| The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus Newsletter |
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Newsletter No. 1. 2013
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January 7, 2013
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Greetings!
Many thanks to all who contributed to our annual fund-raiser. APJ will continue to be available free to all in 2013. If you missed the opportunity to join our sustainers, you can still do so by going to the red sustainer button on our home page to contribute via Paypal or credit card. Or, if you prefer, we can accept checks on US banks: write to us at http://info.japanfocus@gmail.com. Thank you for your support.
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Our home page has two important features. One is a regularly updated guide to the more than 100 articles we have published on the 3.11 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear power meltdown which is transforming Japanese politics and society, and is reshaping issues of nuclear power and energy policy in that nation and globally. Articles are arranged topically. In addition, we have added a guide to some of the most important, and liveliest, online and print sources on 3.11 including blogs and websites. Second, the list of articles now indicates all those available in Japanese translation or original, as well as other languages.
More than 6,000 people now subscribe to APJ, either through our Newsletter or the more than 2,700 who follow us through Twitter or Facebook, whose numbers are growing steadily. Please consider joining them by clicking at the appropriate link on our home page. We invite authors, publishers and directors to bring their books, films and events on East Asia and the Pacific to the attention of our readers. See the home page for information about presenting relevant books and films at our site and for examples of authors, publishers and filmmakers who are presenting their work at the Journal.
Contact Japan Focus by email at info@japanfocus.org
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Subscription information
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The Asia-Pacific Journal is freely available to all. We invite those who wish to support our work by allowing us to make technical upgrades, defray technical, mailing and maintenance fees, and to enable us to expand our output since the 3.11 earthquake and tsunami. Recommended support level: $25 ($10 for students and residents of developing countries); $40 for institutions including libraries, research centers, government offices. If you experience difficulty in subscribing, write to us with the error message at info@japanfocus.org
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Sato Manabu, Japan at a Turning-Point: An Okinawan Perspective on the Return to LDP Government
On December 16, 2012 the Abe Shinzo-led Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) trounced Noda Yoshihiko's governing Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in elections for the Lower House (House of Representatives) of the Japanese Diet. The landslide victory, delivering Abe (and his coalition partner, New Komeito) 325 of the seats in the 480 member House of Representatives (294 LDP plus 31 New Kometo), opened the way to the second Abe cabinet (following the Abe government of 2006-7). It was remarkable in several ways.
Firstly, it was, in a sense, unconstitutional, according to Supreme Court rulings that the regional discrepancy in the value of a single vote under the current electoral system is too wide. But virtually no one paid this any attention. Secondly, forty-one percent of the voters (roughly 11 million people) did not vote at all, a higher absentee figure than in any post-war election, and of the 59 per cent that did vote, less than 30 per cent favoured Abe (in the proportional sector the figure was 27 per cent). Thirdly, the LDP vote actually crashed even when compared with 2009 (a disastrous year that saw the DPJ achieve its landslide victory), from 33.4 million votes in the local constituency sector to just 25.6 million, and its proportional bloc from 18.8 million to 16.6 million. Its victory therefore rested on unprecedented mass absenteeism and the collapse of the DPJ rather than positive endorsement of its agenda. Fourthly, especially notable was that young people, who will determine the country's future and bear the burdens created by their elders of this and previous generations, had little interest in the election. While the figures for 2012 are not yet available, in the 2010 Upper House election the average voter age was 56 and the turnout rate for eligible voters aged between 20 and 24 was 33.68 per cent while for those aged between 65 and 69 it was 78.45 percent. Those with most at stake in the election are less and less involved in it. In 2012 that trend could only have sharpened. Japan faces an increasingly gerontocratic future.
Author
Sato Manabu is a professor of politics at Okinawa International University. This is his monthly (December) column for the Okinawan daily, Ryukyu shimpo, published on 31 December, 2012. For a 2007 essay by author Sato: "Forced to 'Choose' its Own Subjugation: Okinawa's Place in U.S. Global Military Realignment," August 27, 2006, http://japanfocus.org/-Sato-Manabu/2202
Translator
Gavan McCormack is a coordinator of The Asia-Pacific Journal, emeritus professor at Australian National University, and author, most recently (with Satoko Oka Norimatsu) of Resistant Islands: Okinawa Confronts Japan and the United States, Rowman and Littlefield, 2012.
Read More . . . |
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Yuki Tanaka & Satoko Norimatsu, Remembering Nakazawa Keiji
Nakazawa Keiji, atomic bomb survivor, peace activist, and creator of the famed Hiroshima-themed manga Barefoot Gen passed away on December 19, 2012 after a long struggle with cancer. He was 73. Asia-Pacific Journal Coordinators Yuki Tanaka and Satoko Norimatsu offer their memories of Nakazawa and thoughts on his life and work. Read More . . .
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