The Woman Behind Japan’s Rightward Shift
Last October, Sanae Takaichi became Prime Minister of Japan after being elected head of the Liberal Democratic Party, the conservative political party that has governed Japan for most of its post-war history. And on Sunday, after calling a snap election last month, she won a supermajority in Japan’s lower house of parliament, giving her significant power to increase military and domestic spending, impose a tougher line on China and pursue a more restrictive immigration policy. Like Margaret Thatcher, whom she frequently invokes, Takaichi is her country’s first female prime minister and she operates in a political system largely dominated by men. She has already received strong support from President Trump, who she will likely pressure to maintain a hawkish stance toward China.
I recently spoke on the phone with Andrew Gordon, a professor of modern Japanese history at Harvard, about the significance of the election. During our conversation, which was written for length and clarity, we discussed what Takaichi’s landslide victory will mean for Japan’s relationship with China, the changes that have pushed Japanese politics to the right in recent decades, and how this election fits into the broader narrative of the rise of global populism.
Does this election seem significant in the post-war Japanese political context?
The scale of the LDP’s victory is unprecedented since World War II. This is the first time that a party alone has obtained a qualified majority. And this is particularly impressive in the context of the last thirty years, where there has been a certain degree of parity between the PLD and the opposition. The 2005 elections, in which Junichiro Koizumi led the LDP to a major victory, also had a significant margin, but it was larger.
The other remarkable thing is that there is a stereotype, which I think has many elements of truth, that Japanese politics is not strongly driven by personality. And many politicians who have been prime ministers and who have led the PLD or other parties have not done so with much charisma. But Takaichi’s victory appears to be largely due to the surprising increase in the prime minister’s popularity. So it’s quite unusual. Koizumi’s election is the closest analogy I can think of, because of his personality. He had this quick way of speaking in short, direct, clear sentences that seemed to attract people, and he managed to make the election a referendum on him as much as on politics.
But it’s really unusual. I was in Japan from October to part of January. And the gap between Takaichi’s popularity and that of his party appeared to be as high, if not higher, than it has ever been between a prime minister and his party. Usually, the popularity levels of the Prime Minister and the party are close. And sometimes the popularity of the Prime Minister is undervalued compared to that of the party. The big question, then, was whether Takaichi could, individually, raise the profile and increase support for the LDP. And she succeeded.
Do you think it’s useful to view Takaichi’s success through the prism of the rise of right-wing nationalism across the world?
There is no doubt that this is absolutely part of the story. And the surprising success of the far-right Sanseito party in last summer’s elections to the House of Councilors, which determines the makeup of the upper house of Parliament, appears to stem from its xenophobic, hardline, anti-immigrant and anti-foreigner attitude, which is in line with what we are seeing not only in this country, but in a growing number of countries. So it seemed pretty clear that the PLD was going to try to move in that direction and co-opt that support from the far right, which is a political strategy that the PLD has been very good at in the past. They will orient their own policies in the direction of the new sentiment among voters, both on the right and on the left. The best example in favor of the other direction occurred in the 1970s and 1980s, when environmental protection was very popular among the political left and center-left, and the PLD effectively moved in that direction and co-opted it. But they are moving at the moment, particularly when it comes to immigration.
The other major problem is the economy and inflation. And while it’s hard to believe that anyone had a good answer for reducing inflation over the past three years, including the LDP, no one else seemed to have a compelling argument for what they were going to do. So the voters seemed to be saying, “OK, well, this new person, let’s give him a chance.” »
Well, growing nationalism and hostility toward immigrants, combined with concerns about inflation, are obviously a widespread political reality. But, in this case, the Party that benefited was the largest and most successful party in postwar Japan, while in other countries, older, more established parties struggled.
RIGHT. However, the other aspect of Takaichi’s rise that doesn’t exactly fit with the global rightward drift is his hawkishness. As we see in the United States, much of this rightward drift has been isolationist.
We’ll see about that, but keep going.
Yes, maybe it didn’t happen that way here in the United States. But it is interesting to see how easily Takaichi was willing to provoke China. Last year, in response to a question from a lawmaker, she said the Japanese government would act to defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack. His response is different from how it was publicly stated. I think what she meant, which also would have been provocative, was that Japan would defend Taiwan because it has an alliance with the United States, which of course would be involved. His response amounted to saying that we would stand with the United States, but that remained implicit. So it was a very provocative statement, although no one really knows what the United States will do these days, because Takaichi could have, if she wanted, signaled to the Chinese government not to mess with Taiwan through a back channel and easily avoided all this fuss. But because she said it publicly in front of the National Legislature, it caused the Chinese to react with fury.
