Kaikaku Forum 21

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The Kaikaku Forum 21 ( Japanese 改革 フ ォ ー ラ ム 21 , kaikaku fōramu nijūichi , German "Reform Forum 21") was from 1992 to 1993 a faction of the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) under the chairmanship of Tsutomu Hata ; a second leading politician was Ichirō Ozawa . In the media and the public, the Reform Forum 21 was mostly referred to as the Hata faction ( 羽 田 派 , Hata-ha ) or Hata-Ozawa faction ( 羽 田 ・ 小 沢 派 , Hata-Ozawa-ha ).

After the Sagawa Kyūbin scandal , Shin Kanemaru , chairman of the Takeshita faction , resigned. In the faction-internal power struggle between the supporters of the ex-general secretary Ozawa, who wanted to install Finance Minister Hata as his successor, and Kanemaru supporters, who campaigned for Keizō Obuchi as the new chairman, Ozawa and Hata withdrew when their defeat was foreseeable: they stayed away from the decisive meeting of the [ex-] Takeshita faction. Hata and Ozawa left the former Takeshita, henceforth Obuchi, faction with their supporters in October 1992 and founded the Kaikaku Forum 21, now the fifth largest faction in the LDP. The power struggle, which was initially internal to the faction, also reflected a party-wide dispute over the necessity of political reforms, particularly in terms of electoral law and party financing: Hata, like ex-party chairman Toshiki Kaifu, positioned himself as a reformer, while Obuchi and Kaifu's successor Kiichi Miyazawa relied on the tried and tested internal parties Set power structures. When the cabinet ( Miyazawa cabinet ) and party leadership were replaced in December 1992, the Hata faction only had two heads of authorities in the cabinet and none of the "three party offices" , while Seiroku Kajiyama (Obuchi faction), an outspoken opponent of Ozawa and his political reforms, General Secretary became.

Kanemaru and his secretary were arrested in March 1993, and the party chairman, Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa, promised political reform under public pressure. However, opponents of reform within the party prevented concrete steps. When the 126th (regular) parliamentary session neared its end without a reform bill, the SPJ , Kōmeitō and DSP applied for a vote of no confidence in the Shūgiin against the Miyazawa cabinet on June 17, 1993. On June 18, the Hata faction voted with the opposition, as did some, especially younger, MPs from other factions: The vote of no confidence was successful with 255 to 220 votes. On the same day the two ministers of the Hata faction, Hajime Funada and Mamoru Nakajima, resigned. In the evening the resolution of the Shūgiin was read out.

On June 21, 1993 Masayoshi Takemura (previously Mitsuzuka faction ) left the LDP with 10 MPs (later the New Party Sakigake ), four days later the 34 members of the Hata faction followed and founded the Renewal Party . As a result, the LDP was without a majority and after the new elections on July 18 , which confirmed the loss of majority, the new parties agreed on a coalition with the previous opposition (without communists): After 38 years, the LDP was ousted from the government.

literature

  • Gerald L. Curtis: The Logic of Japanese Politics: Leaders, Institutions, and the Limits of Change. Columbia University Press, New York 1999, ISBN 0231108435 , pp. 88-92: The Battle over Kanemaru's Successor and pp. 92-97: Prime Minister Miyazawa's Fall.
  • Jacob Schlesinger: Shadow shoguns: the rise and fall of Japan's postwar political machine. Stanford University Press, 1999, ISBN 0804734577 .
  • Richard J. Samuels: Machiavelli's Children: Leaders And Their Legacies In Italy And Japan. Cornell University Press, 2005, ISBN 0801489822 , p. 316 ff .: Options on the Right: Umberto Bossi, Silvio Berlusconi, Ozawa Ichirō and Ishihara Shintarō.