20 May 2013 What Drives Shinzo Abe? By Gwynne Dyer Shinzo Abe, now six months into his second try at being prime minister of Japan, is a puzzling man. In his first, spectacularly unsuccessful go in 2006-07, he was a crude nationalist and an economic ignoramus who rarely had control of his own dysfunctional cabinet. …
25 August 2009 Japan: Not an Election, A Revolution By Gwynne Dyer Some years ago, a political science professor at a Japanese university told me that he reckoned you could fit everybody who counted in Japan into one room. There are about 400 of them, so it would have to be a ballroom. All but …
22 February, 2009 Liberal Democrats: Up and Down? By Gwynne Dyer Big crises like the current recession change a lot of things that once seemed to be a permanent part of the landscape. In Japan the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has governed the country for all but nine months of the past half-century, is …