Politics
Japan is a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government. There is universal adult suffrage with a secret ballot for all elective offices. Sovereignty, previously embodied in the emperor, is vested in the Japanese people, and the Emperor is defined as the symbol of the state.
Japan's Government is a parliamentary democracy, with a House of Representatives (also known as the Lower House) and a House of Councillors (sometimes called the Upper House). Executive power is vested in a cabinet composed of a prime minister and ministers of state, all of whom must be civilians. The prime minister must be a member of the Diet and is designated by his colleagues. The prime minister has the power to appoint and remove ministers, a majority of whom must be Diet members.
A key highlight of the 1993-1994 transformation from LDP rule to coalition government was the change of the electoral system. It did away with the multi-member districts and now 300 seats of the 500 seat Diet are elected using single-member, vote for the candidate, “winner take all” districts. The remaining 200 seats are filled by people elected under a regional proportional representation system. For these seats, voters cast one vote for the party not the candidate.
The judiciary is independent. Japan's judicial system, drawn from customary law, civil law, and Anglo-American common law, consists of several levels of courts, with the Supreme Court as the final judicial authority. The Japanese constitution includes a bill of rights similar to the U.S. Bill of Rights, and the Supreme Court has the right of judicial review. Japanese courts do not use a jury system, and there are no administrative courts or claims courts. Because of the judicial system's basis, court decisions are made in accordance with legal statutes. Only Supreme Court decisions have any direct effect on later interpretation of the law.
Japan does not have a federal system, and its 47 prefectures are not sovereign entities in the sense that U.S. states are. Most depend on the central government for subsidies. Governors of prefectures, mayors of municipalities, and prefectural and municipal assembly members are popularly elected to 4-year terms.
The post-World War II years saw tremendous economic growth in Japan, with the political system dominated by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). That total domination lasted until the Diet lower house elections in July 1993, in which the LDP failed for the first time to win a majority. The LDP returned to power in 1994, with majorities in both houses of the Diet.
In April 1994, Prime Minister Hosokawa resigned. Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata formed the successor coalition government, Japan's first minority government in almost 40 years. Prime Minister Hata resigned less than 2 months later. Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama formed the next government in June 1994, a coalition of his Japan Socialist Party (JSP), the LDP, and the small Sakigake Party. The advent of a coalition containing the JSP and LDP surprised many observers because of their previously fierce rivalry. Prime Minister Murayama served until January 1996, when he was succeeded by Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto. Hashimoto headed a loose coalition of three parties until July 1998, when he resigned due to a poor electoral showing by the LDP in Upper House elections. Hashimoto was succeeded as LDP President and Prime Minister by Keizo Obuchi, who took office on July 30, 1998.
The LDP formed a governing coalition with the Liberal Party in January 1999, and Keizo Obuchi remained prime minister. The LDP-Liberal coalition expanded to include the Komeito Party in October 1999. Prime Minister Obuchi suffered a stroke in April 2000 and was replaced by Yoshiro Mori. After the Liberal Party left the coalition in April 2000, Prime Minister Mori welcomed a Liberal Party splinter group, the New Conservative Party, into the ruling coalition. The three-party coalition made up of the LDP, Komeito, and the New Conservative Party maintained its majority in the Diet following the June 2000 Lower House elections.
After a turbulent year in office, Prime Minister Mori agreed to hold early elections for the LDP presidency to improve his party's chances in crucial July 2001 Upper House elections. Riding a wave of grassroots desire for change, political maverick Junichiro Koizumi won an upset victory on April 24, 2001, over former Prime Minister Hashimoto and other party stalwarts on a platform of economic and political reform.
Koizumi was elected as Japan's 87th Prime Minister on April 26, 2001. The New Conservative Party dissolved in December 2002, and elements of it and defectors from the opposition DPJ formed the Conservative New Party (CNP). The CNP joined the coalition with the LDP and Komeito at its inception. Prime Minister Koizumi was re-elected as LDP President on September 20, 2003, securing a second 3-year term as Prime Minister. In autumn 2003, the Liberal Party merged with the Democratic Party of Japan, combining party identification under the DPJ name. In congressional elections held in November of 2003, the DPJ won 40 seats, bringing to 177 the total number held by the party. This result brought Japan as close as it has ever been to a two-party political system (the LDP picked up two seats in a by-election in April 2005). The DPJ's position in the Upper House improved in the July 11, 2004 election, when it won 50 seats, 12 more than its pre-election strength. The LDP coalition fared less well, winning 49 seats, one less than its pre-election strength.
On September 27, 2004, Koizumi carried out a major cabinet reorganization, dubbing his new ministerial lineup "Reform Implementation Cabinet." Key appointments included Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura, who called the U.S.-Japan alliance the "linchpin" of Japan's foreign policy while also pledging to improve ties with key Asian neighbors, including the People's Republic of China (P.R.C.) and the Republic of Korea.
In August 2005, Koizumi dissolved the Lower House of the Diet and called for snap elections after the Upper House failed to pass his massive postal reform package. Viewed as a referendum on his leadership, Koizumi stunned even LDP party observers with the size of his victory in the September 11 elections. With 296 seats, the LDP won a majority in the Lower House; the LDP-Komeito coalition swept 327 seats, a controlling majority that gives the Lower House considerable leeway in overriding Upper House decisions. Opposition DPJ lost 56 single-member seats and 11 proportional seats, a performance poor enough to cause DPJ president, Katsuya Okada, to resign.
Shinzo Abe was elected Prime Minister in a Diet vote in September 2006. Abe was the first prime minister to be born after World War II and the youngest prime minister since the war. However, Abe resigned abruptly on September 12, 2007, not long after the LDP lost control of the upper house in the July 2007 elections in which the LDP's handing of domestic issues was a leading issue. In elections in July 2007, the LDP lost its majority in the upper house, with the DPJ holding the largest number of seats but with no party possessing a clear majority. The LDP maintained a majority in the lower house.
Yasuo Fukuda of the LDP was elected Prime Minister by the Diet on September 25, 2007 to replace Abe. Fukuda, who suffered from low approval ratings, resigned suddenly on September 1, 2008. Former Foreign Minister Taro Aso was the victor in the subsequent LDP presidential election held on September 22, 2008, and was designated by the Diet and formally appointed by the Emperor as Japan's Prime Minister on September 24, 2008. Lower House elections, which decide which party or coalition can choose a prime minister to form a cabinet, must be called by September 2009, and were held 30 August 2009.
The opposition Democratic Party, led by Yukio Hatoyama, the grandson of former premier Ichiro Hatoyama, won 308 seats in the 480-seat lower house of parliament, while the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which had been in power almost continually since 1955, secured only 119. The New Komeito Party claimed 21 seats, nine for the Japanese Communist Party, seven for the Social Democratic Party, three for the People’s New Party, and 13 for independents and other parties. The Democrats had won on a wave of public desire for change exacerbated by the crisis in the ruling party, which has changed three leaders and three premiers in the last three years, and by the economic slump and growing unemployment.
