ABSTRACT
Perceptions have differed over time regarding the behavior of members of the Diet, as well as the functioning of this national assembly. Most observers agree that the members of the governing LDP and opposition parties altered their attitude towards each other when they entered into the era of “near parity (hakuchū)” during the latter half of the 1970s. This change has been attributed to two alternative explanations that are different, but mutually reinforcing. One is that election results do make a difference because they determine the respective strengths, measured in number of seats, between the governing and opposition parties. The other is that members of the Diet gradually recognized the need for being more accommodating towards each other than they had been when the LDP had exercised control hegemonically (during the latter half of the 1950s and throughout the 1960s) and began to behave more in accord with the norms of conduct set forth in the Diet Law and the Rules of the respective Houses (Krauss, 1984).
