat that could otherwise have been won. Many studies have confirmed that Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) solved this strategic problem relatively well and ran close to the optimal number of candidates. Each of these studies makes the standard unitary actor assumption that the LDP can be understood as if it were a single individual maximizing its total number of seats in the Diet. Even though these unitary actor models have produced an impressive account of LDP nomination policy, I argue for an alternative decentralized model based on candidate strategy. The primary mechanism producing the optimal number of LDP candidates per district is not strategic decision-making by the party headquarters, but competition among strategic candidates. Political parties are organizations and therefore capable of unitary action, but parties are also arenas for competition among factions and candidates. The LDP was not a coherent organization but rather an open arena for candidate competition.

Candidates, Votes, Outcomes: A Method for Evaluating Nomination Strategies in MMD/SNTV Electoral Systems

While characterized by disagreement, all scholarly work on multimember district electoral systems in which each voter casts a single, nontransferable vote (MMD/SNTV) is alike in one way: it evaluates party nominations under the assumption that votes are invariant under alternative strategies. But party votes may, in fact, vary with different nomination strategies. Moreover, depending on how much party votes vary under alternative nomination strategies, a method that considers such changes may evaluate nominations differently than previous studies in the literature have. In this article, I address party‐vote variance, proposing a method that estimates how much a party's obtained votes change under alternative nomination strategies and using this method to reevaluate the nominating behavior of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party.

選挙制度改革と候補者公認--自由民主党(1960-2000)

選挙制度改革と候補者公認--自由民主党(1960-2000)

POLITICAL ECONOMY OF GOVERNMENT SPENDING FOR TRADE LIBERALIZATION: POLITICS OF AGRICULTURE RELATED GOVERNMENT SPENDING FOR THE URUGUAY ROUND IN JAPAN

This paper investigates the effect of political factors on the interregional allocation of the budget to assist farmers in coping with agricultural trade liberalization in Japan. We present a simple model to show the relationship between political factors and interregional budget allocation and empirically examine whether political factors played a key role in the interregional allocation of Japanese government spending for the Uruguay Round agricultural trade liberalization. Our findings show that this allocation was distorted due to political reasons, which was problematic from the standpoints of fairness and social efficiency.

Policy Dissension and Party Discipline: The July 2005 Vote on Postal Privatization in Japan

This article examines party discipline and party cohesion or defection, offering as an illustration the rebellion over postal privatization in 2005 by members of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). It explores the importance of party rules – especially the seniority rule and policy specialization for district rewards – as intervening variables between election rules and party defection in a decentralized and diverse party. It is argued that in such cases, party rules like seniority can help prevent defection. When these rules are changed, as in the postal case of 2005, defection is more probable, but it is found that the relationship between defection and seniority is likely to be curvilinear, and also that the curvilinearity is conditional upon each legislator's having different incentives for vote, policy and office.

Prime Ministerial Popularity and the Changing Electoral Fortunes of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party

This article explores the impact of prime ministerial popularity on the changing electoral fortunes of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). We show that the popularity of the Japanese prime minister exerted a modest but definite impact on aggregate vote shares captured by the LDP throughout the postwar period.

New Dimensions of Financial Liberalization in Japan

This article contrasts the development of Japanese financial institutions over the past 50 years to that of the United States and compares the two countries' household savings behavior. Although reform and liberalization is driving the Japanese financial sector to become more open and more sophisticated, there are powerful reasons for the Japanese system and Japanese asset-holding behavior to remain divergent from that of the United States. One major factor is that income and wealth in Japan are distributed much more evenly than in the United States. Since wealthy households are more sophisticated and better able to accommodate risk, the concentration of wealth in the United States means that, compared to Japan, there are more high income/high wealth households that are willing to take on risk from equity and bond holdings. In Japan, in contrast, there is a much heavier reliance on bank deposits. Even though financial institutions in the two countries are becoming more similar, the persistent differences in income distribution are likely to lead to persistent differences in asset holding and the composition of capital markets in the two countries.

How Junichiro Koizumi seized the leadership of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party

In this paper, we examine some of the ways in which Koizumi Junichiro took advantage of changes in television news to win the 2001 Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) presidential election and become prime minister of Japan. Koizumi adopted a strategy of political populism to increase his exposure in the media and develop a public reputation. Changes in the LDP selection procedure, in combination with long-term social and economic change and political reform, meant that the media mattered more to his campaign than had previously been the case. We use data from the Japan Election Study II (JES II) to show that the effects of Koizumi' media-driven popularity and style of politics reversed the LDP' electoral fortunes in the Upper House Election in 2001.

The Liberal Democratic Party at 50: Sources of Dominance and Changes in the Koizumi Era

More than 50 years after its founding, Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is still going strong. It has become the dominant party within a democratic setting. How did the LDP manage to cling to its dominant position for such a long time? And to what extent has the LDP changed colours under the leadership of Koizumi Jun'ichiro? This survey article attempts to answer these questions by focussing on the three dimensions of LDP dominance: electoral, parliamentary, and executive dominance. It argues that clientelist politics explain a good deal of the success of the LDP in the past. Such an orientation however became decreasingly effective and sustainable in a political environment that has changed significantly since the early 1990s. In the Koizumi era, the LDP managed to rise again to the challenges posed to its dominance by appealing directly to voters, by optimizing electoral cooperation, and by making efforts to centralize policymaking. Whether these more recent approaches to maintaining LDP dominance can be sustained, however, remains an open question.

Electoral Reform and the Costs of Personal Support in Japan

How does the choice of electoral rules affect politicians' incentives to campaign on the basis of personalized support? This article examines to what extent the adoption of new electoral and campaign finance rules affects the incentive of politicians in Japan's Liberal Democratic Party to rely on personal support organizations called koenkai. The core of the analysis utilizes newly collected campaign finance data. The empirical analyses confirm a considerable weakening in the number of koenkai across systems as well as a decreased need for politicians to spend money in the proportional representation tier. These results highlight the importance of previous organizational legacies as well as the efforts of political actors to mitigate the effects of rule change on their election and reelection prospects.

Nation, state, empire and war: Problems of liberalism in modern Japanese history and beyond

Liberalism in Japan before 1945 has been understood to be problematic because of its disposition to embrace elitism, nationalism and imperialism. These problems are often argued to have been caused by particular Japanese impediments, such as its history, customs, culture and system, and accordingly it is suggested that a ‘proper’ development of liberalism as seen in the ‘West’ did not occur in Japan. This essay argues that these problems are in fact problems inherent in the internal logic of liberalism in the modern period, and especially in the age of mass-based democracy and of empire. It argues so by expanding the thesis of Berlin on liberty of 1958, and examining the notion of ‘positive liberty’ in particular. The essay argues that the Japanese case articulates an often-neglected and problematic aspect of the discourse of liberalism, and concludes that this aspect needs to be seriously taken into account in an exploration of a critical alternative to currently dominant neo-liberal visions and institutions.

Factional rivals and electoral competition in a dominant party: Inside Japan's Liberal Democratic Party, 1958–19901

Abstract. Formally organized factions in dominant parties face an electoral dilemma – namely, they need to cooperate sufficiently to ensure party control of government while competing with each other for members. This article examines the efforts of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) factions to reconcile these conflicting interests during the period 1958–1990. In particular, we are interested in how institutional constraints imposed both by the electoral system and the party affected the ability of the various factions to increase membership. Following the literature, which identifies incumbency, the party endorsement and mainstream faction status as important determinants of electoral success, we investigate the relative ability of individual factions to increase membership by refocusing analysis on the party's non‐incumbent candidates. Consistent with earlier research, we confirm the importance of the party endorsement and mainstream faction status for the electoral success of these candidates. Contrary to current belief, however, we establish empirically that the electoral advantage enjoyed by the non‐incumbent candidates of mainstream factions is not due to a disproportionate number of party endorsements, but rather is heavily influenced by their disproportionate assignment to run in districts with attributes that enhance their electability.

Stars and Stripes across the Pacific: The United States, Japan, and the Asia/Pacific Region, 1895-1945

Preface The Beginnings: New Experiences for Americans in Asia and the Pacific Expansion in Asia and the Pacific New Century and Rising New Powers World War I: Big Rewards for Japan with Little Pain The 1920s: A Move to Liberalism in Japan and Turmoil in China The Japanese Army Moves in on Civilian Government The Early 1930s: Japan Expands While the United States Withdraws from Empire Japan Attempts to Conquer China Confrontation Between the United States and Japan The Military Dictatorship Takes Japan to War Ending the War Appendix Selected Bibliography Index

Reactionary Globalization: Local, Regional and Global Implications of the New “Japan Problem”

If the old “Japan problem” was largely economic, the new one closely links economics with power politics. The nature of this emerging geopolitics, however, will depend largely on the course of Japan's domestic political development. Here there is cause for hope as well as alarm. The good news is that, without its economic miracle, Japan's Liberal Democratic Party machine finds itself in danger of losing its purchase on legitimacy. The bad news is that Koizumi's new LDP may find salvation in globalization. In that case it could forfeit, along with the current domestic reform dynamic, any chance of a progressive IR role.

Can Japan disengage? Winners and losers in Japan's political economy, and the ties that bind them

The Japanese economy has long been divided between world-class manufacturers, on the one hand, and uncompetitive small enterprises, inefficient service industries, and staunchly protected farmers, on the other Recent economic troubles have made the system's inefficiencies less tolerable, exacerbating the conflict of interest between the two. In political terms, however, the two Japans have not parted ways. Japan's post-war system bound the competitive and protected sectors to each other through political bargains and economic relationships. And despite enormous pressures for reform, this legacy continues to slow the pace and shape the content of Japan's economic liberalization today. Those groups with the greatest stake in liberalization, such as consumers and exporters, have not always defined their policy preferences in terms of their economic interests narrowly conceived, and have not always demanded liberalization even when they favored it. And when they have advocated it, they have not achieved clear-cut victories but only complex compromises, with considerable compensation for the potential losers from liberalization.

Electoral Reform and the Fate of Factions: The Case of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party

For years, scholars and pundits have blamed Japan's single, non-transferable vote (SNTV) electoral system for the factions that divide and organize the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). In January 1994, Japan abandoned SNTV, and the first election under the new rules occurred in October 1996. If SNTV did in fact sustain the factions, it makes sense that the factional structure ought to have weakened under the new rules. In this article, we provide an informal model of what the old factional exchange between leaders and followers was like and investigate the extent to which the terms of this exchange, and hence the characteristics of Japanese factionalism, have begun to change under the new rules. We expect and find the largest decline in factional leaders' role in the area of nominations, and the slightest changes, at least in the short run, in the allocation of posts. On the other side of the exchange, we find that followers appear less willing to march to their leaders' tunes in LDP presidential elections.

精神障害の場合 : 日本の精神医療とリベラリズム(精神科医の立場から,シンポジウム 日本の医療とリベラリズム-患者の位置づけから共通基準の形成まで-)

精神障害の場合 : 日本の精神医療とリベラリズム(精神科医の立場から,シンポジウム 日本の医療とリベラリズム-患者の位置づけから共通基準の形成まで-)

Providing Clear Cues

The 1993 election brought to an end the 39-year rule of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The major issue in that election campaign was the `political reform' that the government had twice promised and twice failed to deliver. Using data aggregated at the candidate level, the paper examines the question of whether the electorate were attracted to those candidates who participated in the reform movement. Candidates running for political parties standing for reform and leaders of reform groups were handsomely rewarded. LDP candidates who voted for or abstained from voting against the no-confidence motion that forced the election also gained votes. Candidates tainted with scandal and LDP incumbents lost votes. Yet the rank and file of the reform movement were treated no differently than other candidates. Though Japanese voters could not make fine distinctions among candidates, they proved perfectly capable of rewarding those clearly identified with reform.

Factional Competition for the Party Endorsement: The Case of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party

This Note explores the candidate-endorsement process in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Japan during its period of hegemony (1955–90). Even in parties without an enduring factional structure such as the LDP, nominations are often troublesome – witness, for example, the reselection controversy in Britain's Labour party at the end of the 1970s or the perennially damaging fights in American primary elections. Moreover, it is easy to understand why nomination politics is so consistently problematic: the gist of the problem is simply that different groups within a party may differ as to who should receive the party endorsement in a given district (or, in list systems, who should get the safe spots on the list). Group A naturally wants its candidate(s) endorsed (there may be more than one in multi-member districts), but so do groups B, C and D. The resulting interaction between groups can be what a game theorist would call a co-ordination, or Battle of the Sexes, game.

Geld- und Währungspolitische Implikationen der Finanzmarktliberalisierung in Japan

Financial liberalization in Japan has both advantages as well as disadvantages. Critics point to rising market risks and a weakening of monetary control. The study discusses these arguments in detail by looking at the various aspects of liberalisation and by comparing theoretical justifications for financial market regulation with a focus on models of conflict and cooperation, market failure, and institutions and regimes, respectively. In conclusion, all three models can to a certain extent help explain regulation issues in Japan. Furthermore, actual deregulation effects are considered. The analysis reveals that, clearly, the potential for conflict in Japan has risen. Also, there are growing signs of market failure and a risk increase. Thirdly, informal policy influence has widened, adding considerably to these dangers by further reducing market transparency as well as by limiting the central bank´s scope for risk containment and monetary control.