ABSTRACT
Japan's social and economic stagnation during the past twenty years is frequently blamed on problems in its political system. Japanese politics has often been viewed as failing to respond to broader changes both in the global political economy and Japan's domestic developments, in particular demographic changes such as declining birthrates and an ageing population. This chapter provides a brief sketch of three major reforms highly significant for the evolution of Japanese politics. The first set of reforms involved the Lower House's electoral system. The second set of reforms involved administrative reforms centering on strengthening the functions of the cabinet. The third set of reforms involved decentralization. The chapter labels this package of reforms as Japanese-style majoritarianism. The Political Reform Guidelines focused on anticorruption measures and blamed many of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)-related problems, such as excessive political campaign financing and factionalism, on the multimember district (MMD) electoral system used to elect members of the Lower House.
