With the general resignation of the Cabinet led by Shikoku on October 21, the Shikoku regime came to an end after 386 days. That afternoon, Shikoku was elected the first female prime minister in the history of Japanese Congress.
Unlike Shigeru Ishiba, who failed to reach half of the first round of voting in the House of Representatives more than a year ago and needed to rely on a simple majority to win in the second round of elections, takaichi sanae relied on the support of his new ruling partner, the right-wing Japanese Reform Association, to win more than half of the 237 votes in the first round of voting in the House of Representatives and won successfully.
However, the high-market early prime minister's path is actually going down and down.
On October 21, local time, during the meeting of the House of Representatives of the Japanese Parliament, the Japanese prime minister was elected.
Break the "unitary vertical" with "even horizontal"
On October 10th, six days after sanae takaichi defeated Koizumi Shinjiro and was elected president of the Liberal Democratic Party, the 26-year-old ruling coalition between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito Party collapsed. According to the usual practice, the ruling party will start the prime minister election process four to five days after the new leader is elected. The "long waiting period" means that this prime minister election is unusual.
Out of caution about the extreme right-wing colour of the high market, the "middle" self-government party expressed doubts to the self-government party on October 4 about the policy put forward in the campaign around the high market early, hoping that the self-government party can clarify on the following three issues: first, whether money can be banned from political interference; second, whether it can be guaranteed that the prime minister after taking office does not worship Yogyakarta; third, whether it can safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of foreigners.
The first point clearly refers directly to the old Abe’s in the district of the black gold scandal of the self-democratic party. The old Abe’s and Ma’s are like the “two legs” that support the president of the high city. The second and third articles are the “God’s Signs” of extreme nationalism in Japan, and abandon these two articles are no different from the coat of the extreme right.
Senator Shigeharu Aoyama, who supported Takaichi Sanae in the presidential election, later disclosed that Takaichi Sanae's camp was ready to cut its seats with Komeito Party at that time. However, takaichi sanae's initial partner was not the Japan Reform Association, but Yuichiro Tamaki, the leader of the National Democratic Party.
There is no wall in the world that does not pass through the wind. After receiving the news that the self-government party is engaged in "top-top diplomacy", the commonwealth party eventually placed a sign to the high-market early-money, demanding that the self-government party make substantive responses on the three questions as soon as possible. However, in addition to ensuring that it does not visit the Yogyakarta Shrine in the autumn, the high-market early-money still needs collective discussion within the party to continue to implement the delay tactics. After 26 years of cooperation, the commonwealth party that knows the self-government party's decision-making process clearly understands the calculations of the high-market early-money, finally made the decision to withdraw from the ruling alliance.
The largest opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party, also has insight into takaichi sanae's trend of wooing the National Democratic Party. Noda Yoshihiko, the senior and former prime minister of Takaichi Sanae's Panasonic School of Politics and Economics, took a slant sword, offering a condition that Takaichi Sanae could not give: supporting Yuichiro Tamaki, the leader of the small party, as prime minister with the respect of the big party. You know, among the 465-seat House of Representatives, the National Democratic Party has only 27 seats, or even less than one tenth of the total seats. Such favorable conditions made Yuichiro Tamaki hot-headed for a while, and excitedly told the media that he was ready to become prime minister. Coupled with the announcement of the Komeito Party's withdrawal from the ruling coalition on the same day, takaichi sanae's road to prime minister took a sharp turn for the worse.
But after a night of digging, Yummy Yummy realized clearly that joint rule with the Constitutional Democratic Party faced at least two major problems. First, even if the Constitutional Democratic Party and the National Democratic Party were combined, there were only 175 seats in the House of Representatives and still not as many as 196 seats in the People's Party, so it was necessary to find a third party with enough seats to join the Japanese Socialist Party Cabinet. More importantly, in the history of the Japanese Constitutional Party, the small party's lead in the formation of the government was more like a sweet poison for the Japanese socialist system after the party went down the valley. In 1994, Yummy Yummy Yummy issued a statement in the House of Representatives that after waking up, "Jummy Yummy will
From the perspective of the political spectrum, the Japan Reform Association is a right-wing party that started as a populist party, and it has a considerable degree of fit with sanae takaichi, who has slipped to the far right. Unlike the National Democratic Party, which has been rising steadily in the 2024 House of Representatives election and the 2025 Senate election, the Reform Association has fallen into a bottleneck in the process of transforming from the Osaka Reform Association with Kansai as its main stronghold to the national political party Reform Association. In the 2024 House of Representatives election based on the ruling party, the Reform Association is one of the few non-left opposition parties that "does not increase but decreases" in seats. At present, the Japan Reform Association urgently needs some opportunities to make changes.
New bottles of old wine.
In fact, Vichy has long been discussing the possibility of cooperation with the self-government party, but the previously chosen negotiator looks more like the future prime minister of the country. It is because of the black history of friendship with the enemy, the Japanese Vichy is not the first choice for the high market. But when the high market turns its head to seek help, the situation is no longer the same.
The cooperation between Shinjiro Koizumi and the Reform Council is based on the ruling alliance between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito Party. The participation of the Reform Council is the icing on the cake. After the Komeito Party withdrew from the ruling coalition, the Reform Council was a timely aid to the Liberal Democratic Party regime, and the asking prices were naturally very different. Perhaps the Komeito Party learned its inspiration from the conclusion of "waving a wave of hands without taking away a cloud" in its 26-year cooperative relationship, and the Reform Association chose the "cooperation outside the cabinet" approach to join forces with the Liberal Democratic Party.
In fact, the seat of the cabinet is only a vassal of the cabinet, and the seat of the cabinet is dissolved. What the Reform Association wants is a more institutionalized irreversible guarantee. First, strengthen the party's basic plan, and implement the long-standing idea of creating "Osaka Capital" advocated by the Reform Association to a concrete level in the form of building a deputy capital. The second is to comply with public opinion and reduce the number of seats of members of Congress. Once these policies are launched, the funds spent are in tens of billions, so they cannot be easily turned around. In addition, not joining the cabinet also leaves room for the Reform Association to overthrow the cabinet, thus grasping the sword of Shang Fang that forces the Liberal Democratic Party to fulfill the cooperation agreement.
In addition to the cooperation on the table, the distribution of constituencies is the core issue of political party cooperation, which is also the key to the future growth and decline of political party power. After years of running-in, the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito Party have completed the division of constituencies, supporting each other in distinct constituencies. However, there are many overlapping constituencies between the Reform Association and the Liberal Democratic Party, so the grassroots of the Liberal Democratic Party are worried that cooperation with the Reform Association means that the Liberal Democratic Party will hand over the Kansai region to others. Such a situation will undoubtedly weaken the future ruling base of Takaichi Sanae and even the Liberal Democratic Party.
However, if you are burning your eyebrows, look at your eyes first. Takashi Saami was finally elected as prime minister without danger through cooperation with the populist right-wing party Reform Society. This joint efforts have also gradually clarified the policy of the Gaoshi Cabinet, that is, to cater to the populist and continue to turn right. The characteristics of populist politics are that it attaches importance to a single political proposition and ignores the rationality of its policy logic. For example, the expansion of military spending advocated by Gao Shizao Miao requires increasing government spending, while the series of tax reduction policies proposed by the Reform Council mean reducing government revenue. So, where does the government budget come from? This contradiction, which is not within the scope of populism's consideration, needs to be resolved by Takashi Zaomiao, as the ruler.
When social contradictions can't be bridged, it is the most comfortable choice for the rulers to further embrace populism to alleviate the immediate crisis. This is also the strange circle that led Japan to war mentioned by Shigeru Ishiba in his views on the 80th anniversary of the post-war Prime Minister. Ishiba's cabinet, which lasted for 386 days, was short-lived, but it ranked 24th among the 36 prime ministers in Japan after the war. Behind the strange circle of "one prime minister a year" is public opinion as elusive as flowing water.
Takashi Saami is Japan's first female prime minister, but her policies are more than "men are more men". You know,"opposed couples retaining their respective surnames after marriage" and "only men can become emperors", Takashi Saami's many facade policies are regarded as the most conservative ideas of older male voters in Japan. When the novelty of the first female prime minister ejects, the trick of "old wine in new bottles" will be exposed. At that time, how far contradictory policies can be persisted will determine Takichi Haramu's career as prime minister and even Japan's future direction.
(Li Ruoyu is an associate researcher in the Department of World History at Sichuan University and a director of the Chinese Japan Society; Zhang Bo is an associate professor at the Center for Russian Studies at Henan University and a director of the Chinese Japan Society)
Author: Li Ruoyu, Zhang Bo
Edited by:徐方清