The introduction of "small districts" in 1994 helped to radicalize changes in the Japanese political arena. On the agenda of electoral reform is the search for the optimal combination of majority and proportional principles, as well as reducing the difference in the price of the electoral vote. At the same time, the absence of significant programmatic differences between the two dominant parties does not allow the voter to make an informed choice based on their ideological preferences.

Keywords: Japan, electoral reform, majority principle, "floating votes", vote price, proportional representation.

The current electoral system in Japan has been formed for more than a century and a half. It acquired its modern form as a result of the political reform of 1994.The Japanese Parliament is bicameral - it consists of the House of Representatives (lower) and the House of Councillors (upper). The mechanisms of their formation, the procedure for holding elections, and other components of the electoral system vary significantly. Accordingly, the issue of electoral reform has its own characteristics for each of the chambers.

ELECTORAL REFORM CHALLENGES FOR THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Elections to the House of Representatives are held within 40 days after its dissolution or within the last 30 days before the end of its 4-year term of office. The system of elections to the lower house is mixed and parallel: 300 deputies are elected in single-mandate ("small") districts, and 180-in districts of proportional representation, in which voting is carried out according to closed party lists. Accordingly, the country is divided into 300 single-member districts and at the same time into 11 districts of proportional representation (hereinafter referred to as OPP), which are regional blocks of several prefectures.

A broad public debate is currently taking place in Japan on the reform of the lower house electoral system. The reason for it was a number of significant shortcomings, many of which are systemic in nature. One of the problems characteristic of majority electoral systems is the large number of "dead" votes, which is unavoidable when only one candidate wins in a district. As a result, districts where there is real competition between several candidates are won by a relative minority, which distorts the basic principle of democracy as a "majority dictatorship".

Another problem is that the big political parties - the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the Democratic Party (DPJ)-have more chances in the "small districts". Large parties have the best financial, organizational and media capabilities to concentrate forces simultaneously in many parts of the country. In these

In this context, small and medium-sized parties1 have a very limited opportunity to obtain parliamentary mandates only in those electoral districts where they have traditionally strong positions. In reality, the passage of these parties to Parliament is mainly provided by the OPP.

As the experience of Japan over the past decade and a half shows, elections in single-member districts lead to dramatic changes on the political map, which are much more radical than it was during the existence of" medium-sized electoral districts", each of which delegated from two to six people to parliament. The main reason for this is that the elections there are held in the form of a tough alternative - "all or nothing". This is especially evident in cases when the election campaign is focused not on the complex political programs of parties, in the intricacies of which, or rather, in the differences between which the ordinary voter, as a rule, does not understand, but on some relatively simple issue, such as trust or, conversely, distrust of one or the other. to another political leader. Thus, in 2005, the LDP's convincing victory in the lower house elections took place in conditions when the issue of personal confidence in the head of the LDP Dz was on the agenda. Koizumi, who has faced strong internal party opposition to the postal reform agenda. Another option is the negative motivation of voters, the desire to punish a political party in power that ignores their will for too long or discredits itself by the actions and statements of its leadership. For example, in the plane of a simple alternative, the main issue in the 2009 elections to the House of Representatives was determined by the formula: "Are you for the progressive, reformist DPJ or the retrograde, conservative LDP?" As you know, these elections ended with a crushing defeat of the LDP and an unprecedented victory for the DPJ, which won almost two-thirds of the seats in the lower house. In any case, the elections in "small districts" clearly take on the character of a popular referendum, which in no way reflects the complex and multi-colored palette of public moods.

In general, the level of representation of major political parties in Parliament obtained during elections in "small districts" is significantly higher than the percentage of votes they receive. In this sense," small districts "play the role of an" amplifier "of voters' moods, providing them with hypertrophied, disproportionate expression. As a result, there are conditions for crushing victories or defeats that dramatically change the balance of power in the highest legislative district of the country. It is no coincidence that the term "landslide"is invariably used in the English-language literature to refer to the electoral victories of the LDP and DPJ in the 2000s². According to the Asahi Shimbun newspaper, "the current system significantly contributed to the historic change of power in 2009. The single-member system brought new life to the country's democratic processes taking place in connection with the government elections" [Asahi Shimbun, 20.11.2011].

The radicalization of changes in the political arena is facilitated by qualitative changes in the social portrait of the Japanese electorate. The processes of urbanization that have been going on for several decades are leading to an increase in the share of "floating" votes that are not associated with any of the current political forces. The traditional orientation of Japanese voters towards a specific figure, which implies that they vote for a particular politician, regardless of his party orientation, is reduced. At the same time, the importance of party slogans in the electoral motivation of voters is growing.

¹ Komeito, Communist Party of Japan, Social Democratic Party of Japan, Party of All, New People's Party, etc.

² Landslide, crushing.

The final balance of power in general elections begins to be determined by a relative minority of voters. An increasingly important role among them is played by politically motivated electoral groups, mostly living in cities and keenly interested in the content of political manifestos of parties, and before the next election they calculate which of the pre-election promises were fulfilled by the current government and which were not. This part of the population is more likely to belong to the older age categories - 50-70 years. By occupation, they are more likely representatives of the intelligentsia. Unlike "traditional" voters, whose political choice is more determined by their origin, status, and belonging to traditional social institutions, these electoral strata have lost their country ties with their native locality, come from nuclear families, and therefore are more variable in their political preferences, being a product of post-industrial civilization. As a politically motivated voter makes their last-minute choice based on their own subjective preferences, the overall outcome of the vote becomes less predictable. Even though the overall share of such voters is relatively small3, it was their support that was crucial for the Democrats ' crushing victory in the 2009 Lower house elections, and the loss of this support predestined the DPJ's defeat in the 2010 House of Councillors elections. Politically motivated voters punished the Democrats for not fulfilling specific promises that were thoroughly written down in the "manifestos" of 2009: abolish fees for the use of highways, increase child benefits at the rate of 26 thousand yen per month per child, establish a system of targeted assistance to farmers, etc.

Be that as it may, there is no doubt that the model of "small districts" in its pure form leads to a significant distortion of the real picture of the people's will, allowing a clear minority to dominate. And this is not just the cost of the transition to a two-party system - a goal that was originally declared by the architects of political reform. The party-political configuration in the country's highest legislative body, which is a product of the electoral system, is difficult to characterize as the expected result. The biggest criticism is that the two major parties that dominate the political arena of Japan in the multi-party era do not differ much from each other in terms of program and ideology. If the goal of the political process is to create certain political alternatives for voters, diversify the opportunities for electoral manifestation for minorities, and isolate the specific interests of certain social groups and strata divided by professional, gender, age, and other characteristics, then the current electoral model cannot be called successful. It is difficult to disagree with the opinion of the Asahi newspaper that the system of single-member districts "does not contribute to the reflection of diverse views and opinions in public policy" [Asahi Shimbun, 20.11.2011]. In this respect, the situation in Japan is qualitatively different from Western countries with two-party political systems (for example, the United States and Great Britain), where voting for one of the leading political parties requires the voter to make a much clearer programmatic and ideological choice.

It can be argued that the Japanese electoral system has a mechanism that allows to correct this shortcoming to some extent-party-list elections held in proportional representation districts. Voters cast their votes in them for parties, not for individual candidates, as a result of which

³ According to Hosei University lecturer Mitsuo Imanishi, - about 15% [Cooperation and rivalry in Eurasia..., 2011, p. 11.]

it becomes possible to more accurately identify not personal, but political preferences of voters, to get political figures in the deputy corps who are more concerned with national interests than with the interests of a single electoral district. But this mechanism in its current form can hardly be called perfect.

The distribution of parliamentary mandates in the OPP is carried out as follows: first, the norm of representation of individual political parties is determined, then the mandates received by the parties are personified in accordance with the number under which a particular candidate stands in the closed list. The situation is complicated by the fact (and this is a feature of the Japanese electoral system) that several deputies may appear under the same number in the lists. If the number of mandates received for a given number is not enough for all the candidates running under it, those who received more votes in the "small district"are considered to have passed. In this regard, it is worth noting another specific feature of the electoral system in the OPP - the right to stand for a candidate simultaneously in the "small district" and the OPP. A candidate gets priority seats in a single-member constituency, and only in case of failure - in the OPP. This rule was designed to mitigate the consequences of the abolition of the previously existing "middle electoral districts" during the 1994 reform, which allowed several candidates to win elections within one district at once. Many politicians who previously successfully won by the second or third numbers, in small districts faced the risk of defeat. The use of the new rules made it possible to "lay down straws" for deputies, especially those who occupied a prominent position in the party hierarchy and for whom failure to enter parliament would mean political death. As a result, as shown by the British researcher J. R. R. Tolkien. Stockwin, based on statistical data on the results of elections to the lower house, the transition to the new system did not radically change the personal composition of the LDP deputy corps, as one might expect at first glance [Stockwin, 2008, p.169-174].

If a candidate passes through the OPP to parliament after being defeated in a single-member district, this is called "rebirth" (fukkatsu) in Japanese political slang, and such a deputy is often referred to as a "zombie deputy". The phenomenon of "revival" is negatively perceived by public opinion, since failure in a "small district" is associated with an insufficient level of trust on the part of voters, and passing through the OPP is associated with abuse of official position. In this regard, a rule was adopted in 2000, according to which if such a candidate receives less than 10% of the total number of votes recognized as valid in the "small district", his passage to Parliament through the RCP is not recognized [Hashimoto, 2006, p.101]. Nevertheless, many opponents of the current government, mostly supporters of small and medium-sized parties, who rarely use this mechanism for political insurance of their leaders, sharply criticize the Vozrozhdenie system as undemocratic and demand its abolition.

Among the discussed ways of reforming the electoral system for the lower house of Parliament, projects that involve changing the ratio of the number of seats elected according to the majority and proportional principles have become widely known. The major parties-the LDP and DPJ - are in favor of increasing the quota of "small districts" and further reducing the system of proportional representation, for example, from 180 to 150 seats. In turn, Komeito and other parties of the parliamentary minority, whose deputies get into Parliament mainly by proportional representation, advocate expanding the OPP and reducing the number of majority districts. As an alternative, Komeito suggests the revival of" middle districts", in which their chances of winning are higher than under the current system. 3 Vostok, No. 4

A significant problem for Japan is the question of the equivalence of votes. The difference in the price of a vote calls into question the validity of the basic democratic principle, according to which every voter has one vote and these votes should be equal.

After the reform in 1994, which provided for the abolition of" medium-sized districts "and the introduction of" small "ones, a special independent commission cut the boundaries of the created"small districts". At first, one of the 300 seats was allocated to all forty-seven prefectures, while other districts were created as part of prefectures in proportion to the number of voters living in their territories. With this approach, it is inevitable that there will be a significant difference in the price of the vote of individual districts.

At the same time, the difference in the price of voting increases even more as the processes of urbanization increase, as well as population migration from depressed regions to the Pacific coast of the country. A significant contribution was made by the fact that the existing administrative boundaries between cities and towns with different population densities were taken into account when cutting district boundaries: "small districts" appeared, numbering 200 thousand voters, and districts where their number reached 500 thousand people [Hashimoto, 2006, p.102]. An additional problem was the process of consolidation of local entities that continued in the 2000s, as a result of which it was necessary to change the boundaries of electoral districts, adjusting them to new territorial and administrative contours.

In 2002, the map of districts was redrawn, and in the five most populous prefectures, ⁴ were added, and in the five prefectures with a lower population density, ⁵ were reduced by one electoral district. Nevertheless, the contrast in the price of the vote continued to worsen. After the next population census, which took place in 2010, an independent expert commission on redrawing the borders of "small districts"was created by a special decision of the Parliament. The Commission, headed by M. Muramatsu, Professor Emeritus of Kyoto University, was to conduct a study of the situation within a year and submit its recommendations to the Prime Minister by February 25, 2012.

However, in March 2011 The Supreme Court of Japan ruled that the situation in which the difference in the price of the vote exceeds the level of 1.99 times is contrary to the country's constitution. The reason for the trial was the publication of official data from the 2010 census, which showed that in 97 of the 300 existing "small districts", the price of the vote is more than twice as low as in the smallest by population electoral district No. 3 of Kochi Prefecture. The court found that the 2009 lower house elections were held in violation of the Constitution, since the maximum difference in the voting price was 2.3. However, the results of the 2009 vote were not declared invalid by the court [The Japan Times, 26.10.2011]. However, the verdict referred to the need for fundamental amendments to the Law on Elected Public Positions, which would bring the electoral system in line with the country's constitution. ⁶

However, the powers of the Muramatsu Commission were not enough to decide in principle what to do with the country's electoral system, and it suspended its work. In October 2011, an inter-party commission was organized with the participation of representatives of all parliamentary parties.

⁴ Chiba, Saitama, Kanagawa, etc.

⁵ Shimane, Yamagata, Hokkaido, etc.

⁶ In particular, it was a question of abandoning one of the principles of forming "small districts", according to which each prefecture should create one "small district" "by default", i.e. without reference to the size of its population.

make a comprehensive decision on whether to change the current electoral system, and if so, in what direction. We are talking about finding the optimal balance between the "people's will" (which implies the widest possible range of political forces in parliament) and the "choice of power" (which means a workable parliamentary majority that ensures the passage of government bills through parliament). Updating the agenda of the commission's work is facilitated by the fact that elections to the House of Representatives can take place at any time after its early dissolution by the head of government, and a new recognition of them by the court as unconstitutional can provoke an acute political crisis, depriving the newly elected lower house of legitimacy.

In the course of the commission's work, contradictions between the positions of individual parties were revealed. By mid-February 2012, DPJ representative S. Tarutoko presented a draft electoral reform that included the elimination of five "small districts", the reduction of seats in the OPP by 80 seats, ⁷ and the partial introduction of a combined mixed system. ⁸ The DPJ project also called for the creation of an expert council that would develop recommendations on the reform of the country's electoral system within one year of the next lower house elections.

The DPJ project, according to experts, may lead to some strengthening of the representation of "small parties" and an increase in their influence on political life, while it will be much more difficult for large parties to gain a stable majority in the lower house [Yomiuri Shimbun, 16.02.2012]. For example, according to the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper, if the 2009 elections had been held according to the proposed scheme, the Komeito party would have won 30 more seats, while the DPJ would have won only three [Yomiuri Shimbun, 16.02.2012]. This circumstance has acquired a special meaning in the light of the emergence of a number of "small" but promising political parties in the political space, for example, the All Party or the regional party Isin-no kai, created by Osaka Mayor T. Hashimoto. It is these parties that are expected to win the votes of a significant segment of the electorate in the upcoming elections, which is disappointed with both the current DPJ administration and the opposing LDP, which has failed to come up with a positive reform program. Meanwhile, excessive representation of relatively marginal political forces in parliament, according to experts, can lead to confusion and complicate the formation of a workable parliamentary majority.

The DPJ's proposals were criticized by other political parties, including the LDP and Komeito. The LDP, in particular, insisted on limiting itself to the reduction of five seats from "small districts", eliminating one district each in Yamanashi, Kochi, Saga prefectures, etc. In turn, Komeito proposed to expand the quota of proportional representation in much larger volumes, which would allow small and medium-sized parties to significantly strengthen their position in parliament.

Under these circumstances, the LDP's proposals, which limit the reform to the abolition of five "small districts" in the least populated prefectures, have become the most realistic in the short term. However, DPJ Secretary General A. Kosiisi told reporters that in the absence of a cross-party compromise, the DPJ will have to proceed to formalize its proposals in the form of a government bill and try to pass it through Parliament without prior approval [Asahi Shimbun, 22.02.2012].

⁷ From 180 to 100.

⁸ This system is similar to that in Germany: voting takes place simultaneously in the small districts and the OPP, all the votes received by the parties in both types of districts are added up, and the distribution of seats between the parties is based on the principle of proportional representation. After that, the total number of seats received by the party is subtracted from the number of seats it received in the small district. Accordingly, the more parliamentary seats a party receives in "small districts", the fewer seats it can expect in "districts of proportional representation".

3*

ELECTORAL SYSTEM CHALLENGES FOR THE HOUSE OF COUNCILLORS

Elections to the House of Councillors are held according to a different formula compared to the House of Representatives. Of the 242 seats in the upper house, 146 are held in prefectural electoral districts that coincide in size with the geographical boundaries of prefectures (there are 47 in total), 96 in the national Proportional Representation District (OPP), which covers the entire territory of Japan, where voting takes place on open lists. The composition of the House of Councillors is renewed by half every three years. During the July elections, 73 deputies from small districts and 48 from the OPP will be selected. As in the House of Representatives, each voter receives two ballots on election day - one for voting in the prefectural district, the other for voting in the national district.

Each prefectural district delegates from two to eight deputies to the upper house, depending on the number of electors in the prefecture. Since the upper house is re-elected by half every three years, the number of prefectural representatives in the upper house is always even. The method of determining the winner in the prefectural district is similar to that which existed before 1994 in the "middle districts" - the candidates who won the largest number of seats in terms of the number of votes received win. In reality, it is almost impossible for an independent candidate to win the election without the support of a political party, given the need for huge organizational and financial resources.

In the national district, voting is carried out on open party lists. The voter can enter both the name of the party and the name of the candidate from the list on the ballot. Votes cast for individual candidates are included in the total pool of votes received by the parties they represent. After counting the votes according to the d system'Onta ⁹ determines the number of seats won by a particular party. The distribution of seats among candidates is made in accordance with the results of individual preferences of voters (i.e., those candidates who received more personalized votes win).

One of the problems with elections to the Chamber of Councillors ' OPP is that only people with a national reputation have a real chance of winning them. As a result, the share of ^{taranto 10} is too high, reducing the overall level of professionalization of the deputy corps. "Recognition" turns out to be a good tool for winning elections, but it cannot be considered an absolute plus if we are talking about routine work on a draft law in parliamentary committees and commissions.

The electoral reform of the House of Councillors, as well as the House of Representatives, is discussed in the context of the problem of the difference in the price of votes (which is more acute in the upper house). The difference can be five-fold, since elections are held on the basis of prefectural districts with different numbers of voters. So far, the situation has been corrected by changing the electoral quota: for more populated prefectures, it has been increased, and for less populated prefectures, it has been reduced. For example, the reform carried out in 2007 for two districts (Tokyo and Pref. Chiba) was added two seats each and two districts (pref. Tochigi and Gunma) - reduced by two seats, as a result of which the difference in the price of the vote was reduced to 4.8 times [Stockwin, 2008, p.178].

However, in the 2010 elections, it again reached more than five times the level. This gave rise to another legal action, and in November 2010, the court decided to take legal action. The Tokyo court ruled that the elections were unconstitutional, although it did not annul their results [Asahi Shimbun, 20.11.2011].

⁹ Method of distribution of mandates in proportional representation.

¹⁰ This is the name given in Japan to people in creative professions with a national reputation.

The court's verdict stimulated Japanese lawmakers to step up efforts to implement electoral reform so that the next 2013 elections would be held under new rules. In December 2010, the then Speaker of the House of Councillors, Takeo Nishioka, put forward a package of proposals to radically change the electoral law, which included the introduction of nine regional electoral blocs instead of prefectural districts, where elections would be held according to a proportional system with open lists [The Japan Times, 13.01.2011]. The implementation of T. Nishioka's proposals would make it possible to almost completely negate the difference in the price of a vote.

Similar initiatives were taken by the DPJ, which proposed that elections to the House of Councillors should be held in the same eleven regional blocs that hold elections to the House of Representatives for convenience [Asahi Shimbun, 01.12.2011]. Such districts were supposed to have a quota of 6 to 32 seats each, depending on the size of their electorates. At the same time, the DPJ draft proposed reducing the number of seats in the House of Councillors from the current 242 to 200. The maximum difference in the price of a vote, if we count the least populated Tohoku electoral bloc as one, would then be 1.2. Elections, as in the draft of T. Nishioka, were proposed to be held on open lists, which would allow those party candidates who received the most votes to enter Parliament. Projects to reduce the number of seats in the upper house to 100 are also widely known, which, according to their authors, would be enough to preserve its status as an "institution of common sense" [Asahi Shimbun, 20.11.2011].

The arguments of the initiators of these reform projects were convincing. In addition to the main thing - eliminating the difference in the price of votes and, accordingly, eliminating the grounds for regular lawsuits, the reform would significantly reduce the number of "dead votes" that are inevitably lost when voting in districts with relatively small quotas. Thus, the whole range of people's will expression would be much better represented in the Parliament. The implementation of the project would facilitate the expansion of representation for small and medium-sized parties, which, in turn, would remove their objections when passing the bill through Parliament.

During the discussion, some systemic flaws in the proposed projects also emerged. Thus, the transition to regional blocs will inevitably lead to the fact that individual prefectures, each of which has its own socio-cultural and historical identity, will not be properly represented in the parliament. Thus, the Shikoku block (6 seats) would have a quota of three seats in the elections (the composition of the upper house is updated by half each time), and since it includes four prefectures, at least one of them would not be represented in the upper house. This circumstance is important from the point of view that, although Japan is a unitary state, the role of the upper house has, among other things, the function of representing individual administrative divisions.

A similar problem is the inevitably better representation of densely populated areas of the country as opposed to areas with low population density. This, as can be expected, will lead to a greater disparity in development, as the parliament will be inclined to make decisions in favor of the economically more developed regions of the country.

Another issue is the reverse side of applying the proportional representation principle of forming a chamber. As in the case of the lower house, the highly diversified composition of the chamber means that it will be much more difficult for an individual party in power to get a working and stable majority in it, as a result of which it will have to take more care of forming coalitions, finding compromises, etc.

The dispute over electoral reform bills has highlighted a basic problem of the electoral system for the House of Councillors, which is not imperfection

The main reason for the formation of the upper house is the lack of technical mechanisms, but rather the uncertainty of the very meaning of the upper house's existence. Many rightly point out that the House of Councillors, which is not subject to dissolution and has a longer term of office than the lower one (six years versus four), should ensure the continuity of state policy, conduct long-term programs, solve strategic development tasks, etc.That is why it should be staffed with political figures who are less bound by considerations of political expediency. They must be reputable and professional, and have the recognition of specialists.

In the current conditions, the pre-election campaign takes place in similar forms and according to similar principles as in "small districts". This is noticeable not only in the national district, where voting takes place according to the proportional system, but also in prefectural districts. So, in most of them (twenty-nine out of forty-seven), the struggle is for the only parliamentary seat, which, of course, gets a candidate from either the LDP or the DPJ. The proposed formula for electoral reform is questionable, according to which political parties are at the center of elections and not bright individuals, but unknown party functionaries are more likely to have more chances.

At the same time, the emphasis only on personal orientation, which is divorced from party affiliation, is fraught with the risk of a different plan, namely, the danger of reviving the infamous "monetary policy", which in the first half of the 1990s already led to an acute crisis of the entire party and political system of the country. The challenge is to make sure that the struggle over personal preferences of voters is not reduced to a competition of "money bags", which in Japan became widespread in the era of"medium-sized electoral districts". But in regional blocks that are much larger in scale than the "average districts", the intensity of competition should be stronger, and the level of spending should be higher. However, relying on party support will mean mainly the party principle of forming the upper house, the need to get rid of which is declared as one of the primary goals of the reform. Therefore, we are talking about finding the optimal balance between the priorities of personal and party-political principles in electoral mechanisms. So far, such a balance has not been found.

list of literature

Asahi shimbun.

The Yomiuri shimbun.

Cooperation and Rivalry in Eurasia (proceedings of the Eighth Russian-Japanese scientific and practical conference of scientists and journalists of the series "In Search of New Ways of Development of Eurasia", Moscow, September 7, 2010). Moscow, 2011.

Hashimoto Goro, Iida Masayuki, Kato Shujiro. Q&A Nihonseijihandobukku (A desktop book on Japanese politics. Questions and Answers (nayap.). Tokyo, Ichigeisha, 2006.

The Japan Times.

Stockwin J.A.A. Governing Japan: Divided Politics in a Resurgent Economy. Blackwell Publishing, 2008.

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