This is the eighth installment in my general election guide. For an explanation of my purpose in making this guide, see here. For previous installments, see here, here, here, here, here, here and here.The Kinki regional block, which includes Shiga prefecture, Kyoto, Osaka, and Hyogo, Nara, and Wakayama prefectures, elects forty-eight representatives from single-member districts …
Tag: Japanese politics
2009 general election open thread #2
The general election campaign begins officially on Tuesday. In the meantime, here's a somewhat stylized picture I took outside Fussa station in Tokyo's twenty-fifth district.Nagashima Akihisa, the DPJ's candidate in Tokyo's twenty-first district, gives a speech on behalf of Masago Taro, the PNP candidate in the twenty-fifth district.Post your notes and observations from the campaign …
It’s not 1954 all over again
At a press conference over the weekend, Okada Katsuya, the DPJ's secretary-general stressed that because Hatoyama will be winning the mandate for the party, Hatoyama should serve a full four-year term (which, Okada stated, a DPJ government will serve so that it is able to accomplish its goals).After four prime ministers in four years, I …
Tokai, Japan’s industrial heartland — and a DPJ stronghold?
This is the seventh installment in my general election guide. For an explanation of my purpose in making this guide, see here. For previous installments, see here, here, here, here, here, and here.The Tokai block, comprised of Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, and Mie prefectures, is Japan's industrial heartland. Aichi, the fourth most populous prefecture, is home …
Continue reading Tokai, Japan’s industrial heartland — and a DPJ stronghold?
Hokuriku-Shinetsu, favorable prospects for the DPJ
This is the sixth installment in my general election guide. For an explanation of my purpose in making this guide, see here. For previous installments, see here, here, here, here, and here.The Hokuriku-Shinetsu region, comprised of Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui, and Nagano prefectures, has twenty single-member districts and eleven proportional representation seats.In 2005, opposition parties …
Continue reading Hokuriku-Shinetsu, favorable prospects for the DPJ
Tokyo, reversing an LDP landslide?
Tokyo, the center of Japanese political and economic life, is growing more than any other jurisdiction — mostly by drawing people from other prefectures — and sends forty-two representatives to the Diet between its twenty-five single-member districts and its seventeen proportional representation seats.The LDP won twenty-three of twenty-five SMDS in 2005, with Komeito and the …
South Kanto, a (mostly) urban battleground
The South Kanto regional block, comprised of Chiba, Kanagawa, and Yamanashi prefectures, sends thirty-four representatives to the Diet from single-member districts and another twenty-two through proportional representation. Yamanashi, with only three electoral districts, is an unusual fit alongside Kanagawa with its eighteen districts and Chiba with its thirteen. This block is densely urban: Kanagawa has …
"The DPJ that does not do any pork-barrel spending"
Watanabe Yoshimi and Asao Keiichiro, who, along with Eda Kenji are the three "partners" at the head of the Minna no to (Your Party), gave a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan this afternoon to explain their purposes to the foreign press.The value of the talk was in providing information about how …
Continue reading "The DPJ that does not do any pork-barrel spending"
The Economist eulogizes the LDP
In its Banyan column, the Economist documents the rise and fall of the Liberal Democratic Party, in effect writing the LDP's obituary before the party's death.For the most part it is a handy review of a fascinating organization, whose history is virtually synonymous with Japan's postwar political history. Indeed, the genius of the LDP system …
This Hatoyama’s for turning?
As the campaign has progressed, the DPJ has shown that it is willing to be flexible as far as its manifesto is concerned. While it has taken the work of building a manifesto that is the result of a consensus within the party — and which a DPJ government will give due consideration when formulating …
Tobias S. Harris 