Changes of the Japanese electoral system in 1994

Résumé du document

The word "democracy" comes from the ancient Greek: "demos", which means people, and "kratos", which means rule or strength. Indeed, democracy is a system of government in which people have the power over their destiny. The etymology of the word democracy reminds us that election, which is the way people can exercise their power, is the basis of democracy. The choice of an electoral system is then crucial for any democracy. Moreover, once the choice is done, it is difficult to reform it. Japan experienced a change in its electoral system in 1994: the single non transferable vote (SNTV) was abandoned, and a mixed system was adopted. This change affected the two major elections in Japan: the general election for the House of Representatives or lower house held every four years, and the elections for the House of Councilors or upper house, held every three years to choose one half of its members.

Extraits

[...] He wanted to reform the whole system and was very popular. Koizumi even criticized the electoral system: he believed that parties should select their chairman the one who would become Prime Minister if the party won a majority of seats - before the election. People could then have a chance to know who could become Prime Minister thanks to their vote. However, his term ended and he appointed his son as his successor, which was a practice from the days”. [...]

[...] The choice of an electoral system is then crucial for any democracy. More than that, once the choice is done, it is difficult to reform it. Japan experienced a change in its electoral system in 1994: the single non transferable vote (SNTV) was abandoned, and a mixed system was adopted. This change affected the two major elections in Japan: the general election for the House of Representatives or lower house held every four years, and the elections for the House of Councilors or upper house, held every three years to choose one half of its members. [...]

[...] At the end of the election, the candidates elected from the majoritarian FPP system are given their seats; and at the same time, political parties are allocated a number of seats corresponding to the proportion of vote they obtained during the election, and it is the choice of the party to decide which candidates will be given these seats. Each candidate can run twice using both systems. This new electoral system favor larger parties, but, as there is no threshold in the proportional system, small parties can survive and have few seats. It took quite a long time for Japan to pass the law about the reform of the electoral system. [...]

[...] This reform did not radically change the party system and the political practices. The reason for the change was a general will to eradicate corruption from politics, to enable a political turnover and not a faction turnover, and to decrease the cost of politics. However, even though they have no real political reasons to be on the political screen, political factions still exists; and corruption scandals occurred even after the reform. Past practices are difficult to get rid of, even though it is agreed upon that they should be changed. [...]

[...] A mixed system was adopted: it combined two electoral systems. Out of the 252 seats of the upper house were filled using a proportional system with a binding party list, and for the other 152 seats, the former single non transferable vote or SNTV system was kept. Each voter had to vote twice, once for a party list and once for a candidate. However, this reform did not have much impact in the political life as the upper house had much less power than the lower house. [...]