The idea of the “revolving door” at the Kantei, or the offices of Japan’s prime minister, is a long-standing trope of English-language coverage of politics.
It became part of the parlance in the 1990s, amid US impatience at how frequently things changed at the top while the country went through successive financial crises. The phrase carries an unpleasant colonial snootiness, a sense that the leader of one of the world’s biggest economies does not matter, that they would be gone so soon that we do not need to bother remembering their name.
However, right now it is an accurate metaphor: In Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Japan has a leader who is stuck inside that revolving door, spinning round and round since last month’s upper house election defeat. It is anyone’s guess where he would emerge — outside the building or back in the seat of power.
After his shock victory in last year’s vote to lead the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) that dominates Japanese politics, Ishiba seemed to be following the usual pattern of short-lived premiers: Brief hope, swift disillusionment and then stepping down.
Last year’s lower house defeat left him running a minority government, and a hammering in Tokyo’s assembly elections had him on the ropes. Being without a majority in either house of parliament seemed to seal his fate; surely no prime minister could avoid responsibility for such a drubbing.
Three days later, the inevitable seemed to happen. News reports citing anonymous sources, from publications right across the political spectrum, leaked that the prime minister had decided to step down. It was how every prime ministerial resignation in recent history has happened.
The Yomiuri, the world’s best-selling newspaper, hastily printed extra editions handed out to commuters with the headline, in gigantic point size: “Prime Minister Ishiba to Resign.”
However, it seemed one man had not read the script. After a meeting with LDP big-wigs, all former leaders, Ishiba denied in blunt terms any suggestion that he would go. And as the days passed without a resignation, those newspaper extras became collectors’ editions. A set of three sold for ￥5,000 (US$34) on a flea market app.
Perhaps he changed his mind, or maybe his political enemies leaked the story to try and force his hand. Yet, the reports have been neither retracted nor corrected.
Now, even stranger things are happening. Since the start of this month, survey after survey suggested that voters want him to stay on as prime minister. Support for his Cabinet has risen, despite the successive drubbings. Ishiba has leaned into an image that he is being “bullied” by others in the LDP, with the most unusual sight of a “Don’t Resign, Ishiba!” protest in front of the Kantei.
As elsewhere, one possible answer for the polling might be methodology, with younger people underrepresented in the canvassing that is mostly done by telephone. Public broadcaster NHK is one organization that has acknowledged the skew in its results, as older voters tend to pick up the phone more often, and to favor Ishiba.
The premier reportedly blamed the election defeats on a funding scandal that predates his term. However, his case is not helped by footage resurfacing of his past attacks on leaders who clung to power, such as in 2011 when he slammed then-Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan.
“The cabinet is not your personal property,” Ishiba had said. “It’s not there for your personal satisfaction.”
All this leaves a power vacuum the country could ill afford at a time of increasing uncertainty, with questions around everything from fiscal direction to growing US-China rivalry, and the threats to businesses from still-unresolved US tariffs.
I am usually loath to draw comparisons between US and Japanese politics. The differences are deep, and parallels drawn between, say, the fringe right-wing Sanseito party and Make America Great Again, or former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe and US President Donald Trump, are often facile and confuse more than they illuminate.
Yet it is hard not to think of former US president Joe Biden, hanging on last year when it was clear that his party would lose power if he contested the next election. Many of his own side wanted him to step down, but few were willing to openly call for him to do so. Biden eventually pulled out, but by then it was too late — and the damage done to a party that is a broad church of interests remains today.
It all sounds quite familiar on this side of the Pacific. However, in the absence of a similar change of heart, the LDP is now debating its next steps. A panel is discussing whether to seek a recall election, which would bring forward the next race for leader, which is not scheduled until 2027.
The party has never executed the provision, and it is not clear when such a decision might be made. Ishiba could run in the election, in effect seeking a renewed mandate from his party.
However, until then, the revolving door would keep spinning.
Gearoid Reidy is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Japan and the Koreas. He previously led the breaking news team in North Asia, and was the Tokyo deputy bureau chief.
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