On August 30th after a whirlwind campaign the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) won a landslide victory in the nation’s parliamentary elections. The DPJ and its leader Yukio Hatoyama now hold the majority of seats in the lower house of Japan’s parliament and have displaced the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) led by Prime Minister Taro Aso. During the campaign the DPJ depicted Hatoyama as the “Japanese Obama,” promising expulsion of the old political guard and sweeping changes to domestic and foreign policies. Now that the election is won, analysts are wondering just how many of those promises will be kept and how they will affect Japan’s relationship with the United States.
The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan had been dominant in Japanese government, for all but eleven months, since 1955. During this time, the government became one of the most notoriously bloated and intractable bureaucracies in the world. The LDP-led government buried all lawmaking activity in hours of political ritual and under a burden of precedent, discouraging innovation. However, few challenged the these policies as Japan’s economy skyrocketed in the “bubble” days of the 1980s. Even in more recent years, following the economic collapses of the 1990s and 2008, the conservative LDP continued on as if it was still the 1980s. The parliament passed policies that discouraged immigration, put taxpayer money towards endless (and often needless) public works projects, and paid official visits to Japan’s controversial Yasukuni Shrine, which reveres all Japanese soldiers killed in service, including convicted war criminals. Relations with other East Asian nations such as China and South Korea have been chilly partially based on issues such as Japan’s endorsement of revisionist WWII history textbooks, and Japan’s downright antagonistic relationship with North Korea has been well documented.
Conservative, slow-moving government has been the standard in Japan for 55 years. Why the sudden clamor for change now? The Japanese economy is at its worst ebb since World War II, with unemployment at a record high. The huge companies that Japan was known for in the 20th century can no longer guarantee lifetime employment, liberal expense accounts, and a pension for all its workers as it could in the 1980’s. Japan’s extremely low birthrate (about 7/1000 in 2008 compared with the US’s 14/1000) has ensured that as baby boomers age out of the workforce and go on government pensions, there are not enough younger workers to pay taxes and keep the system going. A shrinking workforce will also contribute to the further decline of Japan’s economy, setting Japan, the former industrial powerhouse of Asia, in stark contrast with the rise of China. In responding to these crises, the LDP-led government seemed to be spinning its wheels, going through three seemingly interchangeable prime ministers in three years, but otherwise changing little. Enter Hatoyama and the DPJ, promising to put ordinary people ahead of industrial and business interests. The party offered tax cuts, expanded social security, and even monetary support to families in order to encourage families to have more children. Above all, the DPJ cast itself as the mirror opposite of the LPD, even if some election-time promises and predictions contradicted and conflicted with each other. The DPJ promised change, and the Japanese are ready to embrace it.
Foreign policy experts are now scrambling to predict how Japan’s new ruling political party will conduct relations with the outside world. Without historical precedent (the DPJ is untested as the ruling political party) experts can only base their predictions on the DPJ’s campaign promises. In the experts’ predictions, Japan’s relationship with the United States is likely to change the most dramatically. Japan has long been a key ally of the United States and the Japanese islands are home to several US military bases. The bases are essential strategic locations for American operations in East Asia. The LDP-led government has long been supportive of the US, even during the Bush Administration when world criticism of the United States and its foreign policy reached a zenith. During this time, Japan offered money and manpower to American-led campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq despite a constitutional ban against engaging in military operations, an action critics branded as hypocritical on the parts of both Japan and the US. Hatoyama has said that he will put an end to this type of military support and reassess official acceptance of US military on Japanese soil. He also has stated that he intends to pursue better relations with other East Asian nations such as China.
These are bold proposals. However, the lack of detail and specifics, coupled with official backpedaling and hedging, lessen the impact. Hatoyama has been quick to assert that he wishes to maintain a close relationship with the United States while he pursues these closer relationships with nations like China. This is a good idea. A continued close relationship is advantageous for both the US and Japan. Japan remains a key strategic outpost for American forces in Asia. Without an official standing army, Japan has appealed to the US and the UN for help in dealing with North Korea as Kim Jong Il threatens the country with missile tests and nuclear aspirations. Japanese commercial interests enjoy a unique American “umbrella” over business transactions abroad. The Obama administration would welcome a more compromising Japanese government, more open to dealing with China and negotiating with North Korea, in place of the rigid, stubborn tactics of the LDP. However, that is as much certainty as experts can have about Japan’s foreign policy in the near future.
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