By Eva Cheng
Japan's main capitalist party, the Liberal Democratic Party, gained ground in the October 20 lower house election, increasing its seats from 211 in a 493-seat house to 239 out of 500.
The gain is not big enough for a working majority, let alone the control the LDP had during the 38 uninterrupted years it was Japan's ruling party, ending in 1993. But the LDP will find it easier to form a coalition government, on the back of a very fractured and weaker opposition.
Paradoxically, the Japan Communist Party made significant advances too, nearly doubling its seats from 15 to 26. The near 7 million votes for the JCP is the highest ever for the party (in spite of the lowest ever voter turnout, 59.6% compared to 67% in 1993), pushing its share of total votes to 12%.
The shift from a multi-member constituency system to a mix of first-past-the-post constituencies (for 300 seats) and proportional representation (for 200 seats) in this election made it harder for smaller parties to win seats. Despite this, the JCP scored an unexpected two seats in the first-past-the-post category.
The JCP's seats enable it to submit non-budgetary bills. Only parties with more than 21 seats can do so.
No other party increased its seats. Shinshinto's (New Frontier Party) seats dropped from 160 to 156, the Social Democratic Party from 30 to 15 and the New Party Sakigake from nine to two. Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) — formed in September from splits from Sakigake, the SDP and the NFP — retained its 52 seats.
The LDP's gains do not reflect an increase in voters' confidence in it. Rather they reflect voters' disorientation and the perceived lack of an alternative, following four prime ministers and five cabinets in three years. Given the persisting crisis in the Japanese economy, there is no material basis for a decisive LDP comeback or major swings to other ruling-class parties. The main burden of the crisis is borne by the working class.
Insufficient profitability, cheaper labour costs in the Third World and a strong yen —which, to a large extent, is a result of US pressure for a larger market share — have led to a major hollowing out of industries, leading to increased unemployment. The bursting in the early 1990s of Japan's bubble economy (acute inflation of financial assets in excess of the real economy) and the legacy of bad loans by financial institutions led to a collapse of major sectors.
Huge amounts of public funds were used in rescue operations, as well as in public works to boost the economy. The resulting sharp rise in public debt and major budget deficits (3.9% of GDP last year) was addressed by the ruling class by drastic cuts to social spending — under the disguise of "administrative reforms" — and increases in the regressive consumption tax from 3% to 5%, from next April.
None of the ruling-class parties offer a solution that does not increase the attacks on the working class. Despite its reformist illusion that the ultimate solutions to these problems lie within the capitalist system, the JCP's orientation to lessening the attacks has increased its electoral support.
And despite its narrow nationalist stance on Tokyo's territorial disputes with its neighbours over the Kurile and Senkaku islands, the JCP's persistently firm position for the abrogation of Japan's military alliance with the US helps it tap into the anti-bases sentiment which revived significantly in the last year. The JCP's election result reflects a growing attraction to socialist electoral alternatives in Japan.