Election Time in Japan (Ugh)

Bad news for anyone in Japan who likes sleeping late in the mornings: election season will be starting at the end of August, which means lots of politicians riding around in speaker cars shouting things like, “My name is Tanaka! I will work hard for you! Thank you for your vote!” Japan has a British-style parliamentary democracy with two houses and several political parties, which compete for enough seats to be able to form a government and elect a Prime Minister. The major parties are the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has been in power very nearly without interruption since the end of World War II; the upstart Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), hoping to win the upcoming election; the New Clean Government Party (Komeito), which is the political arm of an evangelical Buddhist sect called Sokka Gakkai, although you’re not allowed to say that on TV; and the Japan Communist Party, with 400,000 members, one of the largest in the world. Japan’s elections are tightly structured, and there is a long list of things candidates are not allowed to do, such as give or receive many kinds of gifts or make personal attacks against competing candidates, although for some reason attacking the Prime Minister the minute he assumes office a national pastime. The stakes are high in this election, as Prime Minister Aso (famous for being an anime otaku) and his LDP may bear the brunt of electorate’s anger over the state of the economy. If the DPJ wins, it might mean some pretty disruptive times for Japan.

A poster invoking Gundam to get young people to vote.