Insight: Having lost its parliamentary majority in both houses as well as Komeito, its coalition partner of 26 years standing, Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party – and Japanese politics as a whole – is in turmoil. Accustomed to governing almost without interruption over the past 80 years, the LDP and its newly elected, controversial leader Sakae Takaichi must now try to cobble together a working majority by persuading one of Japan’s three other opposition parties into a coalition. The most promising partner is the Osaka-based Japan Innovation Party and the two are now in talks. Together they would have 231 seats in the Diet’s 465-member Lower House, just two shy of a majority. But there are big policy differences to resolve before a scheduled vote to elect the country’s new prime minister, scheduled for next Tuesday.
Impact: Given the recent growth of right-wing populism and anti-immigration sentiment in Japan, the LDP thought it was being smart by choosing Takaichi, a hardline conservative and nationalist as its new leader. It turns out that her elevation was too much to swallow for the more moderate, Buddhist-inspired Komeito. Shorn of its long-standing coalition partner, the LDP has been exposed as overly dependent on a shrinking demographic of aging, rural voters. The main thing in its favor is that Japan’s three other opposition parties do not seem to be able to agree on anything, including – as of now -- a unified candidate for prime minister. So, there is a decent chance that the LDP can peel off one of them, allowing Takaichi to become premier after all. Either way, however, Japan’s next government looks set to be weak and internally focused at the very moment it needs to tackle big questions about the country’s strategic future internationally.
