(Japanese original version is posted to Diamond Online on November 30, 2021)

Abstract 

The presidential election of the Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) was held on 30 November to choose a successor to Yukio Edano, who resigned following his disastrous defeat in the general election. Former Prime Minister's aide Seiji Osaka, Parliamentary Vice-Chairman Junya Ogawa, Parliamentary Research Council Chairman Kenta Izumi and former Deputy Health, Labour and Welfare Minister Tomonami Nishimura are the candidates. To be honest, I have no interest in them at all because no matter who becomes the party's representative, the CDP has no future prospects.

The fatal lack of name recognition of the candidates representing the CDP

None of the four candidates has given a clear idea of the pros and cons of an "opposition unity" with the Japan Communist Party(JCP). In terms of policies, they are not successful to make a clear distinction between themselves and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has made a big left turn with its call for "new capitalism" (Article Vol. 288, p. 5).

What is more serious is that for most people, except those who know a lot about politics, all four are probably only known to the extent of "Who is this guy?" This is a pity, because it contrasts with the LDP, which has a large number of politicians, both senior and younger, with strong personalities and well known to the public.

The CDP also has politicians who are well known to the public. These include former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, former Deputy Prime Minister Katsuya Okada, former Foreign Minister Koichiro Genba, former Finance Minister Jun Azumi and former Democratic Progressive Party leader Renho. However, they say they are not allowed to run because of the "image of the former DPJ government". This seems strange.

You might say they are the "old generation". However, they are of the same generation as the key members of the LDP since the second Shinzo Abe administration. It is too early for them to retire from the forefront. Moreover, the Abe administration learned from the mistakes of the "first Abe administration" and built the longest government in history (Article No. 101). It is for the opposition to learn from its mistakes.

 The advantage of a "liberal democracy", as opposed to other political systems such as authoritarianism, is that liberal democracy can open mistakes and can learn from them and correct them (Article No. 218). In fact, the Liberal Democrats did just that and came back to power.

However, the leftist opposition in Japan cannot do that. Politicians who were senior members of the former Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) government have been eliminated as if they had made a mistake. Even the name of the party has been changed to make it look like the old DPJ never existed. Those who remain insist that they did not make the mistake.

Is it OK for the opposition to be a party that never admits mistakes and never learns from its mistakes?

One of the characteristics of people on the left is their insistence on infallibility, which means never admitting mistakes (Article No. 112). The JCP's chairman, Kazuo Shii, has never won an election since he took office, but he has not resigned his post for 21 years, using various theories to justify himself. But the CDP's internal culture is not so different.

That is why experienced veterans will never be able to return to the leadership again just because they are the image of the "old DPJ" which made mistakes in running the government. It sounds nice to say that the election is about "the rise of the younger generation" and "generational change". However, in reality only politicians who do not seem to have the capacity to be the leader of the first opposition party as the “next prime minister”, are standing for the election. This is the limit of this party.

No political party in the world's liberal democracies has ever abandoned its name or split after one or two failed attempts to run a government. Not only the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in Japan, but also the Conservative Party and the Labour Party in the UK, the Christian Democratic Union and Social Union (CDU/CSU) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) in Germany, have repeatedly taken power and fallen out of power, but they have never wavered in their political ideas, beliefs or policy direction. Even when they fail, they learn from it and come back. This is the strength of liberal democracy. 

The formation of the CDP was a absolute folly

I believe that the formation of the CDP was in itself a mistake. In September 2017, Prime Minister Abe made the decision to dissolve the House of Representatives and hold a general election. Then, Seiji Maehara, the leader of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), announced the "de facto dissolution" of the Party and its joining to the new party "Kibou no Tou (Party of Hope)" led by Representative Yuriko Koike, Governor of Tokyo (Article No. 168). By joining with Koike, who was highly popular at the time, Maehara tried to realise a change of government.

However, when members of the Democratic Progressive Party applied to be approved by the Kibou no Tou, Koike used her own criteria to select candidates in order to refuse to approve candidates who did not agree with her on basic policies such as the constitution and security. The candidates who were excluded screamed and shouted one after another.

This situation led to severe criticism of Koike's "ruthlessness" and Maehara's "laxity". At this time, Mr. Edano formed the CDP to rescue DPJ members who had lost their way because they could not become official candidates of the Kibou no Tou.

The CDP won 55 seats in the general election and became the first opposition party. The Kibou no Tou, on the other hand, won only 50 seats, after which its leader Koike resigned and the party was disbanded. A part of it is now the National Democratic Party of Japan, led by Yuichiro Tamaki (Article No. 182).

The formation of the CDP is the result of Yukio Edano’s action with no vision of where Japanese politics should go and with no vision of how to run a political party. This can be seen by examining what happened after the 2017 general election. 

By using a theory of political science, I interpret the formation of the CDP as establishment of "polarised one-party dominance system". This is a system in which there is a huge Liberal Democratic Party with a large policy wing to the left and right, and a smaller opposition party that is much closer to the left.

Supporters are only leaving the CDP after its policies are taken over by the LDP

After the LDP stole the "All For All" policies, such as the free education through consumption tax hike that the DPJ’s leader Maehara had advocated during the 2017 general election, the Abe government has been implementing a series of social democratic domestic policies that should have been undertaken by the opposition parties (Article No. 218). The silent majority as the middle class and passive conservative supporters supports the LDP.

In contrast, the CDP did not compete with the LDP for the support of the silent majority, but worked together with the JCP to consolidate its supporters on the left. In the Diet, together with the JCP, the CDP took the stance of "opposing everything", but the LDP, which had built up an overwhelming majority, ignored this and passed its policies without amendment (Article No 189).

The "polarised one-party dominance system" is actually a system in which the interests of the LDP and the JCP coincide. There is no communication between them, of course. But it is mutually convenient for both parties.

If the DPJ did not disintegrate and became a party with experience in government and a capacity for pragmatic debate, it would have been a strong competitor to the LDP. It is lucky for the LDP that the DPJ fell apart and joined forces with the JCP. The CDP is devoured by the termite-like JCP and lost its range of policies on economics, finance and security. The LDP are now more likely to force through the policies they want.

An opposition party that cannot engage in realistic debate is safe for the LDP because it will not be supported by the silent majority and will become a "perennial opposition party".

On the other hand, for the JCP, it is better that the LDP extremely increase "conservativism" on security and the Constitution. The JCP, which opposes everything, will stand out, making it easier for it to attract support and strengthen its presence. The LDP and the JCP are both "necessary evils".

What would have happened if the CDP had never been born?

Edano's decision to form the CDP was a short-sighted action without any sense of the wide perspective. How might Japanese politics have changed if the CDP had not been formed? Japanese politics might have been heading for a "two-party system of moderate conservative and middle of the road".

"Two party system of moderate conservative and middle-of-the-road" is one in which security is not a political issue, and in which conservative and middle-of-the-road parties compete with each other to formulate realistic policies, arguing that domestic policies such as economic, fiscal and social security policies are not being reformed enough.

Of course, this does not mean that Koike and Maehara had a grand plan. Koike just wanted to challenge Abe to a power struggle. Maehara had an unavoidable feeling that if the DPP continued to be overrun by the JCP, it would lose a large number of seats in the Diet. 

Nevertheless, after the general election, even if the DPP had failed to achieve a change of government, the leftist faction within the party would have been almost completely wiped out, the collaboration with the JCP would have ended, and the Kibou no Tou would have become the first opposition party.

This would have led to a politics in which security would not be a political issue, and in which the parties would have competed on the basis of what they considered to be more reformist policies. And, beyond the fate of the past, the Nihon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Association) could have joined the Kibou no Tou, and a "two party system of moderate conservative and middle-of-the-road" could have emerged.

The formation of the CDP was a desperate attempt to stop this movement, which had once seemed to be on the verge of becoming a reality. Then, "polarised one-party system" has emerged. It has been beneficial not to the CDP, but to the LDP and the JCP.

What has happened since then is that Abe's government has run a heavy-handed administration, abused its power for personal gain, abused its personnel powers and subjugated the bureaucracy, and caused many scandals. The "perennial opposition" screamed against it. It has been the corruption of Japanese politics (Article No. 226).

And it is not just politics that has gone mad, but the people too. Those who support the Abe administration and those who support the left have become so emotionally opposed to each other, They have lost the ability to think seriously about policies.

In this sense, Edano's decision to form the CDJ was an act of folly. He has resigned as the party's leader, but he should also resign as a member of parliament and leave politics.

The problem with LDP politics is that its policies are "Too Little", "Too Late" and "Too Old".

The LDP is a “catch all party”. It is like a sogo shosha (general trading company) that is said to handle everything from cup noodles to satellites. The LDP covers almost every policy issue that exists in society, from security to social democracy. The breadth of its policy agenda has only grown since Kishida took office.

The problem with LDP politics is not the "presence" or "absence" of individual policies, but the fact that it is "too little", "too late" and "too old" to address almost all of them. This is becoming increasingly recognised by the public, as the covid-19 pandemic has shown that the 'IT' and 'digitalisation' of Japanese society lags behind that of other countries.

The first reason why the LDP's policies are "Too Little", "Too Late" and "Too Old" is that its politicians are getting older. Even Tatsuo Fukuda, the so-called representative of the younger generation, is 54 years old.

The first problem is that they are too old to understand "IT" and "digitalisation". Another problem is that the LDP is the party that achieved high economic growth, and it is still unable to forget the success of that experience (Article No. 229).

Moreover, the centralised political system is no longer able to cope with the fragmentation of policy issues. In areas such as social security and welfare, it is more efficient for local governments to take the initiative and respond quickly to local needs. It can be said that the LDP's nationally uniform policies are no longer working (Article No. 209, p. 4).

Therefore, what Japan needs in the future is not an opposition party that is "against everything", but an opposition party that severely criticises the LDP's "Too Little", "Too Late" and "Too Old" policies and calls for "bolder reforms". Also, it is an opposition party that advocates the promotion of local sovereignty to ensure that reforms are carried out quickly and accurately.

The Nihon Ishin no Kai, which made a breakthrough in the lower house election, has confirmed it will work with the National Democratic Party to transform itself from an Osaka-centric regional party into a national party. It would be good for the two parties to cooperate on individual policies. However, I strongly require them to set up a forum to discuss a "new national vision" for Japan, based on local sovereignty.

As for the CDP, which will not be able to decide until the Upper House elections whether to go ahead with its collaboration with the Communist Party or not, I would like to offer the traditional words of Japanese politics: "Don't take it lightly, ignore it”. I think that the Nihon Ishin no Kai and the National Democratic Party have a better chance of a future than that.