The public anxiety behind Sanae Takaichi’s landslide win

In the House of Representatives election held on February 8, candidates of the Liberal Democratic Party led by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi won in 249 of the 289 single-member districts, accounting for 86% of them, and secured 67 seats through proportional representation. In total, the party captured 316 of the House’s 465 seats (up from 198 before the election). As a result, the LDP’s share of seats in the House of Representatives surpassed the two-thirds threshold required to initiate constitutional amendments, reaching a postwar record high of 68%.

Meanwhile, the number of seats held by the leading opposition party—the Centrist Reform Alliance, hastily formed through the merger of the Constitutional Democratic Party and Komeito (Clean Government Party) on January 16—plummeted from 167 to 49. Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Innovation Party), which secured the next-largest number of seats at 36, is expected to continue its coalition with the LDP, making the weakening of the opposition plainly evident.

The results demonstrated that Prime Minister Takaichi’s gamble of turning the House of Representatives election into a de facto confidence vote on herself succeeded well beyond her expectations. At a January 23 press conference at the Prime Minister’s Office announcing the dissolution of the House, she declared, “I want the people of Japan, as the sovereign, to decide now whether Sanae Takaichi should serve as prime minister,” and made clear that she would resign if the ruling parties—the Liberal Democratic Party and Nippon Ishin no Kai—failed to secure a majority. She also declared that, if she won the public’s confidence, she would boldly pursue policies that could divide the nation. As a result, the election effectively became a popularity vote focused on Prime Minister Takaichi herself.

During the campaign, Prime Minister Takaichi sought to project hope for the future by highlighting her proactive fiscal policy, while emphasising an image of strong leadership in foreign and security policy. This amounted less to an appeal based on the substance of concrete policies than to impression-building through forceful rhetoric. In other words, voters who supported Prime Minister Takaichi were drawn less by expectations of specific policies than by the sense of hope for the future and the image of strong leadership they perceived in her rhetoric and overall presentation.

In fact, expert evaluations of the policy agenda advanced by the Takaichi cabinet prior to the election were, on the whole, unfavorable. Regarding fiscal policy, many economists warned that it would impose a triple burden of inflation, a weaker yen, and rising government bond yields. The policy agreement between the Liberal Democratic Party and Nippon Ishin no Kai listed politically divisive agendas such as constitutional revision and legislation related to intelligence and counter-espionage, which are inherently difficult to realise politically. Prime Minister Takaichi’s off-the-cuff remarks in the Diet concerning a Taiwan contingency and “situations threatening Japan’s survival” also created unnecessary friction in Japan–China relations. Yet none of these factors appeared to affect Prime Minister Takaichi’s conduct during the campaign or voters’ judgments.

In short, the election result cannot be interpreted as an endorsement of Prime Minister Takaichi’s conservative policy agenda. As many observers note, voters’ attitudes are rooted in distrust of established politics and anxiety about the present and the future, with Prime Minister Takaichi seen as a potential source of hope for escaping this unease.

If so, support for Prime Minister Takaichi does not necessarily reflect a rightward turn in Japanese public opinion or a defeat for liberalism. When anxiety about the present and the future is the primary motivation, ideological distinctions such as conservative versus liberal lose much of their significance, which may explain why the Centrist Reform Alliance’s appeals failed to resonate with voters. How long Prime Minister Takaichi’s leadership will endure depends on whether the Takaichi administration can deliver concrete results that ease public anxiety—something that will not be easy to achieve, whether in economic or foreign policy.

Finally, with respect to foreign policy, as the three major powers—the United States, China, and Russia—adopt strategies increasingly reliant on the elements of power, the Takaichi administration is likely to strengthen Japan’s defence capabilities to deter China while further deepening cooperation with the United States under the Trump administration. Obviously, no matter how much Japan enhances its capacity for self-reliance, it cannot formulate a security strategy capable of countering China on its own. Consequently, there exists a structural dynamic whereby the more Japan emphasises self-help efforts, the more it is compelled to deepen its cooperation with the United States. As a result, friction with China is likely to intensify further.

Likewise, Prime Minister Takaichi, who sees herself as the political successor to the late Shinzo Abe, champions the “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” (FOIP) and cooperation through the QUAD (Japan, Australia, India, and the United States) as central pillars of her strategy to counterbalance China. Yet in an international environment where US–China rivalry has already eroded the rules-based international order, the significance of the QUAD, particularly if it includes a Trumpian America, may well diminish. Japan, Australia, and India should instead seek to recalibrate this objective by deepening their cooperation through a middle-power agenda–setting perspective.

Although trade and investment with China have been on a downward trend in recent years, the Chinese market will remain of critical importance for many Japanese companies for the foreseeable future. Also, given its geographic proximity to China, Japan cannot leave its security dilemma unaddressed indefinitely. Prime Minister Takaichi’s effort to frame a tough stance toward China as evidence of strong leadership risks pushing Japanese diplomacy into a narrow path lacking genuine strategic imagination.

Yoshihide Soeya is Professor Emeritus, Keio University

Image: x.com/takaichi_sanae