The Japanese leader’s election gambit, fueled by the power of her personality and some unlikely help from young voters consumed by “Sanamania,” appears to have paid off.
Japan’s conservative prime minister Sanae Takaichi has won a landslide victory after she gambled on a high-stakes snap election.
Takaichi, who took office in October after being elected leader of the governing Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), surpassed the 310 seats needed for a supermajority in the 465-seat lower house, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported from the official election count on Sunday evening. The supermajority allows her ruling coalition to override the upper house, where it lacks a majority.
An NHK exit poll as voting ended earlier on Sunday projected the LDP would win between 274 and 326 seats. The party and its coalition partner Ishin were projected to win a combined 302-366 seats, as voters turned out amid freezing temperatures in a rare winter election.
Why are the Japanese leaning ultra-nationalist conservative?
I kind of get it in the States. The US has always leaned fundamentalist religious and more conservo-libertarian, more skeptical of federal government.
I kind of get it elsewhere, like the UK or Brazil.
But Japan? I thought they were… more urban? I thought work burnout + a population age cliff was their existential crisis, so why would they vote for less immigration and less control over that, unless I’m misunderstanding the platform?
Japan is ultra racist. Always has been. It probably has something to do with them living on islands, separated from other ethnic groups.
“Why would the country spawned from the Japanese Empire without significant reeducation against fascism descend towards fascism…”
They seem heavy into their culture and traditions. Foreigners always destroy that stuff.
They are pretty close to North-Korea which has nukes. They feel only ultra-nationalist conservatives will defend them well against NK & China.
Also the US is their major ally and turned right wing as well.
By all indications, cost of living and stagnant wages are the highest priority across the board. Overtourism is usually second or third. NK is hardly a consideration. China (and even Russia) are higher but mostly among ultranationalists due to territory disputes and Chinese investors buying up property.
Cult of personality + foreigners bad. LDP went further right since Sanseito and other anti-foreigner-spewing parties took a chunk of their voters in the last election. This correctly showed that they would go back to LDP (though Sanseito still lives).
The main opposition, CDP, merged with Komeito, LDP’s former coalition partner, to form a new centerist party (mostly to the right of the former CDP). Komeito has ties to Sokka Gakkai which, in my personal opinion, is a cult. This put off people voting on any of their new candidates. They also didn’t have time to really solidify things since the election came so fast (I suspect this was either very last-minute or not fully baked by the time the election was called).
Some other parties did get more seats. Team Mirai was one, though they seem to also have a bit of a vague platform in some regards and, at worst, may turn out to be DOGE-like techbros. Time will tell.
For parties left of center, with the CDP being gone, there are only a couple. The JCP (Japanese Communist Party) is not actually a communist party anymore but stubbornly refuse to rebrand and people are still scared of them (they’re more social democrats or somewhere thereabouts).
This seems like a good overview, thanks.
Japan is more or less the Israel of East Asia.