Japan: Shinzo Abe�s upcoming election test
Aurelia George Mulgan
Elections for the House of Councillors, Japans upper house, might well bring back bad memories for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. After all, it was under his leadership that the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) lost 27 seats in July 2007. As a result of that drubbing, the ruling LDP-Komeito coalition faced a divided or twisted (nejire kokkai) Diet with a resurgent Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) under Ichiro Ozawa. In the past, the loss of a majority in the Upper House as well as divided Diets have both been key triggers for prime ministerial resignations. Certainly, the 2007 election was a major factor precipitating Abes resignation in September of that year.
Abe has a lot riding on this Julys poll. While a repeat of the 2007 result is unrealistic (the ruling LDP-Komeito coalition would have to lose around 13-14 seats), it is also unlikely that the coalition will, on its own, gain the necessary two-thirds majority to launch the process of constitutional reform.
The upper house in Japan is extraordinarily influential in Japans parliamentary system because of its power to block almost all legislation in the absence of a government majority. This power can only be overridden by a two-thirds majority for the government in the lower house. While the Abe administration is in this position, it could be endangered if he calls a double election in July.
Because of reform of the upper house electoral system, there are now 32 constituencies that end up effectively as single-member districts, compared with 31 in the 2013 election. In these electorates, every vote counts in order for a candidate to secure a plurality. They are concentrated in the rural and regional areas of Japan where farmers and the Japan Agricultural Cooperatives (JA), including their executives, staff and members, are important elements of the voting public. On a rough estimate, regular (farmer) and non-farmer associate members make up around 10 million voters (almost 10 percent of eligible voters). In the past, rural and regional districts have represented a reliable source of votes for the LDP.
However, Japanese farmers and JA have taken serious hits in recent times at the hands of the Abe administration, on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and JA reform respectively. When a study group involving approximately 50 local JA executives from across the country was held in Tokyo in February, the theme was the TPP. At the end of the meeting, one of the JA chairmen angrily spoke up: It will be foolish to field a candidate from an agricultural organization (JA) for the LDP in the Upper House election. The battle has only just begun. We need to ask our members to reduce the number of LDP members in the Diet. He was referring to the planned JA organizational representative in the national proportional representation (PR) electorate standing for the LDP, but he said that he would call for the withdrawal of this recommendation.
Other indications also suggest that both JA and the farmers are very unhappy with the Abe administration. When Shukan Asahi sent a questionnaire to JA executives in February, support for the Abe administration came in at 3 percent. The questionnaire targeted 145 out of the 679 agricultural local cooperatives with responses obtained from 55 chairmen and directors.
With respect to the Abe administrations agricultural policy reform, 74.5 percent answered that they did not support it, as opposed to 3.6 percent who did.
When asked whether the JA executives would recommend ruling party candidates in the forthcoming Upper House election, only 37.7 percent said that they would, while 13.2 percent answered that they would not
recommend and almost half (49.1 percent) answered that they had not decided yet.
Evidence of disaffection amongst co-op leaders was also seen in the JA chairmens survey that was published by Japan Agricultural News (Nihon Nogyo Shinbun) on January 4, 2016. In this survey, 93 percent of respondents were dissatisfied with the Abe administrations agricultural policy, while only 1 percent highly appreciated it. As for the result of the Upper House election, 75.3 percent answered that they wanted a situation where the ruling and opposition parties are not necessarily reversed, but are of comparable strength, with 50 percent answering that they had no parties for which they had hopes.
One Upper House LDP Diet member reacted to these results with surprise: We were prepared for some harsh opinions, but this is worse than I imagined.
The writer is professor of Japanese Politics, University of New South Wale
