Since 1955, the Liberal Democratic Party, a political behemoth that dominated the political arena for 54 years, experienced a brief disintegration of 1993- 1994, and then experienced a transition period of 15 adjustment, and finally stepped down from the ruling throne and became the largest opposition party with the Democratic Party. The great change in the ruling and opposition parties-the reversal of Japanese political geomantic omen, is not only reasonable, but also contains many uncertain factors, which is meaningful.
This election, from the dissolution of the last House of Representatives to voting, lasted 40 days. It can be said that both the ruling and opposition parties have done their homework for the election campaign. Nearly140,000 voters participated in the voting, with a turnout rate of 69%, which was higher than 67.5438+0% in the last general election. In some areas, people have to vote four hours in advance because of the typhoon forecast. Those voters who took advantage of the precious leisure time of legal rest days to go to various polling places to exercise the sacred rights endowed by law in the rainstorm that swept across the island, their hasty figures and persistent and serious expressions merged into the trend of people's hearts: the day before voting, major Japanese media unanimously used the expression of "national trial" to locate this important election.
The results show that the vast majority of voters choose to say "no" to people's politics. This is not only the choice of the people, but also the result of the LDP's alienation from relatives and friends. As an established political party that has been in power for more than half a century, the Liberal Democratic Party has long been accustomed to and relied too much on the superiority of one party, hiding in a special structure composed of politics, officials and finance known as the "iron triangle", enjoying exclusive rights and interests, hereditary transmission, and constant black gold scandals, taking the trust and entrustment of taxpayers for granted, not thinking about reform, and forming a rather stubborn "metal fatigue", which is even crucial to the current society and politics. In this regard, the anxiety and criticism of the public and public opinion have been growing for a long time.
What's more, in the three years after Koizumi, three prime ministers "played lanterns", and two of them "left behind" halfway in an extremely irresponsible way; Prime Minister Aso, though "from beginning to end" stuck in some illusory self-feelings, misjudged the situation, missed the excellent opportunity to dissolve the House of Representatives more than once, and finally made up what little political capital he had left and became a veritable "terminator" of the Party, in sharp contrast to the historical freeze of the conservative alliance "1955 system" founded by his grandfather and former Prime Minister Ji Tianmao 54 years ago. In this case, "regime change" has not only become the slogan that the opposition Democratic Party is determined to win, but also become the realistic trend and motivation for the majority of voters and political opposition forces inside and outside the party to "fall to the people". This is also proved by the desperate efforts of the late Aso regime and the dismal operation of "flying at low altitude" with extremely low support rate.
Therefore, in a sense, it can be said that the LDP was defeated without a fight and was a loser of the "national trial"; In contrast, although the Democratic Party is the winner, it almost won without a fight, and to a considerable extent it is the beneficiary of the LDP's "loss of government". Here, not only the opposition of public opinion is obvious, but also the democratic rules of the game have begun to work: you have played for so long, but you have played so badly, so you should change people to play. Therefore, many voters support the Democratic Party not because of their trust in the latter, but because of their extreme distrust of the Liberal Democratic Party.
It is this political dynamic relationship that also constitutes voters' expectation and pressure on the Democratic Party: the Liberal Democratic Party is not only a fiasco opponent, but also a warning. Needless to say, as a Conservative Party whose political quality is similar to that of the Liberal Democratic Party in previous lives, the Democratic Party has no obvious advantages in policy, and objectively, Japan lacks more choices at present. In addition, the Democratic Party inherited an economy that was in high exhaustion and some indicators were regarded as high risk: in July, the total unemployment rate was as high as 5.7%, setting a new high after the war; Deflation has further intensified, shrinking by 2.2% compared with last year; The number of suicides exceeds 30,000 every year; One of the three people is an informal dispatched worker ... and how can we fulfill the "democratic version" of the people's livelihood policy without raising taxes for four years (the Democratic Party's commitment to the people) and carrying astronomical national debt with a total amount of 1.7 times GDP? Such a profound contradiction is not a big problem even for a political party with mature ruling experience. For the Democratic Party with zero ruling experience, it is really a severe test of "starting from scratch".
In terms of security policy, although the Democratic Party's proposition has always been different from that of the Liberal Democratic Party, it seems to be the proper meaning in the title to give up the so-called "reciprocal diplomacy" between China, Japan and the United States after taking office and realize the "transformation" of Japan-US relations over Asia. But even so, this is not much different from the foreign policy of the LDP in the past. As far as Sino-Japanese relations are concerned, there should be no retrogression (but it is difficult to make a big breakthrough).
The rise of the Democratic Party will profoundly rewrite Japan's political structure and inject new vitality into the political map of East Asia. On the other hand, the Liberal Democratic Party, which lost the election this time, is a "worm with a hundred feet, but not stiff". Its deep-rooted social resources in post-war Japanese society and its "legacy" in industrial, agricultural and security policies are far from "past tense". Depending on the future ruling performance of the Democratic Party, the possibility of a comeback is not small.
In this sense, for Japanese nationals, the most realistic achievement of this election is the initial turning point of bipartisan politics. Whether this turning point can become a stable bipartisan political structure in Britain and the United States still needs the efforts of Japanese people and politicians.