ABSTRACT
The Japanese electorate was treated to a bewildering series of new parties forming and failing between the 1993 and 1996 elections. This chapter traces the various proposals for new parties, party mergers and party splits. The failure of the JNP-Sakigake merger was not primarily a matter of policy differences, but policy disputes inside the coalition government influenced perceptions of the realignments which were possible or desirable. The first major dispute was over the liberalisation of rice imports. The process of enacting political reform was complicated by the fact that both the coalition and the opposition Liberal Democratic Party were divided on the issue. With political reform passed, the Hosokawa coalition lost what cohesion it had until then possessed and its popular support waned. In April of 1994 Hosokawa unexpectedly resigned as prime minister over a relatively minor scandal involving a large loan he had received from Sagawa Kyuubin.
