The or in official usage the "Hokkaidō electoral district" (北海道選挙区, ''Hokkaidō senkyo-ku'') is one of eleven proportional representation (PR) blocks for the

House of Representatives House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...

in the

Diet of Japan The is the national legislature of Japan. It is composed of a lower house, called the House of Representatives (, ''Shūgiin''), and an upper house, the House of Councillors (, '' Sangiin''). Both houses are directly elected under a paralle ...

. It consists of

Hokkaidō is Japan's second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost prefecture, making up its own region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; the two islands are connected by the undersea railway Seikan Tunnel. The la ...

and is one of two PR blocks that covers only one prefecture, the other being

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...

. Following the introduction of proportional voting, it elected nine representatives in the election of 1996. Since 2000, the Hokkaidō PR block has been represented by eight representatives.

Summary of results

With eight seats, Hokkaidō is the second-smallest PR block (

Shikoku is the smallest of the four main islands of Japan. It is long and between wide. It has a population of 3.8 million (, 3.1%). It is south of Honshu and northeast of Kyushu. Shikoku's ancient names include ''Iyo-no-futana-shima'' (), '' ...

has only six seats), and the vote share needed to gain a seat is usually above ten percent. In 2000, when the combined vote of the two major parties reached a low of 56.8%, the Social Democratic Party managed to obtain a seat with only 8.9% of the vote (for a detailed explanation, see

D'Hondt method The D'Hondt method, also called the Jefferson method or the greatest divisors method, is a method for allocating seats in parliaments among federal states, or in party-list proportional representation systems. It belongs to the class of highest- ...

). In addition to the five national parties that emerged from the party realignments of the 1990s, the regionalist one-man party

New Party Daichi The New Party Daichi (新党大地 ''Shintō Daichi'') is a Japanese political party. The party works based on jurisdiction and administrative divisions. The party's leader is Muneo Suzuki, a former Representative for the Liberal Democratic P ...

has become a contender for PR seats in Hokkaidō. In the first three elections in which it fielded candidates, it managed to obtain the third-largest vote share and one seat. In 2012, the Liberal Democratic Party became first party in the Hokkaidō proportional election for the first time, and has narrowly held onto that position in 2014 and 2017. Party names are abbreviated as follows (format: abbreviation, translated name, Japanese name, Engrish name): * DPJ "Democratic Party", ''Minshutō'',

Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to: *Democratic Party (United States) Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to: Active parties Africa *Botswana Democratic Party *Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea *Gabonese Democratic Party *Demo ...

* LDP Liberal Democratic Party, ''Jiyūminshutō'' * Kōmeitō "Justice Party", ''Kōmeitō'', New Justice Party Party * JCP

Japanese Communist Party The is a left-wing to far-left political party in Japan. With approximately 270,000 members belonging to 18,000 branches, it is one of the largest non-governing communist parties in the world. The party advocates the establishment of a democr ...

, ''Nihon Kyōsantō'' * SDP

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

, ''Shakaiminshutō'' * NFP New Frontier Party, ''Shinshintō'' * LP

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. __TOC__ Active liberal parties This is a li ...

, ''Jiyūtō'' * HRP

Happiness Realization Party The , abbreviated as Kōfuku (), is a Japanese political party founded by Ryuho Okawa on 23 May 2009 "in order to offer the Japanese people a third option" for the elections of August 2009. The HRP is the political wing of the conservative Happ ...

, ''Kōfuku-jitsugen-tō'' * Honshitsu "New Party 'The Essential'", ''

Shintō Honshitsu Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintoists ...

List of representatives

Recent results

2017

* #: List rank assigned by the party * District column: For double candidates who concurrently ran in a single-member electoral district, the district column contains the electoral district where they stood and the

sekihairitsu The is a method used in the proportional representation (PR) constituencies ("blocks") for the Japanese House of Representatives of Japan, House of Representatives to determine the order of candidates placed on the same list position by their party ...

(lit. "narrow defeat ratio"), the ratio of margin of defeat. It determines the ranking of candidates who are put on the same list rank by their party. * (in parentheses): Double candidates who are not eligible for election in the proportional block either because they won their district races or were disqualified for having received less than 10% of the vote in the district race (the same threshold as for losing the deposit in the single-member district election)

2014

2012

(lit. "narrow defeat ratio"), the ratio of margin of defeat. It determines the ranking of candidates who are put on the same list rank by their party. * (in parentheses): Double candidates who are not eligible for election in the proportional block either because they won their district races or were disqualified (for having received less than 10% of the vote in the district race)

2009

References

* Heartbeats Corp., The Senkyo
Results of general and by-elections for the House of Representatives since 1890
{{coord missing, Hokkaidō Prefecture Politics of Hokkaido PR Hokkaido