Will The Abe Government Survive COVID-19?

Japan Prime Minister Abe Shinzo
I look at the history of Abe Shinzo's reign - including his first failed term of office - and consider whether Abe can keep his good luck streak going.

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At the end of February, Japan’s Prime Minister, Abe Shinzo (安倍晋三), called on all public schools to close until late March. It was a bold decision – one made, it seems, without consulting any experts in contagious diseases. (Sadly, that seems to be a pattern in Japan’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis.)

Days before that decision, Sankei News came out with some startling poll numbers. A joint poll between Sankei and Fuji news Network (FNN) showed that, for the first time since his last serious round of scandals, Abe’s disapproval exceeded his approval. His disapproval stood at 46.7% – a 7.8% hike – and his approval was 36.2% – an 8.4% drop.

The numbers were as startling as their source: Sankei is an Abe-friendly operation. (Sankei runs the English language site Japan Forward, which essentially shills for the Abe government and various Japanese right-wing causes.)

Other recent numbers have been less apocalyptic. And it’s always good never to discount Abe’s seemingly superhuman ability to shrug off scandal. But it seems Abe’s now at a tipping point where, if he doesn’t get a solid handle on the COVID-19 crisis, his options could dwindle quickly.

Abe’s First Brush with Failure

Content Warning: Brief discussion of suicide.

Abe’s staying power has been pretty remarkable. So remarkable that, in November 2019, Abe became Japan’s longest-serving Prime Minister.

That staying power is all the more remarkable when we remember that it hasn’t always been this way.

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Abe’s first crack at Prime Minister was back in 2006. At the time, it seemed Abe had everything going for him. He was picking up where the popular Koizumi Junichirou left off, and his government had committed to furthering Koizumi’s agenda. Abe ran his government on the slogan “Separate From the Post-War Regime” (戦後レジームからの脱却). Abe aimed to create a Japan that was a hub for international business, and whose military was free of its post-WWII restrictions.

But the wheels started falling off quickly. Soon, Abe found his government plagued by a wave of financials scandals among the ministers in his cabinet. The wave started in December 2006, when it was discovered that Minister of Special Missions Sata Genichirou had been charging the government for 10 years for expenses on an office space that never existed. Next month, a similar story emerged involving Ministry of Education head Ibuki Fumiaki.

Things got worse for Abe when news broke that the Japan Social Insurance Agency’s move to an online system was plagued with data input errors and recording problems. Concerns that the Abe cabinet was mismanaging the nation’s pensions served to further undermine confidence in the government.

In March, news broke that Minister of Agriculture Matsuoka Toshikatsu had collected some ¥5 million in heating and electric fees for his office – even though his office was in the Legislative Hall and he received these things for free. In May, Matsuoka committed suicide in his government-provided apartment in Tokyo. He was the first active minister to ever take his own life.

The dominoes kept calling for Abe’s government one by one. Minister after minister resigned either due to financial scandal or verbal gaffe. A prime example of the latter was when Defense Minister Kyuuma Fumio, trying to explain the threat that the Soviet Union posed to Japan, argued that the WWII bombing of Nagasaki “couldn’t be helped.” He resigned days later. (Interesting historical footnote: His replacement was current Tokyo governor Koike Yuriko.)

The government’s public support numbers went into absolute free-fall. By August 2007, the first Abe government was over.

A Different Political Environment for “Abe Part 2”

This failure actually helps to explain Abe’s success in his subsequent – and more successful – stints as PM. Writing for Diamond Online, Kamikubo Masato argues that Abe learned from this experience that a high public support rating is paramount to enacting a political agenda. That’s why the lead policy of the second Abe government wasn’t political, but economical. Abe’s “Abenomics” stimulus package was intended to convince the public that Abe was rescuing them from “the lost 20 years” – i.e., the 20 years of economic stagnation following the bursting of Japan’s economic bubble in the 1990s.

「政治とカネ」で騒然の今、あえて第一次安倍政権を再評価する

お友達内閣、消えた年金問題、強行採決乱発など、第一次安倍内閣の政権運営はお粗末極まりなかった。だが今、「やりたい政策」を着実に進める安倍首相を見ていると、別の観点から再評価してみたくなる。

(JP) Link: Re-Evaluating the First Abe Government in Light of Today’s “Politics and Money” Scandals

Writing for Toyo Keizai online, Yakushiji Katsuyuki notes that it’s typical for most governments in Japan to lose support after the honeymoon phase ends. A combination of gaffes and scandals almost always ends up peeling off public support. The challenge for PMs is not to keep support at its initial peak levels, but to prevent it from crashing. A crash typically spells the end of a government. A good example is Mori Yoshirou, the Prime Minister who played golf during the Ehime Maru crisis. Mori’s public support crashed to a stunning 9% and never recovered.

Abe’s first government didn’t fall so hard – but it fell hard enough. After starting with a healthy 60% public support rating, Abe saw his cabinet’s support dip to 30% in just nine months.

How has Abe avoided making the same mistake twice?

According to Yakushiji, Abe benefits partly from a weak opposition. No political party in Japan currently comes close to the support enjoyed by the LDP. Whereas the LDP enjoys around 37% public support, the next largest political party, the Constitutional Democrats (立件民主党; rikken minshutou), earns a mere 6%. Indeed, when asked in a poll why the Abe government had stayed in power so long, 82% of respondents said it’s because there was no alternative. This differs from the first Abe cabinet, when the Democratic Party (民主党; minshutou) enjoyed around 27% of the public’s support. In other words, the opposition is fractured now. Abe’s LDP is the only game in town.

Another factor, says Yakushiji, is that few people are getting their news mainly from traditional media outlets any longer. Yakushiji argues that this has made most voters – particularly the young – more alienated from what’s happening with the government.

安倍内閣の支持率はなぜ下がらないのか

憲政史上、最長の首相在職日数を更新した安倍晋三首相だが、9月に内閣改造をして以降、いい話がまったくない。新たに閣僚に起用した菅原一秀・経済産業相と河井克行・法相が不祥事を理由に相次いで辞任した。11月…

(JP) Link: Why Does the Abe Government’s Support Never Drop?

Abe on the Cusp

As it turns out, Abe’s numbers may not be as bad as that Sankei poll suggests. The latest numbers from NHK just came out and they paint a slightly rosier picture. Abe’s support has dipped, but not into negative numbers. Digging into the details, it seems the public still – barely – has confidence in the Abe government’s ability to handle the COVID-18 crisis: 49% of those polled support the government’s handling of the crisis, compared to 43% who don’t.

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20200309/k10012321501000.html
(JP) Link: Abe Government: “Support” 43%, “Do Not Support” 41% – NHK Public Opinion Poll

However, other recent polling suggest the administration is heading into dangerous territory. A Nikkan Gendai Digital poll conducted on March 7th and 8th says a full 50% of the public doesn’t support Abe’s handling of the novel coronavirus outbreak.

So Abe’s numbers aren’t in danger territory…yet. He’s still above where he was several years ago when the Moritomo and Kake scandals threatened his government. (During these scandals, his support dipped into negative territory.) However, for months, his support has been crawling sideways. It hasn’t crashed…but it hasn’t grown, either. The Cherry Blossom Viewing scandal has again shaken the public’s trust in how Abe runs his government. And a series of more minor scandals and ministerial resignations over the past six months hasn’t helped his public support either.

My own read is that Abe is on a precipice. His decision to call for mass school closures in Japan has resulted in confusion and turmoil. Reports of kids milling around Shibuya and Shinjuku has led people to wonder what the point of the closures even was. Parents who can’t secure babysitting still don’t know how they’re going to care for their kids and provide for their families.

The government will likely need some sort of massive economic stimulus to revive businesses and help families. Its first step – announcing a ¥4000/day (<USD $40) to help parents who can’t go to work – is already being derided as insufficient and tone-deaf.

If Abe doesn’t act fast, then his one saving grace – the impression among the Japanese public that he’s the “stable” choice – could finally fade. That wouldn’t be enough to toss the LDP out of power entirely; as I said above, there’s no clear alternative. But it could spell the end of Abe’s long reign.

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