Can One Election Reshape Japan? The Takaichi Supermajority

Ken Jimbo

The Liberal Democratic Party's landslide victory in Japan's recent general election is notable not only for the sustained public support for Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi but also for the convergence of two developments: the withdrawal of Komeito from the governing coalition and the decisive defeat of the former Constitutional Democratic Party. Together, these outcomes suggest that Japan's long-standing model of "politics as a brake" has effectively come to an end.

For decades, Komeito functioned within government as a moderating force, while the former Constitutional Democratic Party embodied a post-1955-system pacifism and a preference for political restraint. In a rapidly shifting international order, however, these restraining roles no longer aligned with voters' sense of reality. Faced with mounting uncertainty, the electorate appeared less interested in balance for its own sake than in the capacity to act.

As Japan's first female prime minister in the postwar era, Takaichi carries undeniable symbolic weight. Yet voter expectations extended well beyond symbolism. Many sought clear judgment and decisive leadership capable of anchoring the U.S.-Japan alliance while navigating an emerging global order marked by strategic competition and instability.

This election outcome does not fit neatly with familiar explanations centred on middle-class frustration, populist backlash, or a simple drift toward militarism. Rather, it reflects a pragmatic choice driven by Japan's increasingly severe security environment and the accelerating importance of emerging technologies—particularly artificial intelligence—which demand speed, clarity, and governing capacity. The result is best understood not as an ideological shift, but as an electoral endorsement of leadership suited to a faster and more demanding world. As the United States seeks to redefine its role in the world, the U.S.-Japan relationship will require renewed strategic imagination. The question now is whether the strong governing mandate produced by this election can be translated into concrete diplomatic action.

Yuka Mizoue

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party has won a historic victory under Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi. This was not an election driven by substantive policy debate. Instead, it was primarily framed as a simple choice: Takaichi or not.

While her position as Japan's first female prime minister is historically significant, Takaichi has rarely foregrounded gender equality in her rhetoric. She has built support through a "queen bee" strategy, as critics point out, demonstrating strength within the male-dominated political culture without directly challenging its foundations. In Japan's political world, whether at the national or local level, hierarchies and sexism remain deeply ingrained in its culture. Because of this culture, both ruling and opposition parties have struggled to cultivate women who can appear genuinely authentic in their political expression.

In a political arena where women remain underrepresented, Takaichi's sudden rise simply made many voters feel that she would "do something different."

Her victory suggests a significant shift in Japanese society. Women leaders are still a minority in Japan. Yet many voters no longer think that a woman is unfit to lead simply because of her gender, especially among young independent voters. It is the political establishment that failed to recognize this shift fully. The defeat of the Centrist Reform Alliance's leaders, who half-jokingly called themselves "5G" (five ji (爺) or old men), symbolized that disconnect.

The hidden issue in this election was gender, not as a moment to celebrate the symbolic milestone of a woman prime minister, but as a deeper question of whether political power structures could truly change.

Ryo Sahashi

The House of Representatives election held in February 2026 resulted in a landslide victory for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), led by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, the first female prime minister in Japan's history, and the Japan Innovation Party, which together secured 352 of the 465 seats. Prior to the dissolution, the ruling parties held 232 seats, meaning they increased their representation by 120 seats in total, of which 118 were gained by the LDP. Prime Minister Takaichi positioned this election at the time of dissolution as a vote to choose the prime minister; in that sense, it amounted to a quasi-presidential election in Japan, in which she achieved what could be described as a smash-hit victory.

Of course, several explanations are required for this outcome. First, the largest opposition party was simply too weak. In particular, in the Centrist Reform Alliance (CRA) formed after the dissolution by the Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) and Komeito, the CDP significantly altered its longstanding positions on security policy and energy (including the operation of nuclear power plants). Both its traditional supporters and independent voters reacted harshly to such abrupt policy shifts. Second, the LDP's vote share did not, in fact, increase dramatically. In proportional representation, the LDP received 36.7 percent of the vote, followed by the CRA at 18.2 percent and the Democratic Party for the People at 9.7 percent. However, in the single-seat constituencies, the LDP secured approximately half of the total votes (when all districts are aggregated), creating a substantial gap with other parties, and won 249 of the 289 single-seat constituencies. In Tokyo and the surrounding residential prefectures of Kanagawa, Chiba, and Saitama, the LDP captured 79 of 80 seats. The sole exception was the district of former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, who has since resigned as a co-leader of the CRA. With multiple opposition parties competing against one another, the single-seat constituency system produced a sweeping victory for the LDP.

What, then, will Prime Minister Takaichi do with such an overwhelming majority? While the ruling party remains in the minority in the House of Councillors, in the House of Representatives it has secured three-quarters, well over the two-thirds required to override upper house opposition and re-pass legislation. First, she may move to implement what she has described as a long-cherished goal: a reduction in the consumption tax (including a two-year exemption for food), pushing forward despite skepticism. Fiscal policy prioritizing economic growth is likely to continue. In security policy, momentum will accelerate for revising the three National Security Strategy documents, amending the Economic Security Promotion Act, easing export restrictions on defense equipment, and potentially further increasing the defense budget. In policies impacting foreign residents, an expert panel examining revisions to rules governing land acquisition by foreign nationals is expected to be launched, with the aim of reaching certain conclusions by summer.

The overall direction of foreign and security policy is unlikely to deviate from the traditional framework centered on the U.S.-Japan alliance. Although statements that evoke nationalism may occasionally emerge from the administration, this is not a government in which such rhetoric forms the core. At the U.S.-Japan summit meeting scheduled for March 19, the first hurdle will be demonstrating economic achievements, such as investment commitments, sought by the Trump administration, but President Trump is likely to value Prime Minister Takaichi's strong domestic political footing. Observing Japan's strengthened political base, new dynamics may emerge in Japan-China relations. Prime Minister Takaichi has already built a favorable relationship with the Lee Jae Myung administration in South Korea. However, issues such as visits to Yasukuni Shrine and differences over territorial matters could complicate relations with both China and South Korea going forward.

Noah Sneider

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has dominated Japanese politics for 70 years. But its victory in the lower house elections on February 8th was its biggest ever. Two forces explain Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s unexpectedly decisive triumph. One is the collapse of the mainstream opposition, which has failed to present answers to Japan’s present-day challenges or articulate a vision for its future. The other is Takaichi’s personal popularity, which proved to be a potent force. I believe she tapped into Japanese voters’ twin desires for change (which she represents through her gender, her background, and her style) and for security (which she prioritizes in her policies).

The historic victory gives Takaichi a historic chance. The question is whether she will use her mandate to deliver strength and change, or whether she will squander it on symbolism and populism. She now has the political space to govern expansively and be a broad-minded leader. She is especially well-placed to accelerate the pace of change in Japan regarding defence and security policy. The risk is that she instead indulges her ideological side—by visiting Yasukuni Shrine, or by fighting culture wars over immigration or family, or by triggering showdowns with bond markets over her big-spending fiscal plans.

Miyuki Inoue

Security has struggled to keep up with the size of the crowds wherever Sanae Takaichi appears on the campaign trail. As the dynamics of the election suggested, the Liberal Democratic Party went on to secure the largest number of seats in its history. Where there is fervor, there is also amplification. When emotions are stirred, online spaces such as TikTok, YouTube, and X, erupt as well. Mixed into this surge are posts of uncertain veracity, along with commercially motivated content designed to go viral in order to generate advertising revenue.

Rather than deepening debate over policy, this election functioned as a blank-check referendum on whether or not Takaichi should be the prime minister. Framed as a form of fandom-like activity, the kind of devoted oshi-katsu support more familiar from idol culture than electoral politics, the sense of excitement only accelerated. "They've seized air superiority online. Newspapers, do your best," a senior official at the Ministry of Finance remarked. The comment reflects concern over the current situation, in which information that ought to be known is not being adequately conveyed. How can established media carry out fair and impartial reporting that truly serves democracy? This House of Representatives election also posed a test of journalism operating within an environment saturated with disinformation and misinformation.

In the post-truth era, where people treat "what I want to believe" as "the truth for me," deepening divisions are becoming visible even at the reporting frontlines. One manifestation is personal attacks directed at reporters on the ground. In response to this election, the Japan Federation of Newspaper Workers' Unions went so far as to adopt a special resolution calling for vigilance against the spread of xenophobia and exclusionary ideologies, and for protecting journalists from attack.

Japanese legacy media, including newspapers and television, have long adhered to a principle of neutrality and fairness in election coverage. In recent years, however, this stance has been criticized as an excessive preoccupation with "electoral fairness." Traditionally, candidates' claims have been presented in equal measure, comparable airtime or column space, and similar numbers of photographs, while exposure seen as benefiting one side over another has been avoided. Within this framework, criticism of specific candidates was also restrained. This election thus marked the first House of Representatives race in which legacy media shifted toward more proactive reporting amid a flood of disinformation and misinformation.

People are, by nature, inclined to believe what they want to believe. Recognizing the biases that shape our judgments, individuals have little choice but to raise their own antennas, asking what they have failed to notice and what information they have not taken in. Journalism faces a dilemma in an age of information overload: it often fails to reach those it most needs to reach. Barriers created by digital platforms' distribution systems limit what content producers can achieve through effort alone. In this environment, it is increasingly necessary for audiences, as consumers of information, to cultivate media literacy and to seize control of the airspace themselves.

Kenji Kushida

Will Prime Minister Takaichi's conservative path to gaining power give way to classic LDP pragmatism? While Takaichi rose to power by cultivating support from the conservative wing of the LDP and shaped her political career by leaning right, does the landslide victory actually allow her more room to maneuver in ways that would have undermined her in the recent past, when she depended heavily on her traditional conservative base? One reason the LDP has managed to remain in power for approximately 66 of the past 71 years has been its ability to be relentlessly pragmatic rather than strictly ideological. Landslide victories are also often followed by disappointing results. If Takaichi aims to remain in power and lead the LDP to victory in the next election, an upper house election in July 2028, will she move toward more pragmatic and centrist positions? Economic policy may be an area to watch for pragmatism over keeping campaign promises, as Takaichi's pledges of tax cuts and aggressive fiscal expenditures have already unsettled bond markets and driven the yen weaker, potentially threatening her promise to alleviate cost-of-living concerns. Japan's accelerating aging and population decline raise another question: will immigration restriction rhetoric yield to a quiet expansion of guest worker policies and other mechanisms to keep the country running?

How well will Takaichi manage the enlarged LDP, which gained 118 Diet members? On one hand, Takaichi's personal popularity, not the LDP's, led to the blowout win. On the other hand, 93% of all 338 LDP candidates won, including almost all the centrist and center-left candidates who ran. Each of the 100+ added LDP members are channels for their districts' voters, businesses, and organized interests to make themselves heard in the party. Will the LDP become unwieldy and return to a more patterned factionalism? Will particular elder or charismatic members cultivate followers who engage in factional political dynamics, making LDP leadership more of a negotiated compromise among various groups rather than strong top-down leadership?

Japan-China relations present another critical question. Regardless of whether China expected that escalating economic pressure on Japan through restrictions on rare earths and critical minerals would weaken Takaichi, she is here to stay. She may enjoy more flexibility to moderate her position given the LDP's unprecedented strength. However, a substantial part of her popularity among conservatives stemmed from the perception that she could stand up to China. Real economic pain to critical sectors such as automobiles and semiconductors could be devastating for Takaichi's broad support, but one wouldn't expect China to back down. Will we see signs of a gradual and quiet de-escalation, or will both sides harden their positions? Now that the time horizons of both sides are longer, will they conclude that further escalation is not worth it, or will we face major shocks? Or will Takaichi's large win actually provide her more maneuverability rather than simply a mandate to stand up to China, which could be extremely costly?

There is little reason to expect any change to Japan's position as America's best ally in Asia, with Takaichi working hard to maintain and strengthen Japan's relationship with President Trump and his administration. The risks of volatility come mostly from the U.S. side at this juncture, especially with uncertainty over the U.S. relationship with China, which could conceivably go either way or simply remain at the status quo level of friction.

Sohei Ide

The Liberal Democratic Party's landslide victory marks a watershed in Japan's economic policymaking. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi campaigned on a platform of "responsible and proactive fiscal policy," including a two‑year freeze on the consumption tax for food. With her mandate now secured, little stands in her way.

At the heart of Takaichi's program is the so-called "high‑pressure economy". The idea is simple enough: if the government pumps sufficient spending into the system—enough to push demand above the economy's current productive capacity, perhaps by 2% of GDP—Japan Inc., long accused of hoarding cash to the detriment of growth, will finally be forced to invest. That investment, it is hoped, will unleash a virtuous cycle of higher productivity, stronger wages, and renewed economic vigour.

Economists are divided. Textbook theory suggests that demand running hot tends to generate not investment but inflation. The Ministry of Finance, the historical command center of Japan's economic orthodoxy, has long treated large‑scale fiscal expansion as reckless and has successfully deterred previous governments from attempting anything on this scale.

The coming months will reveal whether Takaichi's unorthodox wager can deliver where decades of cautious technocracy have failed. If her gamble pays off, Japan may at last shake off its long malaise of dismal growth. If it does not, the country will at least have tested—and perhaps finally put to rest—the notion that ever‑looser fiscal policy is the cure to its economic woes.

Mineko Okamoto

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which suffered a major defeat in last summer's upper house election, secured a landslide victory in the recent lower house election. Exit polls attribute this dramatic turnaround largely to the high approval ratings of the Takaichi Cabinet and Prime Minister Takaichi's strong personal appeal. During the campaign, she consistently attracted crowds of several thousand people, many filming her on their phones with evident excitement.

While some analyses suggest that her firm stance on policies impacting foreign residents and her tough attitude toward China helped her regain conservative voters, a striking trend appeared among younger generations. A survey by Asahi Shimbun and Osaka University showed that even among those who identified as "left-leaning," voters in their 40s and younger chose the LDP more often than any other party. Among teens to people in their 30s, 34 percent of left-leaning respondents supported the LDP, whereas only 9 percent chose the Centrist Reform Alliance. This pattern emerged despite the CRA's stronger emphasis on diversity, individual freedom, and human rights. Ultimately, the positive impact of having Japan's "first female prime minister" appears to have outweighed the appeal of a new party led by two older male politicians.

Kyoichi Sasazawa

The general election held in the depths of winter, which Prime Minister Takaichi framed as a vote of confidence in her leadership, concluded with a historic landslide victory for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP): a result that seemed almost like a rebound from more than a year of struggling with declining party support.

Hong Kong's South China Morning Post reported the LDP's sweeping victory on its front page, featuring a lead photograph of the prime minister placing a red rose on the elected LDP candidate’s name. The New York Times and the Washington Post both covered the outcome prominently in their main inside pages, with front-page teasers. The Wall Street Journal carried the story on its front page in both its weekend edition and again on the 9th. Amid events such as the Super Bowl and the Olympics, it can be said that overall international interest was high.

One factor behind the victory may have been the self-destruction of the Centrist Reform Alliance (CRA), whose name evoked a revival of the Showa-era cooperation between Komeito and the Democratic Socialist Party. In addition, following remarks about a "survival-threatening situation," commonly understood as a Taiwan contingency, China launched strong attacks against Takaichi. There must have been no small number of voters who felt a sense of crisis or reacted against this. As with the Fukushima treated/contaminated water issue, China once again failed in its strategy of securing "discourse power." This overwhelming majority also reflects the scale of voters' expectations. Great power can at times invite corruption. The administration is now called upon to govern without arrogance born of numbers, and to fulfill its pledge to make "the Japanese archipelago strong and prosperous."

Daisuke Furuta

The vote share reveals the scale of support more clearly than the number of seats. The LDP's absolute vote share was about 27% in single-seat constituencies and 20% in proportional representation blocks, surpassing the 2017 landslide under the Abe administration. While there are various reasons for the victory, as a fact-checker, I was struck by the flood of short videos aimed at stimulating emotions. Most were from anonymous posters, positive toward the LDP and negative toward opposition parties. They focused on praising or mocking individual politicians rather than policy debates. Many lacked any logic, making them impossible even to verify.

For example, the most-viewed video title was "Prime Minister's Morning: Applying Makeup!" Many of these were likely created by YouTubers seeking profit by riding the wave of Takaichi's popularity. Aggressive algorithms spread videos lacking logic or evidence. The ruling party should not simply celebrate this "tailwind." This wind can change direction at any time. Precisely because they have secured a stable majority through this advantage, I want them to address the need for regulation—to protect a healthier democracy.

Atsushi Shiraki

Are you familiar with the film 12 Angry Men? In the film, twelve strangers convene to deliberate the case of a boy facing the death penalty. The circumstantial evidence appears to point only toward the defendant's guilt. At the outset, all but "Juror 8," played by Henry Fonda, are convinced of the boy's guilt.

The outcome of this election called to mind the opening scene of that film. For the Takaichi administration, the result presents an opportunity for effective governance. Yet when one reflects on the history of democracy, it is difficult not to feel a sense of unease at the overwhelming victory of any single political party.

Juror 8 does not impose his own doubts; instead, he listens. In response to that posture, a timid juror and an immigrant juror gradually begin to speak about their own experiences. The audience witnesses twelve men of entirely different races and upbringings, including bank clerks, stockbrokers, machinists, a retired elderly man, and an architect. They engage in debate grounded in their respective experiences and perspectives. It is precisely through such deliberation, unhurried as it may be, that a single set of facts comes to be seen from multiple angles. I would like to assess the quality of democracy not by the "outcome," whose rightness may never be known, but by the "process" through which it is reached.