Elections In Japan

The Japanese political process has three types of elections.

* held every four years (unless the lower house is dissolved earlier).

* held every three years to choose half of its members.

* held every four years for offices in prefectures and municipalities.

Elections are supervised by Election Administration Commissions at each administrative level under the general direction of the Central Election Management Council, an extraordinary organ attached to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC). The minimum voting age in Japan's non-compulsory electoral system was reduced from twenty to eighteen years in June 2016. Voters must satisfy a three-month residency requirement before being allowed to cast a ballot.

For those seeking offices, there are two sets of age requirements: twenty-five years of age for admission to the House of Representatives and most local offices, and thirty years of age for admission to the House of Councillors and the prefectural governorship. Each deposit for candidacy for national election is 3 million yen (about 27 thousand dollars) for a single-seat constituency and 6 million yen (about 54 thousand dollars) for proportional representation.

National elections

Japan's postwar national legislature, the , has two directly elected chambers, elected on independent electoral cycles:
* The has 465 members, elected for a rarely completed four-year term, 289 members in single-seat constituencies and 176 members by proportional representation in 11 regional "block" constituencies.

are usually held before the end of a four-year term as the chamber may be dissolved by the cabinet via the Emperor. Most prime ministers use that option. The only exception in post-war history was the " Lockheed Election" of 1976 in which the Liberal Democratic Party lost its seat majority for the first time.

The single-seat constituencies are decided by plurality, and the proportional seats are handed out in each "block" constituency to party lists proportionally (by the D'Hondt method) to their share of the vote. Each voter votes twice, once for a candidate in the local constituency, and once for a party in the regional "block" constituency. In a parallel system, there is no link between votes in one tier and seat numbers in the other; but so-called of one candidate in both tiers simultaneously are allowed. If such dual candidates lose in the majoritarian tier, they still have a chance to be elected in the proportional block. Parties may also place dual district and block candidates on the same list rank; in that case, the system determines the order of candidates.

* The has 245 members (248 from 2022), elected for a fixed six-year term, 147 (2022–: 148) members by single non-transferable vote (SNTV) in 45 single- and multi-seat constituencies (most are prefectures, two combined constituencies comprise two neighbouring prefectures each) and 98 (2022–: 100) by proportional representation (by D'Hondt method) with optionally open lists in a single, nationwide constituency.

are usually held once every three years. In staggered elections, half of the House of Councillors comes up for election every three years in elections. The term is fixed, the House of Councillors cannot be dissolved. This, too, is a parallel electoral system. Dual candidacies are not allowed. As in House of Representatives elections, voters have two votes: In the majoritarian election, the vote has to be for a candidate, but in the proportional election, the vote may be for either a party list or a single candidate; in the latter case, the vote counts as both a vote for the party list (to determine proportional seat distribution), and as a preference vote within that list (to determine the order or proportional candidates within that list). The district magnitudes in the majoritarian tier vary between one and six, dependent on, but not fully proportional to the population of each prefecture. In single-member constituencies, SNTV becomes equivalent to first-past-the-post, whereas seats are usually split between different parties/alliances in multi-member constituencies (and in the proportional constituency by definition). Therefore, the are more likely to swing the election result and often receive more media and campaign attention. The proportional election to the House of Councillors allows the voters to cast a preference vote for a single candidate on a party list. The preference votes strictly determined the ranking of candidates on party lists before 2019. Since the 2019 election, parties are allowed to prioritize individual candidates on their proportional list over voter preferences in a . In the 2019 election, almost all parties continued to use completely open lists; exceptions were the LDP which used the "special frame" to give secure list spots to two LDP prefectural federations affected by the introduction of combined constituencies in 2016, Reiwa Shinsengumi which used it to give secure list spots to two candidates with severe disabilities, and the minor "Labourers' Party for the liberation of labour".

The electoral cycles of the two chambers of the Diet are usually not synchronized. Even when the current constitution took effect in 1947, the first House of Councillors election was held several days apart from the 23rd House of Representatives election. Only in 1980 and 1986, general and regular election coincided on the same day because the House of Representatives was dissolved in time for the election to be scheduled together with the House of Councillors election in early summer.

Vacant district seats in both Houses are generally filled in . Nowadays, these are usually scheduled in April and October as necessary. Vacant proportional seats in both Houses and district seats in the House of Councillors that fall vacant within three months of a regular election are filled by : the highest ranking candidate on a proportional list or in the electoral district who was not elected and is not disqualified takes the seat. Disqualifications may, for example, happen if a candidate for the House of Councillors runs for the House of Representatives or vice versa, or after a violation of campaign laws.

For many years, Japan was a one party dominant state until 1993 with the as the ruling party. It won a majority of the popular vote in House of Representatives general elections until the 1960s. It lost the majority of seats in 1976 and 1979, but continued to rule without coalition partners with the support of independent Representatives. After the 1983 election when it again lost the majority, it entered a coalition for the first time – with the . In 1986, the coalition ended as the LDP won a large majority of seats and even came close to a majority of votes. The party suffered its first clear electoral defeat in the 1989 House of Councillors regular election when it lost the upper house majority and had to face for the first time a where passing legislation depends on cooperation with the opposition. The LDP was out of government for the first time in 1993 after Ichirō Ozawa and his faction had left the party and the opposition parties united in an anti-LDP coalition, but then soon returned to the majority in 1994 by entering a coalition with its traditional main opponent, the . The 2009 House of Representatives elections handed the first non-LDP victory to the .

According to a survey by ''Yomiuri Shimbun'' in April 2010, almost half of Japanese voters do not support any political parties due to political inefficiency.

Election of the Prime Minister

Between 1885 and 1947 in the Empire of Japan, the prime minister was not elected by legisture, but responsible to, chosen and appointed by the Emperor. In practice, the usually nominated a candidate for appointment. The and its elected lower house, the House of Representatives, which were set up in 1890 according to the Imperial Constitution, had no constitutionally guaranteed role in the formation of cabinets.

Since 1947, the Prime Minister has been chosen in the (ja) in the National Diet. It is held after a cabinet has submitted its resignation – the outgoing cabinet remains as caretaker cabinet until the Imperial inauguration ceremony of a new prime minister –; a cabinet must resign en masse under the constitution (Articles 69 and 70) 1. always on convocation of the first Diet after a general election of the House of Representatives, 2. if the post of prime minister has fallen vacant – that includes cases when the prime minister is permanently incapacitated, e.g. by illness, kidnapping or defection –, or 3. if a no-confidence vote in the House of Representatives is not answered by the dissolution of the chamber. Though both Houses of the Diet vote in two-round elections to select a prime minister, the House of Representatives has the decisive vote: If the two Houses vote for different candidates (as they did in 1948, 1989, 1998, 2007 and 2008), a procedure in the may reach a consensus; but eventually the candidate of the House of Representatives becomes that of the whole Diet and thereby prime minister-designate. The designated prime minister must still be ceremonially appointed by the Emperor in the to enter office; but unlike some heads of state, the Emperor has no reserve power to appoint anyone other than the person elected by the Diet.

In 2001, LDP president and Prime Minister Junichirō Koizumi instituted an advisory council to investigate the possibility of introducing direct popular election of the prime minister in a constitutional revision.

Upcoming national elections

2022 House of Councillors by-election

On April 24, a by-election will be held in Ishikawa to the 2019–25 class of the House of Councillors. The seat had been vacated in December 2021 by Shūji Yamada (LDP) for his (unsuccessful) candidacy in the gubernatorial election in March. There are also two vacant House of Councillors seats in Kanagawa (one from each class), but they will be filled in a single, combined regular and by-election in Summer.

2022 House of Councillors regular election

The 2022 electoral map sees the LDP looking to defend or expand on the slightly stronger class of its House of Councillors caucus with 57 (as of February 2022) of its 110 seats up, including defected ex-Democrats in Miyagi and Fukushima. The centre-left opposition will seek to defend single-member seats in "purple" prefectures like Nagano or Yamanashi while trying to make inroads into "red" territory as it had done to some degree with the joint centre-left strategy in the 2019 election when it recovered somewhat from the 2013 wipe-out in single-member districts and gained some seats even in conservative-leaning prefectures (Akita, Yamagata, Ehime). However, depending on the outcome of the April by-election and other party changes until then, the ruling parties would have to lose at least 14 seats overall to lose their majority, even more to give unambiguous control to the opposition.

Latest results

2021 House of Representatives general election

The LDP defended its majority, and the LDP-Kōmeitō coalition government continues under prime minister Fumio Kishida; but the coalition no longer holds a two-thirds majority as it had previously since 2012, i.e. it now needs to retain its majority in the House of Councillors in order to control a legislative majority of its own in parliament. The main opposition CDP picked up some majoritarian seats in a joint centre-left nomination strategy, but lost substantially in the proportional tier where it had held almost the same number of seats as the LDP before the election due to the 2020 party realignments. The centre-right opposition Ishin no Kai surged, winning 15 of 19 FPTP seats in Osaka and gaining seats in ten of eleven proportional districts countrywide.

* Proportional tier (11 constituencies, 176 seats), turnout 55.92%
** LDP 59 PR-only + 251 dual candidates, 34.7% of votes, 72 seats (41% of seats)
** CDP 26+213 candidates, 20.0%, 39 seats (22%)
** Ishin 2+94 candidates, 14.0%, 25 seats (14%)
** Komeito 44+0 candidates, 12.4%, 23 seats (13%)
** JCP 25+15 candidates, 7.2%, 9 seats (5%)
** DPFP 6+21 candidates, 4.5%, 5 seats (3%)
** Reiwa Shinsengumi 9+12 candidates, 3.9%, 3 seats (2%)
** 6 other parties (aggregate) 40 candidates, 3.4%, no seats
* Majoritarian tier (289 constituencies, 289 seats), turnout 55.93%
** Governing parties (LDP+Komeito): 286 candidates (cross-endorsed practically countrywide), 49.6 % of votes, 196 seats (67.8% of seats)
** Centre-left opposition (CDP+DPFP+JCP+SDP+ReiShin): 361 candidates (joint in about two-thirds of constituencies, competing against each other in the rest), 37.7 %, 65 seats (22.5%)
** Ishin: 94 candidates, 8.4%, 16 seats (5.5%)
** Independents: 80 candidates (including several endorsed by the LDP) 3.9 %, 12 seats (4.2%, including two winners retroactively nominated by the LDP)
** Others (aggregate) 36 candidates, 0.4 %, no seats

2021 House of Councillors by-elections

One week before the 2021 House of Representatives general election, by-elections to the House of Councillors were held in Yamaguchi and Shizuoka. Former proportional district member Tsuneo Kitamura (LDP – Kōmeitō) easily held conservative stronghold Yamaguchi for the ruling coalition against candidates from JCP and nti-HK party, former prefectural assembly member Shinnosuke Yamazaki (independent – CDP, DPFP) narrowly won Shizuoka for the centre-left opposition against candidates from LDP and JCP.

2021 by- & repeat elections to both houses

The centre-left opposition won all three April 2021 elections to the Diet:
* In the repeat election to the House of Councillors in Hiroshima following the invalidation of Anri Kawai's 2019 election, opposition-supported announcer Haruko Miyaguchi (I/O – CDP, DPFP, SDP) defeated former METI bureaucrat Hidenori Nishita (LDP – Kōmeitō).
* In the Nagano by-election to the House of Councillors, Jirō Hata (CDP – JCP, DPFP, SDP) beat former H.R. member Yutaka Komatsu (LDP – Kōmeitō) to fill his late brother's seat.
* In the Hokkaidō 2 by-election to the House of Representatives caused by the resignation of Takamori Yoshikawa (LDP) for health reasons during the Akita Foods scandal, former member Kenkō Matsuki (CDP – DPFP, SDP) won safely with 43,7 % of the vote against a field of several independent/third-pillar candidates, the ruling parties did not contest the race directly and endorsed no candidate.

2020 House of Representatives by-election

The 26 April by-election in Shizuoka's 4th district was won by former prefectural assemblyman Yōichi Fukazawa (LDP – Kōmeitō). With 61% of the vote, he easily beat opposition candidate Ken Tanaka (I – CDP, DPFP, JCP, SDP; 35%), a former prefectural assembly member from Tokyo, and two other candidates to fill the seat vacated by Yoshio Mochizuki's death in December.

2019 House of Councillors by-election

The 27 October by-election in Saitama to fill the vacancy created by Motohiro Ōno's (DPFP) resignation was won by previous governor and former DPJ House of Representatives member Kiyoshi Ueda who had been an independent since his move from national to prefectural politics in 2003. The only other candidate was Takashi Tachibana for the anti-NHK party.

2019 House of Councillors regular election

Results summary:
* Proportional tier (1 nationwide constituency, 50 seats), turnout 48.79%
** LDP 33 candidates, 35.4% of votes, 19 seats (38% of seats)
** CDP 22 candidates, 15.8%, 8 seats (16%)
** Komeito 17 candidates, 13.1%, 7 seats (14%)
** Ishin 14 candidates, 9.8%, 5 seats (10%)
** JCP 26 candidates, 9.0%, 4 seats (8%)
** DPFP 14 candidates, 7.0%, 3 seats (6%)
** Reiwa Shinsengumi 9 candidates, 4.6%, 2 seats (4%) and gained legal status as national-level political party (>2% of votes)
** SDP 4 candidates, 2.1%, 1 seat (2%)
** N-Koku 4 candidates, 1.97%, 1 seat (2%)
** 4 other parties (aggregate) 12 candidates, 1.4%, no seats
* Majoritarian tier (45 constituencies, 74 seats), turnout 48.80%
** Governing parties (LDP+Komeito): 56 candidates, 47.5 % of votes, 45 seats (60.8% of seats)
** Centre-left opposition (CDP+DPFP+JCP+SDP): 51 candidates, 30.0 %, 15 seats (20.3%)
** Independents: 31 candidates (many of them jointly supported by the centre-left alliance in single-member constituencies) 10.6 %, 9 seats (12.2%, all of them centre-left opposition)
** Ishin: 8 candidates, 7.3%, 5 seats (6.8%)
** N-Koku: 37 candidates, 3.0%, no seats, but gained legal party status
** Others (aggregate: Reiwa Shinsengumi & 5 other parties) 32 candidates, 1.6 %, no seats

List of House of Representatives general elections

19th century

20th century

21st century

List of House of Councillors regular elections

20th century

*1947 Japanese House of Councillors election

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