This opinion piece originally appeared in Nikkei Asia

Addressing a joint session of the U.S. Congress two weeks ago, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida cracked a joke about how he has rarely received such a warm welcome from the Diet back in Tokyo.

Indeed, while many observers saw his trip to the U.S. as a great success, back in Japan, Kishida is facing tough problems.

His biggest headache right now is the ongoing scandal around the funding of factions of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Kishida's achievements in foreign affairs, such as the successful hosting of the Group of Seven summit in his hometown of Hiroshima last year, and his trip beforehand to Kyiv to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, have often been more than offset by domestic setbacks.

These have included the exposure of close links between LDP politicians and the controversial Unification Church, Kishida's unpopular decision to hold a state funeral for assassinated former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and the chaotic rollout of a new national identity card.

As a result of such troubles, Kishida's public approval rating is hovering at a historic low. With voters going to the polls this weekend to elect new Diet members to fill three vacant seats, the LDP is not even fielding its own candidate in two of the races, and appears to be struggling in the third district although it is usually a party stronghold.

The factional funding scandal could have a lasting impact on Japanese politics. Factions have been central to governance and the distribution of key posts within the LDP since its founding in 1955.

The LDP's factions are relatively unique in that they command members' near-total commitment in respect to parliamentary votes and other key decisions, which are provided in exchange for the factional organization's financial support for operations and campaigning.

Fundraising parties have been an embedded element of the LDP's factional system. These worked in a straightforward manner: The more party tickets politicians could sell, the more money that would come in to their faction.

Individual top ticket sellers would also be rewarded with greater influence by their faction. Large factions, like the one previously headed by Abe, benefitted from selling a large number of party tickets.

This practice was largely legal, as long as the money raised was reported in accordance with the country's extensive election laws. In the current scandal, the problem was that some factions significantly underreported ticket sales.

Such moves, likely with the approval of faction leaders, allowed the factions and their members to evade limits on accepting contributions from individual donors and escape restrictions on how the funds could be used. Abe's faction and a faction headed by former party Secretary-General Toshihiro Nikai are considered to have been the most egregious violators, and their current leaders have been punished accordingly by Kishida.

Kishida has made a couple of bold moves in his handling of the scandal, particularly his decision to voluntarily testify to the upper house's political ethics committee when most other LDP officials resisted appearing, and his move to dissolve his own party faction in response to criticisms about underreporting of its fundraising.

Other factions were then, in effect, forced to follow suit, to the extent that only one of the party's six factions has held back from announcing its dissolution. This could thus be the end of LDP factional politics as we have known it, a development that could transform Japanese politics in a more policy-oriented direction.

As the head of the only faction left standing, former Prime Minister Taro Aso has become even more powerful. He now is not only a critical partner behind Kishida's current administration but also a potential kingmaker for the next government.

Another party figure commanding great influence these days is Yoshihide Suga, whose 2020-2021 prime ministership is being favorably revaluated. He began pushing against party factions long before the current scandal erupted and has been proven correct about their negative effects. As more LDP members become factionless, many are looking to Suga for direction.

Third, considering the severe punishment meted out to some faction leaders, it is noticeable that Nikai and Koichi Hagiuda have been left relatively unscathed.

Nikai shrewdly preempted the announcement of punishments by declaring that he would retire from politics. Hagiuda notably received the lightest punishment among the five top leaders of the Abe faction, likely reflecting Kishida's calculations that he might need his support ahead of September's LDP presidential vote.

The upshot of all this is that factional politics have been transformed but voting blocs will still be important. Kishida's flattening of the LDP party organization could give him more direct influence over many of the party's legislators. The weakening of the factions also means that individual politicians will be able to vote on legislation based on their own judgment rather than the preferences of their faction leader, which could potentially improve the policymaking process.

Yet media reports suggest the factions are moving quite slowly to actually dissolve themselves and dismantle their infrastructure. Only time will tell whether factional politics have been made a thing of the past or whether they will resurface in the LDP in a different form.

September's party leadership vote will give us a great indication of where things are going. Will Kishida be rewarded for rolling the dice on faction dissolution, or will it bite him in the back as Aso, Suga, and others summon the support to topple the prime minister?

In any case, a major transformation is taking place within the LDP, Japan's dominant party since its founding. The results could have a lasting impact on the country's politics.

The April 10 parliamentary elections in South Korea resulted in a landslide victory for the liberal opposition, dealing a resounding setback to President Yoon Suk Yeol and his ruling conservative People Power Party. While the liberal Democratic Party fell short of achieving a super majority, the outcome reflects pervasive public discontent with Yoon's administration amid economic challenges and political controversies, placing Yoon in a difficult position for the remainder of his three-year term.

“In a sense, this was a rematch between President Yoon and Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, whom Yoon defeated in the 2022 presidential race by a razor-thin margin, and Lee won in a big way,” explains Stanford sociologist and APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin. “Now the Democratic Party really became Lee’s party.”

Shin, the William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea and the director of the Korea Program at APARC, joined the Korea Society for a livestreamed election analysis session. Watch it here:

The election outcomes reflect the increased political division and polarization gripping South Korea, which is poised to be a major issue for Korean politics in the coming years, Shin notes. Shin has written extensively about the roles of illiberalism, populism, and polarization in the decline of Korean democracy and their implications for Korean society and politics.

“I have said before that Korea is facing a crisis in democracy. Now I can say that Korea is also facing a crisis in political leadership,” he tells Korea Society Policy Program Officer Chelsie Alexandre.

In this session, Shin explores in detail what the election results mean for Korea’s political, economic, and social policy, its alliance with the United States, and its relations with regional states.

Shin has also contributed to election analysis in national and international media.

Reboot of Adversarial Politics

South Korean voters’ verdict on the Yoon government’s performance reflects deep disappointment and even resentment about some of his policies and leadership styles, Shin shares with Bloomberg News. As the opposition holds a large majority in the National Assembly, Yoon appears destined to complete his remaining three years in office as a lame duck, unable to push for any major policy initiatives, domestic or foreign. We should expect a reboot of adversarial politics in South Korea as the opposition looks to obstruct Yoon’s legislative agenda, Shin predicts. 

Voter turnout for the parliamentary elections reached 67 percent, marking the highest turnout for general elections in 32 years. Liberals expressed discontent with the government by sending a strong message through voting, while the ruling conservative party tried to mobilize its supporters to minimize losses. Ultimately "there were no major policy debates between the ruling and main opposition parties," says Shin in an interview with Singaporean public broadcast service CNA.

Shin anticipates the Democratic Party will likely contest Yoon's stance toward Tokyo and Washington. Speaking with French international news agency AFP, Shin explains the potential return of former U.S. President Donald Trump, who held high-profile but unsuccessful summits with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during his presidency, could add to the tension. If Trump were to reengage with North Korea, then the Yoon government would have to decide whether to shift from its hardline policies against the North or risk friction between Washington and Seoul, Shin says.

The election outcomes could also hinder the Yoon government’s momentum for improving ties with Japan, especially since Japanese Prime Minister Kishida, too, is facing low domestic approval ratings, Shin tells The Korea Herald. "It is unfortunate for the Korea-Japan relationship that both leaders are politically struggling."

Despite facing legal issues, controversial opposition leader Lee Jae-myung remains a leading contender for the presidency when Yoon's term ends in 2027, echoing the situation with former U.S. President Donald Trump, he tells AFP.

Gender and Generational Gaps

The parliamentary election has also brought to relief the tremendous underrepresentation of women and young people in Korean politics. Only 20% of parliamentary seats are held by women, and over 85% of elected members are over the age of 50. The older establishment and the conservative People Power Party have failed to connect with South Korea's young people, Shin says. While the country is a global cultural force and excelling in semiconductor exports, South Korea’s younger people are facing intense competition in education, limited job prospects, and soaring housing prices. “The lack of understanding of the challenges the youth face is contributing to the country's rising generational conflict,” Shin explains via AFP.

Click the link for the transcript of “The Widening Cracks in Iran’s Regime.”
 

Unrest at Home

The March elections were the first held since the 2022 protests in response to the suspicious death of Mahsa Amini following her arrest for not wearing a hijab. The incident catalyzed the Iranian public into a movement calling for the support of “Women, Life, and Freedom,” and sparked the largest and most wide-spread public demonstrations since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. In response, the regime claims more than 80,000 protestors were arrested, and reports claim executions reached record levels.

Even with this repression, people continue to push back, says Milani.

“There are people [in Iran] who are doing what Navalny was doing in Russia on a much smaller scale, and in a much more timid way, exposing the corruption of this regime and these sites within Iran. These defiant people who keep going to prison but don't stop exposing the deep corruption of the leaders of the Iranian regime and their multi-multibillion dollar heist of property.”

Some, like Iranian women’s rights activist Bahareh Hedayati, are even so bold as to openly advocate for a regime change. Even among hard-line supporters of the regime, Milani says there is growing recognition that business cannot continue as usual. 

“In a lead editorial in the newspaper Jomhouri-e Eslami, which Khamenei himself founded, it was said that these elections were a major defeat, and unless that message was heeded, the regime is going to lose,” Milani told McFaul.
 

Trouble in the Neighborhood

The elections also came on the heels of the October 7 Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel, and the ensuing war in Gaza. While the Khamenei government initially tried to use the attacks to its advantage, Iran’s poor economy and its adamant opposition to a two-state solution has left it at odds with both the Iranian and Palestinian publics.

“Iran isn’t really standing up with Palestinians. If Iran was standing up with them in Gaza, the regime would have suggested what the majority of the Palestinians want, which is a two-state solution,” reasons Milani. 

There is a lingering question of why the U.S., and the democratic world in general, aren’t doing more to support democracy in Iran. Dr. Milani asserts that roots of the caution is two-fold: one part stemming from a perception among U.S. progressives that criticizing the Iranian regime could be viewed as Islamophobic, and the other from uncertainty over the status of Iran’s nuclear program and enrichment capabilities. 

The latter is a threat which needs to be taken seriously, says Milani.

“If you read what the Iranian officials have been saying, I think anyone has to be not paying attention if they’ve not concluded that Iran is clearly, unmistakably, threatening to go nuclear with weapons,” he cautions.
 

An Uncertain Road Ahead

There are no easy diplomatic solutions, given the breakdown of the U.S.-Iran nuclear deal and Russia’s destabilization of nuclear policy norms and saber-rattling over the war in Ukraine. Russia, a strategic partner of Iran, is unlikely to be helpful in cooling such tensions, says Milani. But China might.

“I think China can make the regime understand,” says Milani. “Russia can work with the regime in espionage. Russia can help them in threatening dissidents. But Russia can’t have the kind of economic muscle that the regime needs to get out of this pipeline. That will only be China.”

While uncertainties about the future remain both within Iran and in regards to the consequences of its geopolitical influence, Milani is certain the tide is turning:

“These events and this election are as clear an indication as I've ever seen that the great majority of the people of Iran don't want this regime. They might not be clear on how they want to get rid of it and who they want to bring in, but clearly this has been a historic defeat.”

What policy options does the Japanese public prefer, and what might shift its attitudes? These are some questions the Stanford Japan Barometer (SJB) sets out to answer. SJB is a large-scale public opinion survey on political, economic, and social issues in Japan. Co-developed and led by Stanford sociologist Kiyoteru Tsutsui, the deputy director of APARC and director of the Center’s Japan Program, and Dartmouth College political scientist Charles Crabtree, a former visiting assistant professor with the Japan Program, SJB has so far published the results from its first two waves.

Wave 1 focused on issues related to gender and sexuality in Japanese politics, while Wave 2 focused on issues related to foreign policy and national defense. SJB findings fielded in these two waves indicate that most Japanese support recognizing same-sex unions, legalizing a dual-surname option for married couples, promoting women’s leadership in society, and that, in a Taiwan contingency, ​​Japanese people would be hesitant to fight China but would respond to a request from the U.S. military for logistical support.

Jointly with the Japan Program, GLOBE+, an international news outlet operated by the esteemed Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, is publishing a series highlighting SJB findings. Here, we provide an English translation of the first three pieces in this series. Additional articles in the series will be published sequentially.

PART I

How Question Framing Changes the Results of Public Opinion Polls: Japan Barometer's Attempt to Get at the "True Feelings” of Survey Respondents

View the original article at Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+ >

Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+ sat down with Tsutsui to learn more about the findings of SJB, its goals, and how it differs from other public opinion polls.

Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+: Why did you come up with the idea to start the Stanford Japan Barometer?

Area studies have been in decline within the social sciences. Although China research is developing, there has been a significant shift away from Japan studies. In 2019, the Asia Society of North America held a session titled “The Death of Japanese Studies.” It made me think that conducting large-scale research experiments with Japan as the theme could spark new developments in the field. The idea was that this effort would draw attention to Japanese studies and foster young researchers interested in Japan.

Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+: What makes SJB different from other public opinion polls?

First, we routinely administer the SJB to an extensive national sample comprising 8,000 Japanese residents. Another unique point is our focus on the type of questions asked to “sway” people's opinions. That is why we call it an experiment. Thus, one of the characteristics of SJB is that we create questions with different preconditions for a given problem and then compare the answers and see how these preconditions affect respondents’ attitudes.

For example, in the first wave of the survey, the theme was gender and sexuality in Japanese politics, and we asked respondents about the pros and cons of same-sex marriage, looking into what kind of influence the preconditions of the survey questions would have on the responses. We created eight types of such preconditions and randomly assigned them to respondents.

We presented some respondents with prompts about tradition and history, such as “In Japanese society, it is a tradition that marriage is between people of the opposite sex” and “Japanese society has tolerated romantic relationships between people of the same sex since the Middle Ages and the Warring States period.” We presented other respondents with preconditions about the fairness of same-sex marriages from the point of view of constitutional rights and human rights principles. We found that respondents tend to become more supportive of same-sex marriage when presented with an argument that not allowing same-sex marriage is unfair from the point of view of human rights and gender equality.

Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+: Generally, in public opinion polls, we take care to ask neutral questions, but you are intentionally doing the opposite.

That's right. By doing so, we can understand what kind of efforts are effective in moving people’s attitudes. As a sociologist, my research focuses on social movements, and I am very interested in the slow pace of change in Japanese society. Therefore, I want to understand why it hasn't changed much and how we can affect change.

In addition to opinions about same-sex marriage, we asked about respondents’ views of desirable attributes of a candidate for the House of Representatives in categories such as gender, age, and occupation. We also examined how the responses changed depending on a candidate’s political party and other factors.

By asking about desirable attributes of a candidate from multiple perspectives, you can elicit answers closer to the respondents’ true feelings. In the future, we plan to continue conducting experiments to see how the results change depending on these preconditions and the characteristics of the respondents.

Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+: What research themes do you have in mind for the future?

I want to research various fields and have already completed research on Japan’s defense spending tax increase and the Taiwan contingency situation. I also want to investigate topics like AI and immigration. In the future, I would like to open a public call for research themes to investigate with SJB.

Part 2
Do Japanese People Envision the Ideal Political Leaders as Females in Their 30s or 40s? Stanford Japan Barometer Finds Out

A recurring issue in Japanese public discussions on gender equality pertains to the underrepresentation of women in leadership roles, particularly in politics and business. To better understand the Japanese public attitudes toward this gender gap, SJB conducted conjoint experiments exploring the preferences of the Japanese public regarding candidates for a Diet seat. In this article, Tsutsui explains the method and results of this survey.

View the original article at Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+ >

This survey asked respondents about the following six attributes regarding candidates they would like to see in the next Diet:

• Age (from 32 years old to 82 years old in 10-year increments)
• Sex
• Marriage
• Number of children
• Academic background
• Occupation (11 options, including finance, business, foreign affairs bureaucrats, corporate managers and officers, governors, local legislators, homemakers, and others)

When asking the question, we created two “candidate images'' by randomly combining six attributes and asked respondents to choose them in a multiple-choice format. We then aggregated and analyzed the respondents’ answers. This complex method statistically allows us to get closer to the respondents’ “true feelings.”

As a result of the analysis, the combinations of attributes that received the most responses, or in other words, the “ideal candidate image'' that respondents thought of, were as follows:

Gender: Female
Age: 32 and 42 years old
Occupation: Governor and corporate manager/officer

These findings indicate that Japanese people wish to see more female leaders in their 30s and 40s become politicians. Additionally, 75% of respondents agreed that “there should be more efforts to increase the number of female members in Japan's Diet.'' Nearly all respondents, regardless of gender, age group, party support, or the strength of their support for the Kishida administration, favored having a female politician over a male one, and even among those who rated Japan as already diverse, many said they would prefer female candidates.

Based on these findings, we assert that a notable portion of the Japanese population sincerely backs women leaders. Furthermore, if a female candidate is nominated, she will likely get elected.

Conversely, the combinations of attributes with weak public support were as follows:
Gender: Male
Age: 72 and 82
Occupation: TV commentator, parliamentary secretary, financial bureaucrat

These results indicate that Japanese public opinion neither favors older male politicians nor desires people in occupations close to national politics.

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has, in fact, actively supported women in elections in urban areas, including the Tokyo 8th Ward of the House of Representatives, which includes Suginami Ward. The reason is that "experience has shown that women are in demand," according to LDP officials. Interestingly, this sentiment coincides with the image of politicians desired by public opinion (women in their 30s and 40s, not older men), as highlighted by the Stanford Japan Barometer.

There may be an election for the Lower House of Representatives in 2024, and it will be interesting to see how many women will get elected after the supplementary and unified elections.

Part 3
The Liberal Democratic Party's Bold Strategy of Fielding Female Candidates: A "Survival Instinct" Consistent with Voters’ Desires

View the original article at Asahi Shimbun GLOBE+ >

The results of the first wave of the Stanford Japan Barometer match the LDP's policy of supporting women. The LDP, which has approved a string of candidates for the upcoming general election to dissolve the House of Representatives, has been fielding women mainly in urban areas. A typical example is Tokyo's 8th Ward (a large part of Suginami Ward). For a long time, the LDP's Nobuaki Ishihara dominated this seat. Yet he lost the 2021 Lower House election to Harumi Yoshida, a female newcomer to the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan. Ishihara was also unable to regain his seat proportionally.

In 2022, female newcomer Satoko Kishimoto won the Suginami Ward mayor election against the incumbent male candidate. Kishimoto supported mainly women in the 2023 Ward Assembly election, resulting in a female majority. The LDP responded by supporting a 42-year-old woman from the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry in Tokyo's 8th Ward.

In Tokyo's 18th Ward (Musashino, Fuchu, and Koganei), the home district of former Prime Minister Naoto Kan (Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan), who recently announced his retirement, the Tokyo Metropolitan Federation of Trade Unions also held an open recruitment campaign for women only. In addition, there has been a string of female candidates in Tokyo, including Tamayo Marukawa, who switched from the House of Councillors to the upper house of the Diet. That is because LDP officials have learned from experience that "women and young people, especially in urban areas, are the most likely to win now,” according to a senior LDP official.

In the supplementary elections for the House of Representatives and the House of Councillors, women won in the Chiba 5th district of the House of Representatives, the Wakayama 1st District of the House of Representatives, and the Oita Constituency of the House of Councillors. Men previously held all these positions, and the races were considered hotly contested.

Does the LDP have a philosophy that "diversity is important in politics, so let's increase the number of women"? No, not necessarily. When the LDP debated the Candidate Gender Equality Act (enacted in 2018), which calls for political parties to have an equal number of male and female candidates as much as possible, some LDP members protested, saying that forcing an increase in the number of women would lower the quality of politicians, that it was reverse discrimination against men, and that it would also not be a fair assessment of women.

LDP lawmakers were quick to say they were not against increasing the number of women, but it also seemed as if men were afraid of having their status threatened. The LDP's recent nomination of a string of women likely indicates a “survival strategy.”

If the voters prefer women, they will support women. Of course, the LDP is not basing its decision to field women on the results of the Stanford Japan Barometer. Still, the fact that the LDP is fielding candidates who closely match the preferred candidate image yielded in the SJB survey shows how strong the LDP's survival instinct is.

The LDP once even formed a coalition with the Socialist Party, which it continued to oppose as an opposition party. The LDP is tenacious and determined.

This story originally appeared in the Stanford Report.