ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an analysis of the rise and fall of the most successful of the post-1976 new parties, the New Liberal Club (NLC). In order to create a long-term, successful impact on Japanese politics, the NLC had to build a strong party organization. This it attempted to do in the prefectures of the original six NLC Dietmembers and in those selected prefectures that seemed responsive to its reformed conservative call. The major initial success in party building occurred in Kanagawa prefecture at the home of Kono Yohei and his cousin, Tagawa Seiji. The NLC’s successful debut in 1976 encouraged an explosion of other minor parties. The most successful of those parties formed in the wake of the NLC 1976 successes was the Social Democratic Federation (SDF), sometimes also called the United Social Democrats by the press. The SDF entered the 1980 double elections hoping for a “Den boom” similar to that of Kono Yohei of the NLC in 1976.
