ABSTRACT
In post-war Japanese politics 1955 was a particularly important year. During that year the conservative Liberal and Democratic parties merged to form the present Liberal Democratic party (LDP); and the left and right socialist factions, which had been split over the San Francisco peace treaty and US-Japan security treaty, merged to form the present Japan Socialist party. The government and the LDP took the Western democracies as their model and, with efficient decision making in the Diet made possible by the LDP's wide majority and with the cooperation of the economic sector, fostered rapid modernization of the entire society. Although the basic law governing the Diet changed after World War II from the imperial Constitution to the present Constitution, the parliamentary-cabinet system was maintained. The party system established in 1955 was characterized by the minority parties' basic strategy of all-out opposition to all major government/LDP policies introduced in the Diet.
