An early Japanese election?

In recent days, there has been speculation that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will call an early election for the House of Representatives of Japan, after delaying an increase in the sales tax. This would be Abe's second usage of this tactic; he called an early election in December 2014 for the same reason, which he won easily.

Abe currently has a commanding majority in the House of Representatives, which is the house of the bicameral Japanese Diet that has the power of confidence over the government. His Liberal Democratic Party has 290 seats out of 475. If you add the votes of Abe's coalition partner, the Komeito Party (a Buddhist political organisation), the government has 325 seats, or slightly more than a two-thirds majority.

In the House of Councillors, the upper house which has the power to block legislation (but can be overridden by two-thirds of the lower house), the Liberal Democrats have 116 seats (with 121 needed for a majority) and the government coalition has 126. Even if they did not have a majority in this house, Abe could still pass his legislation with his two-thirds in the Representatives.

Like Australia, the Councillors have fixed six-year terms, and half of the members are elected every three years. Unlike Australia, however, the frequency of upper house elections does not match up with the maximum length of lower house elections. While the Representatives can be dissolved at any time, the maximum term is four years.

Also unlike Australia, the Councillors cannot be dissolved as a deadlock-breaking mechanism; while the 2005 lower house election was held to break a deadlock over privatising the postal service, the goal was to win two-thirds in the lower house.

This discrepancy has meant that Representatives and Councillors elections have rarely happened at the same time. It has only happened once in the history of the post-war Constitution; in 1980, when the Liberal Democratic government was defeated on a vote of no-confidence at the same time as the Councillors election. The government won a majority in both houses, including an unexpectedly large majority in the Representatives.

The last Councillors election was in 2013, which means that an election is scheduled for this year; July, to be precise. As a result, if an early election happens this year, it would make sense for it to be in July, to reduce administration costs and to keep turnout up.

So, that being the case, would an election make sense?

Arguments for an election

It would avoid a midterm election. Midterm elections can be dangerous for governments, as they allow voters to express dissatisfaction with the government without necessarily throwing it out. While this can be embarrassing for governments if the elections are for subnational districts, it is dangerous if the election is for a house with direct control over the government.

The effects of a general election, at which the fate of the government would be at stake, would likely give the election winner (likely to be Abe's Liberal Democrats) a boost in the upper house elections, perhaps even giving the Liberal Democrats an absolute majority.

This is an especially important reason, given that a recent redistribution has increased the number of single-member districts in the Councillors. Councillors elections take place using a mixed-member majoritarian system; 78 members are elected in districts using the single non-transferable vote, and 48 members are elected using party-list proportional representation in one nationwide constituency, with open lists.

The redistribution has reduced the number of two-member districts, and increased the number of single-member districts. Two-member districts are very hard to win two seats in, as, in a hypothetical race between three candidates (one from the opposition, two from the government), the government needs two-thirds of the vote to win both seats, assuming equal vote division. This normally means that each party only nominates one candidate, and the two seats go to the top two parties.

In a single-member district, however, the largest party only needs to win the most votes to sweep all of the seats. As a result, in the districts that have become single-member, the largest party will win it all.

For that reason, a drop in support for the Liberal Democrats could lead to a more dramatic loss in seats. Abe cannot afford such a drop; losing control of the Councillors would complicate the government process, and would likely weaken his strength within the Liberal Democrats.

It would strengthen Abe's leadership. Japan has a tendency towards revolving-door Prime Ministers; the 2009-2012 Democrat term in government had three Prime Ministers, and the preceding 2005-2009 Liberal Democrat government had four Prime Ministers. Abe's three-year Prime Ministership looks exceptionally long.

Perhaps this speculation of an election has come about because of unease within the Liberal Democrats as Abe's leadership. An election is a powerful tool for party unity; no faction would dare undermine the leader during an election, an election could allow Abe to attempt to get rid of his factional enemies, and an election would provide Abe with a personal mandate, which would make him harder to get rid of.

Arguments against an election

Unusual opposition unity. From the formation of the Liberal Democrats in 1955, until about 2000, Japan had a 'dominant-party' system, with the Liberal Democrats winning around half the votes and somewhat more than half of the seats, and the remaining seats going to the opposition parties; the Socialists, Communists, Komeito, and the centre-left Democratic Socialists. The Liberal Democratic government was dominant, because there was no alternative government; while the Socialists were the largest opposition party, they did not have enough seats to present the possibility of forming the government.

In 1993, the first non-Liberal Democratic government since the formation of the party was formed. It was a broad coalition of the traditional opposition Socialists, Komeito and Democratic Socialists, as well as a number of parties formed by Liberal Democratic dissidents. While it did not last especially long, one of its key achievements was the replacement of Japan's single non-transferable vote in 3-5 member districts with a mixed-member majoritarian system, in which 300 members would be elected in single-member districts and 200 (later 180) members elected in 11 multi-member districts using party-list proportional representation.

This electoral system was meant to create a two-party system, and encourage more competitive elections, as the opposition parties would be encouraged to merge by the majoritarian effects of the new electoral system. While it took a while, in 1998 the Democratic Party of Japan was formed, as a centre to centre-left party comprising social democrats, conservatives and liberals. The Komeito Party formed a coalition with the Liberal Democrats, and what remained of the Socialists renamed themselves the Social Democratic Party. The Communists remained independent.

At the DPJ's first election in 2000,  the top two parties received 53.5% of the party list vote and 75% of the seats. This jumped to 72% of the vote and 86% of the seats in 2003, and was 69% of the vote and 89% of the seats by the time of the 2009 election, which was the year of the DPJ landslide. 

However, the DPJ's time in government exposed internal splits. The number of government MPs collapsed from 308 to 230, with those that left joining the anti-nuclear People's Life, Tax Cuts and Kizuna parties to the left and the nationalist Japan Restoration Party to the right (a much rarer move). While the anti-nuclear party did not perform so well at the 2012 election, the nationalists polled strongly, reducing the support for the top two parties to 43% of the vote and 73% of the seats. 

Since this election, there have been more party splits, with the Restoration Party splitting into two. This has made presenting an alternative government to the Liberal Democrats a difficult task, as there is little chance of them winning a majority.

However, in recent months the major nationalist party, the Japan Innovation Party, has decided to merge with the Democratic Party of Japan. The party formed is called the Democratic Party, and will be led by DPJ leader Katsuya Okada. It will also be joined by members of the tiny Visions for Reform party, which will give it nearly 100 seats in the Representatives and 71% of non-government seats. This would be enough to present a convincing alternative government.

It is worth noting that such an alliance may not necessarily be long-lasting. And this is a key disadvantage of an early election; it does not give this new party time to have factional conflicts, and potentially split. Abe would be going to an election at the time at which the opposition would be most unified, a courageous decision to be sure.

The stakes would be very high. As stated before, an early election would see Abe facing a more unified opposition. If the election is just for the Councillors, he could afford to lose this and continue to pass legislation. However, if his popularity wanes before a Representatives and Councillors election, the government could end up losing both its Councillors majority and its two-thirds Representatives majority, which would almost certainly lead to the end of Abe's party leadership.

So, what will happen?

In my view, it would not make sense for Shinzo Abe to call such an early election. Such an election would be a high-stakes poll that, if it goes poorly, could lead to Abe losing control of the Diet, which would almost certainly mean the end of his Prime Ministership. As for the consumption tax, an increase could be delayed until after the Councillors election, which could give him a boost.

However, speculation of an election is likely to stick around for longer, since Abe may need the threat of an election to keep members of his party in line, as talk of a consumption tax increase leads to a drop in his approval ratings. For this reason, if Abe is sensible, there will be no election, but there will be talk about it.

Japan local elections 2015-the power of (a specific) one

Over the past few days, Japan has held some of its regional elections, to little international media attention. This lack of attention was somewhat justified, as the election results were extremely unexciting. However, they do give some insight into to the support levels for Shinzo Abe, and the significant crisis of support for the opposition.

Japanese local government

Japan is divided into 47 prefectures, which are the highest form of local government. They have powers over things like education and police, but these powers are only delegated by the central government. As a result, these elections are relatively low stakes.

Prefectures are led by a directly elected Governor. Budgets and laws have to be approved by an elected Assembly.

As a result of this, these elections are relatively low-stakes, in terms of political control. Of course, it is better for the government to control regional governments, as this means that governmental decisions can be taken more efficiently at the local level, rather than having thorny debates with opposition local government members.

The local elections are more important as a political event, however. They allow  elvoters to send signals about the national government, and can often lead to destabilisation for that government. A poor result in the 2011 elections for the incumbent centre-left Democratic Party, and was one of the factors that led to the downfall of incumbent Prime Minister Naato Kan.

The elections this year take place against a backdrop of strong support for the incumbent government. The centre-right Liberal Democratic government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, won a very comfortable victory in the 2014 election. More importantly, the opposition Democratic Party polled poorly, meaning that there is no single opposition party or alternative government.

The results

Japanese local elections are traditionally predictable and boring, given that most governors run against only token opposition. This seems to stem from the idea that governors are non-partisan figures that should not have to enter into political battles to retain their offices. The Communist Party has a policy of contesting all elections, but they rarely win single-member offices, especially when they are opposing a candidate with unanimous support from the non-communist parties.

Traditionally, some areas have had relatively hotly contested gubernatorial elections. The major cities of Tokyo and Osaka have had close elections, as well as the large island of Hokkaido.

Tokyo, however, did not have an election for governor this year. Due to the resignation of former governor Shintaro Ishihara, an early election was held, thus throwing the schedules out of whack.

As a result, ten governorships were up for election. In all these cases, the incumbent was reelected. Incumbents were almost all supported by Liberal Democrat/New Komeito (Buddhist) coalitions. Certain governors ran with the support of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ, centre to centre-left). In one case, an incumbent governor ran with not only the support of these three groups, but with the support of the Social Democrats (left-wing) and the Japan Independence Party (right-wing nationalist led by someone who just can't keep his mouth shut). In only two cases was a sitting governor opposed by a DPJ candidate; in both cases, the sitting governor prevailed.

Regional assembly results were similar, although there was a bit more competition there. Liberal Democrats won 1153 seats out of 2284, while the DPJ won just 264. New Komeito won 169 seats (and apparently contested 169). The Communist Party managed 111, Japan Innovation won 72 seats nationwide, and became the biggest party (albeit without a majority) in Osaka.

What does this tell us?

First of all, it tells us that Shinzo Abe is still popular. Abe looks set to be a long-term leader of Japan, something rare in a country with a revolving-door culture of Prime Ministers such as Japan. No one can tell what the future holds for the incumbent government, but it looks like it will take quite an event to knock Abe off his pedestal.

Second of all, it suggests that the Japanese opposition is in serious trouble. It's true that the Japan Innovation Party and the Communist Party are doing well, but these are ideologically extremist parties that are unlikely to win government. The Democrats have a centrist policy profile, but they clearly left bad perceptions behind from their term in government. This perception is not helped by the fact that their leader Katsuya Okada is a former Democrat leader, and a former deputy prime minister.

Finally, something I left out from above: turnout. On average, turnout was 47%, down from 52% in the 2014 national election, 59% in 2012, and 69% in 2009. Clearly, Japanese voters are becoming less interested in politics. This seems to spring from weakness of the opposition, which makes elections a foregone conclusion.

This threatens to create a vicious cycle for the Japanese opposition, particularly the Democrats. The party's weakness stems from poor election results, which reduces turnout amongst opposition voters who see elections as a foregone conclusion, thus reducing Democrat support, thus reducing turnout. It is unclear what it will arrest this decline, but at the moment it looks like Shinzo Abe and the Liberal Democrats will rule Japan for the forseeable future.

Japan election 2014-the day(s) after

RESULT: Liberal Democrat-New Komeito coalition returned to power, with two-thirds majority.

Original post

Well, it's all over, and the result has surprised no one. A comfortable win for Shinzo Abe, with 326 seats for his coalition in the House of Representatives. The result is a gain for the New Komeito-Liberal Democrat coalition of one on the current House and thirteen on the results of the last election.

The Liberal Democrats recorded a big increase in their vote. Under Japan's mixed-member majoritarian electoral system, they won 33.1% of the proportional representation vote and 48.1% of the single-member district vote, up from 27% and 43% in 2012. A very good performance by Abe, given that his party has been in power for a year of relative stagnation. The party did not gain seats, but the consolidation of the opposition vote meant that they did not have the split of the vote between the opposition parties that helped them in 2012.

The Democrats gained seats, in an entirely inevitable result. They won 73 seats in the 475 member House, a gain from the current House of 11 and from the last election of 16. This is a slight gain, but Democrats worried about a wipeout of their party can rest easy knowing that they appear to have a stable base of voters. The party won 18% of the proportional vote and 22.5% of the single-member district vote. The single-member district vote went down slightly from 23% in 2012, but the proportional vote went up from 15.5% in 2012. The Communist district vote went up, so perhaps leftist Democrats switched their district votes in safe Liberal Democrat seats.

The Innovation Party did well. They won 41 seats, down one from the previous House. They won about 15.7% of the proportional vote and 8% of the single-member district vote. Some of this support probably came from Your Party, which was disbanded before the election. Innovation and the right-wing of Your have some common positions, and Innovation appears to have got the majority of the vote from the 2012 Restoration vote.

New Komeito did well. I had expected them to lose seats as a backlash against militarist initiatives by the Abe government, but they gained 4 seats, and their vote went up slightly. They won all of the single-member seats that they contested off 1.5% of the single-member district vote, thanks to a non-competition agreement with the Liberal Democrats.

The Communists had a good night. They won 21 seats, a gain of 13 from 2012. Attempts by the party to moderate its political stances and to shift away from doctrinaire Marxism appear to be working, and they managed to win a single-member seat for the first time since the introduction of the mixed-member majoritarian system in 1993. The party won 13% of the single-member district vote and 11.4% of the proportional vote.

The Party for Future Generations did very poorly. The party attempted to trade off the personal popularity of 'spiritual leader' Shinataro Ishihara, but it flopped. They were unable to differentiate themselves from the much more popular Innovation Party, and lost most of their vote to them. They won 2 seats, 1.8% of the single member vote, and 2.65% of the proportional vote.

The minor Social Democrats did poorly, winning 2 seats. However, with their 3 upper house members, they have exactly enough members to form a parliamentary party, giving them funding and status in the Japanese Parliament.

Last, and almost certainly least, is Ichiro Ozawa's People's Life Party. This party, set up by former Democrat (and Liberal Democrat, and Liberal, and Japan New Party member, and New Frontier leader) was formed after poor results for the Tomorrow Party in the 2012 election. Ozawa was a key member of Tomorrow, and it has been speculated that his multiple scandals contributed to the downfall of the anti-nuclear Tomorrow Party. A lack of interest in the main issue for People's Life (nuclear power) and Ozawa's poor reputation meant that People's Life won 2 seats.

So, where is Japan's political system headed? Well, the Democrats are unlikely to return to government any time soon, but the Democrats are unlikely to disappear, and they are going to be the main opposition to the Liberal Democrats. The Communists will be a problem for the Democrats, as they are required by party rules to contest every single-member constituency, which will split the left-wing vote. Unless something astonishing happens, the Liberal Democrats will rule Japan for a long time to come.

Update Japan election 2014-The end of Your Party

Japan's snap election, which will take place in about 10 days, has already caused the premature end of one political party. Your Party, a right-wing libertarian party once considered to be a possible third force in Japanese politics, was dissolved by a vote of the party caucus on November 19.

The party had been in disarray ever since half the caucus left to form the (you can't make this up) Unity Party. This party decided to merge into the Japan Innovation Party, itself a split from the nationalist Restoration Party. 

This month's NHK poll showed Your Party with 0% support. Given that 40% were supporters of 'no party', it seems unlikely that there is actually no support for Your Party, but given that they were at 3.7% after the 2012 election, it does show how poorly the party is regarded in the eyes of the public.

0% support rates in the NHK poll for certain parties are not an unusual phenomenon in Japan. The Green Wind party (sounds better in Japanese) managed a top percentage of 0.1% and 5 out of 7 polls in which the party were polled gave them 0%, while the New Renaissance Party managed to get 0% in all 7 polls in which they were included. The same poll had Ichiro Ozawa's People's Life Party on 0% and the Party for Future Generations (the Restoration members who didn't leave) on 0.2%.

This election is not a referendum on Abenomics!

The most common narrative about this election in the media is that it is a referendum on Shinzo Abe's economic plan. This is not acccurate. In a hypothetical referendum on Abenomics, there would be two options: yes or no.

In this election, the Liberal Democrats are the yes option. There is, however, no coherent no option. There are many parties that claim to provide an alternative to Abenomics. While the Democrats are obviously the largest alternative, the Communists (the biggest issue for the Democrats) and the Japan Innovation Party are the other two parties likely to make an impact.

The Liberal Democrats will be able to exploit this division. The Communist Party is bound by their constitution to run a candidate in each single-member district, which will split the anti-Abenomics vote. The Innovation Party do have the option of tactical nomination, but they will be unlikely to want to support a Democrat government. 

The small parties, like People's Life and Future Generations, will have no constructive role in this election other than one that distracts from the campaign of the large alternatives to Abenomics.

To be totally honest, there is virtually no chance of a Liberal Democrat loss. The 2012 election has shown that even a small vote for the Liberal Democrats can give them a majority. The Democrats can make some inroads into the Liberal Democrat majority, but I do not think that there will be enough for them to win.

Japan 2014

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has recently announced that he will be dissolving the House of Representatives (the lower house of the Japanese Diet), and will be calling a general election for the 14th of December. The election only had to take place in 2016, and many questions have been asked about Abe's motives.

How Japanese elections work (Feel free to skip this bit)

Japan's Diet, or parliament, is bicameral. The two houses are the House of Representatives and the House of Councillors. Both houses are elected by a mixed-member majoritarian electoral system. The Prime Minister is elected by the lower house, but bills must be passed by both houses. 

Recent Japanese politics has been rather complicated, but there are effectively two parties. There is the Liberal Democratic Party, which is a centre-right party, and the Democratic Party, which is a centre to centre-left party. 

The Liberal Democratic Party is old. It was formed as a merger of the Liberal Party and the Democratic Party (That name must have taken ages to think up). They were formed in 1955, and were consistently in power from 1955 to 1993. 

The Democrats are much newer. For the first 30-40 years of the Liberal Democrats' dominance, they were opposed mostly by the Socialist Party, which never even came close to government. There were three other parties, too. The Buddhist Komeito party, the centre-left Democratic Socialists, and the far-left Japanese Communist Party. 

However, in 1993, it all changed. The Liberal Democrats split, with many members leaving and forming parties with somewhat more creative names. The Japan Renewal, Japan New, and New Party Harbinger were all formed by Liberal Democrat dissidents. 

In the election of that year, the Liberal Democrats won only 223 seats, with 256 seats needed for a majority. The opposition won the rest of the seats; however, the Communists refused to enter government. The Communists had only won 15 seats, however, meaning that an 8-party alliance could be formed with the support of the Independents.

However, the government's hold on power was tenuous. The coalition only had 258 seats, a majority of just 2, It consisted of parties that could agree on little, other than the evil of the Liberal Democrats. Japan New Party Member of Parliament Morihiro Hosokawa, a former Liberal Democrat, was elected Prime Minister. This government passed electoral and political reform, but was simply too fractured to survive. Hosokawa resigned, and was replaced by another former Liberal Democrat, Tsutomo Hata.

Hata's premiership was cut short by the withdrawal of New Sakigake and the Socialists, who promptly entered into a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. This coalition was disastrous for the Socialists, but it threw the now-opposition parties into disarray.

The opposition parties formed two new parties; New Frontiers, and the Democrats. New Frontiers, which was led by promising young backroom hack Ichiro Ozawa, ended up with 156 seats, while the Democrats won 52. 

New Frontiers collapsed between 1996 and 2000, and Ozawa formed the Liberal Party to contest the 2000 election. The Liberals won 22 seats, and the Democrats won 129. The merger of the two parties created great hopes of a two-party system, a political system that had never been seen in Japan.

Hopes of this were dropped after the 2005 election, which was called by Junichiro Kozumi over postal privatisation. The Liberal Democrats won 296 out of 480, while the Democrats won only 113. This election was perceived as a disaster for the Democrats, and it was used as proof that they were unable to form government.

The Global Financial Crisis changed everything. After the popular Koizumi's resignation, Shinzo Abe ascended to the premiership. Abe's focus on textbooks and patriotic education was unpopular with an economy-focused electorate. Abe lost the 2007 upper house election to a resurgent Democratic Party, a loss which crippled the Liberal Democrats. Abe resigned as prime minister, and was replaced by a series of unpopular and ineffective leaders who failed to do much for the Liberal Democratic Party.

The Democrats, led by Yukio Hatoyama won the 2009 lower house election, with 308 out of 480. The Liberal Democrats, led by Taro Aso, collapsed to just 114, while no other party won over 25 seats. Hatoyama became Prime Minister with a record majority.

However, the Democrats' joy was short-lived. In 2010, Hatoyama resigned, following a scandal over an American naval base. He was replaced by Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Naoto Kan. Kan was popular at first, but ruined his chances in the upper house election after announcing a hike in the sales tax from 5% to 10% before the election. (Little hint to politicians: announce unpopular policies after the election).

The fractured nature of the Democratic Party caused serious problems for the party's stability. Ichiro Ozawa, upset at being forced to take the fall for a number of scandals, challenged Kan for the leadership. Kan comfortably beat Ozawa, but the damage was done.

Following the 2011 earthquake, Naoto Kan resigned. Yoshikiko Noda replaced him, and inherited the difficult task of rebuilding both the country and the economy. Noda, despite shutting down power plants, was still supportive of nuclear power, and supported the sales tax increase. Here, Ozawa saw his opportunity. In 2012, he resigned from the Democrats, and formed the People's Life First party, an anti-sales tax rise, anti-nuclear party, taking 49 Democrat lawmakers with him. This cut into the Democratic majority, and the opposition introduced a vote of no-confidence in the lower house. Noda won the motion, thanks to the Liberal Democrats abstaining, but was massively weakened.

Abe was elected leader of the Liberal Democrats, in preperation for the 16 December 2012 election. Noda's Democrats went to the election having won 308 seats at the last election, but only having 230 still in the party. Ozawa had teamed up with anti-nuclear governor Yukio Kada to create the Future Party, which held 61 seats. The Japan Restoration Party was formed by far-right Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara.

The result of the election was disastrous for the Democrats. They only won 57 seats, while the Liberal Democrats won 294. The Restoration Party won 54, only just behind the Democrats, while Future crashed to just 9 seats. After the election, all but one Future members left to form People's Life (another tool of Ozawa's), and the party collapsed in May 2013. The Democrats elected former Industry Minister Banri Kaieda as leader. 

The Opposition still controlled the upper house, but this changed in 2013, when an upper house election gave the Liberal Democrats a comfortable majority, and gave the Democrats only 13.4% of the vote.

Why an election?

The Liberal Democrats are currently fairly popular, but there are a number of political issues that can destroy a Japanese government, Abe is calling this election mostly to get a mandate for a sales tax increase, an issue that very much needs strong support from the electorate. A sales tax increase will take a long time to have a positive effect on the economy, and Abe needs the few extra years that an early election will give him.

The election may also be somewhat of a housecleaning for the Diet. The right-libertarian Your Party, which won 18 seats at the election, has split, with 9 members leaving to form Unity (the most ironic name for a political party ever). The Restoration Party split, with Kyoto mayor Toru Hashimoto forming the Innovation Party (which was a merger with Unity) and Ishihara forming the Party for Future Generations. People First is also on life support, and will lose almost all of its seats. A clean parliament will be easier to manage for Abe.

Party prospects

Given that Japanese opinion polling is utter nonsense, I will not attempt to predict seats shares. Rather, the table below demonstrates an approximation of how the parties will do. I won't write down justifications for all parties, as that would be overcomplicated, but any justification will be provided below in the comments.

Personally, I think that the Liberal Democrats will be returned to office by a somewhat reduced majority. The Democrats, no matter how hapless their campaign is, will just have to gain seats, while the Communists will probably gain seats. Future Generations is too isolated and weak, while New Komeito (Buddhist) will lose seats, but will remain fairly strong.

The likelihood of Japanese constitutional revision

Recently, there has been some talk about whether Japan will change its currently fairly pacifist constitution to allow for the possibility of a larger, more powerful military. While Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appears to have some support for such a change, there are some rather serious obstacles that are in his way if this is what he wants to do.

What is the problem?

The particular part of Japan's constitution that prohibits a large, powerful military is Article 9. This states that 'land, sea and air forces shall never be maintained'. In order to change this, a two-thirds vote in both houses of the Japanese parliament, plus a referendum, is required. I will focus on the bill passing Parliament, and ignore the referendum, for the moment.

The House of Representatives

In the House of Representatives, the governing coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (Abe's party) and the Buddhist New Komeito party hold a two-thirds majority. Looking at this, one would assume that it would be easy to pass the amendment through the Representatives. Wrong. The problem with this assumption is that the New Komeito party strongly oppose any change to Article 9. The table below shows how the forces in the House line up on a repeal of Article 9.

I could not find clear information  on New Party Daichi or the independents, and as a result they are not included.

This looks pretty straightforward. There is a clear two-thirds majority in favour of repealing Article 9. However, the main fly in the ointment is the Restoration Party. First, the Restoration Party is in coalition with the Unity Party (an ironically named split-off from Your Party), and as a result would not be quite as free to support a repeal as this graph implies. Second, despite extensive searching, I cannot quite pin the Restoration Party down as entirely opposing Article 9.In fact, the only party that clearly opposes Article 9, other than the LDP (which I assume opposes it for the purpose of this article) is the Party for Future Generations.

Also, the Your Party is only on record (as I could find it) as supporting some constitutional revision, and its support may not extend to a full repeal of Article 9.

This makes it harder for the LDP. Unless they could entice a few of the more conservative Democrats to cross the floor, the only option is to do a deal with Future Generations and Restoration and Your, or (more likely, given the ultranationalist position of many within Future Generations) with Restoration and/or Your alone. Anyway, the LDP's biggest problem is that some of their members may cross the floor, which would sink their chances entirely.

But, for the sake of argument, let's assume that it passes. It then goes to the House of Councillors, which is the biggest challenge.

House of Councillors

Again, the same table from above, only with House of Councillors numbers instead.

This is also pretty clear. The pro-Article 9 parties hold a majority in the upper house. Most of the parties supporting Article 9 are fairly rusted on, and while a few conservative Democrats will cross the floor, the bill will probably fall here, at least in the current parliament.

The House of Councillors cannot be dissolved, and does not go to the polls until 2016, the same year when a Representatives election will have to be held. If the House of Councillors result in 2016 gives anti-Article 9 forces a 2/3 majority, Abe will have to rush the bill through before the Representatives election, just in case he loses his majority. Rushing the bill through will be very hard, and there would be an enormous incentive for pro-Article 9 members to delay the bill as much as possible.

Overall

We also need to look at what is happening in the meantime. The economy in Japan is still in bad shape, and if Abe spends most of his time trying to pass this amendment, and not fixing the economy, the quest to repeal Article 9 may be perceived as a sideshow to distract voters from the economy.

Abe has been in this place before. In the run-up to the 2007 House of Councillors election, Abe was unable to get the electorate to focus on his chosen issue, textbooks and Japan's history. Instead, voters punished the LDP for its involvement in the loss of pension records, and Abe lost his majority in the House of Councillors.

The LDP are a notoriously unsentimental party, and any slide in opinion polls (or a movement towards the opposition by New Komeito) would probably be enough to cause the party to dump Abe in favour of a more moderate candidate.

In conclusion, it appears that the likelihood of Article 9 changing with the current procedures for constitutional reform in the current parliament is low.