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Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba adjusts his glasses during a press conference as he announces his resignation, in Tokyo, Japan, on September 7, 2025.
Who will be Japan’s next leader?
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s resignation announcement on Sunday triggered the country’s second leadership battle in less than a year, plunging his center-right Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) deeper into a political crisis.
The party has held power for most of the last 70 years, but recently lost majorities in both houses of the National Diet and suffered a historic defeat in Tokyo’s city council elections. This string of defeats, combined with a stagnant economy and higher inflation, spelt the end for Ishiba.
The LDP must now select a new party leader, who is likely to replace Ishiba as prime minister. That process is likely to unfold in October, though it could come sooner given the urgency of the situation.
To better understand how the leader of Japan, the world’s fourth largest economy, got into this mess after less than a year in power, and who is most likely to replace him, GZERO spoke to one of the top experts on Japanese politics: Eurasia Group’s Japan Director David Boling.
GZERO: Why did Ishiba resign?
Boling: “Three strikes, you’re out,” is probably the most compelling argument against Ishiba. He basically was the leader of the party, and they had three elections where they lost. After that upper house election in July, there was a pretty hard push by a lot of conservatives to call for a special election. Ishiba has a three-year term that started last September, when he was elected. It is unprecedented for the LDP to call for basically a midterm intraparty election. Ishiba was able to stall that for a while, but the momentum started to come back strong.
Last week, they had set up a vote on Monday for whether to have a leadership election, and Ishiba saw the writing on the wall over the weekend. Instead of seeing how this special election would turn out, he could tell that he didn’t have the votes.
Who are the favorites to replace him, and what are their stances?
The two favorites to replace him are well known – they came in right behind Ishiba in the party leadership vote last September.
The person who finished second behind Ishiba was Sanae Takaichi. She is conservative, nationalistic, and a proponent of “Abenomics,” which is loose monetary and fiscal policy. But she’s probably best known for her nationalistic views. She’s a hawk. [She would also be Japan’s first female prime minister.] The person who placed third is Shinjiro Koizumi, a well known name in Japan because his father was prime minister. He’s young, charismatic, and popular. Since they are both members of the LDP, both candidates are broadly pro-US alliance, and right of center. I would put Koizumi as more moderate, and Takaichi as more conservative.
Last thing: what’s the biggest thing to watch out for going forward, once the new leader is determined?
Last October, the LDP and its junior coalition partner Komeito lost their lower house majority, so they now have to work with one of the opposition parties to have enough votes to elect the new LDP leader as prime minister again. I think that it is very likely that whoever is the LDP president will become the next Japanese prime minister, but there will have to be some sort of deal worked out with the opposition parties to have enough votes to approve that person as the next prime minister. The LDP-Komeito coalition may have to make concessions on items for the annual budget, agreeing to spending or taxing provisions favored by the opposition. So that will be the next big watch point.
Graphic Truth: Japan’s ruling coalition loses majority
Japan’s ruling coalition lost control of the upper house in Sunday’s election, further weakening Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba amid growing domestic pressure and international challenges. To retain its majority, the Liberal Democratic Party and its partner Komeito needed to win 50 seats – they got only 47. This follows the LDP’s worst electoral showing in 15 years in last fall’s Lower House election. Rising inflation and opposition calls for tax cuts resonated with voters, while the far-right Sanseito party gained ground with a nationalist, anti-immigration platform. Despite the setback, Ishiba vowed to stay on, stressing the importance of upcoming US trade talks as Japan faces an August tariff deadline. For a refresher on why Shigeru was in such trouble to begin with, see here.
Japanese Prime Minister and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party leader Shigeru Ishiba is surrounded by security policemen as he meets with his supporters after he delivered a campaign speech for his party's candidate Masaaki Waki for the Upper House election in Yokohama, suburban Tokyo, Japan, on July 18, 2025.
Could a hard-right party swing Japan’s election?
Over the past decade, the world’s leading industrial democracies have become intensely polarized, particularly with the rise of anti-immigration populism in Europe and the United States. Japan, where the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has led governments for all but four of the past 70 years, has defied that trend. But with elections looming this weekend, opinion polls say that may be changing fast.
On Sunday, Japan faces elections for the Upper House of the National Diet, the country’s legislature (click here for a good primer on how Upper House elections work). Last fall, the LDP-led coalition government lost its majority in the Lower House, and it badly needs an electoral rebound to avoid a period of uncertainty the country hasn’t seen in decades.
That rebound isn’t looking likely. A poll from broadcaster NHK found that Prime Minister Ishiba Shiberu’s approval rating fell from 39% in June to just 31% this week. His party is faring even worse. Support for the LDP dropped from 31.6% in June to a startling 24% now. Recent surveys from the Yomiuri Shimbun and Nikkei flash similar warning signs.
If the current governing coalition of the LDP and junior partner Komeito loses its Upper House majority, Ishiba’s future as PM will immediately come into question as we see the possible opening of negotiations with opposition parties on joining the government. There’s even a small chance that enough of Japan’s long-fragmented opposition could join forces to form an opposition-led coalition government.
Where is the LDP's public support going? Even in Japan, xenophobic populism is having a political moment as the need for migrant labor in a country with an aging population trumps a longtime public preference for cultural homogeneity and the immigration restrictions that protect it.
Sanseito, a rising party of the right, is an explicitly “Japan First,” anti-globalist, anti-immigrant upstart that’s now capturing enough attention in tough economic times that it could win 10 or more seats on Sunday – the hard-right party currently only has two seats in the Upper House. Given that Sanseito looks to be drawing most of its support from voters who’ve historically backed the LDP, it might also cost the long-dominant party its majority in a close election.
Sanseito is likely benefitting from Japan’s current economic hardship – rising prices, especially for imported food and energy, and falling real wages, in particular – fueled in part by a historically weak yen. Even at a time of dollar weakness, the Japanese currency fell to 149 yen against the dollar earlier this week. All this comes at a time when US President Donald Trump is driving a hard bargain with Japan’s beleaguered government on trade terms.
In short, Japan is not a country prone to political turmoil, but the results this weekend could change that very quickly.
Members of the Lawyers from Across Japan for the Victims of the Unification Church（LAJAVUC）attend a press conference as the Tokyo District Court issued a dissolution order to the Unification Church, the religious group formerly called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, in Tokyo on March 25, 2025.
Japan bans Moonies
On Tuesday, a Tokyo court revoked the legal status of the Unification Church in Japan, ordering the sect known as the Moonies to disband following a government problem spurred by the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2022.
Founded in 1954 in Seoul, South Korea, by Sun Myung Moon, a preacher who cast himself as a messiah, the church raised an estimated 70% of its income in Japan, where its followers heavily pressured Japanese to give donations known as tithings to make up for the brutality of the country’s imperial era.
Widely derided as a cult, the Moonies claimed less than 100,000 followers in Japan in recent years – less than .1% of the country’s population, but pseudo and new-wave religious groups are popular in Japan, with an estimated 180,000 of them, or one for every 700 people. The Unification Church enjoyed outsize influence in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party that has governed Japan for most of the post-war era. Moon was a close friend of Abe’s grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, who saw the sect as an ally against communism. The Moonies retained political influence by fundraising and promoting hundreds of candidates from the LDP.
In 2022, Tetsuya Yamagami admitted to killing Abe in an act of purported retribution after his mother, who was involved with the Moonies, donated over $1 million to the church. The confessed assassin accused Abe for allowing the church, which he blamed for leaving his family bankrupt, to prosper in Japan.
The church said Tuesday’s dissolution order was “absolutely unacceptable” and a threat to religious freedom. It is considering an immediate appeal, but David Boling, Japan director at Eurasia Group doesn't believe that will amount to much. “No one is interested in defending the church," he says. "The attitude of the Japanese public is ‘good riddance.’”
Japanese Prime Minister and leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Shigeru Ishiba bows to LDP lawmakers onstage after a press conference, a day after Japan's lower house election, at the party's headquarters in Tokyo, Japan October 28, 2024.
It’s horse-trading season in Japan after shock election
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is promising deep internal reforms to the Liberal Democratic Party after voters delivered what he called a “severe judgment” in Sunday’s elections, costing him the majority in the lower house of Parliament. The LDP has ruled since 1955 with only brief interruptions, but it lost 56 seats as voters expressed frustration with a funding scandal that has tarnished the party’s image with corruption and entitlement.
An unforced error? The PM only came to power on Oct. 1 in an internal party vote after his predecessor, Fumio Kishida, stepped down. Ishiba could have waited up to a year to call an election but wanted to win a mandate from voters quickly. A little patience might have paid off – and given him time to move away from the scandal and work on Japan’s sluggish economy.
What’s next? Ishiba has 30 days to form a coalition, and he will need to include an extra partner beyond traditional allies from the Komeito party. The most likely contender is the Democratic Party for the People, a fellow center-right party that saw its seat count rise from 7 to 28, but its leader is playing hardball. Yuichiro Tamaki says he would prefer to work with the LDP on an issue-by-issue basis — which would mean catering to his needs on every vote.
Will the US-Japan alliance suffer? Not likely. The alliance is a point of broad consensus in Tokyo, but plans to amp up Japanese defense may need to take a backseat.October 23, 2024, Kamagaya, Japan - Japanese Prime Minister and leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Shigeru Ishiba reacts to his supporters after he delivered a campaign speech for his party candidate Hisashi Matsumoto for the general election at Kamagaya in Chiba prefecture, suburban Tokyo on Wednesday, October 23, 2024.
Will Japan’s LDP lose its grip on power?
As Japan heads to the polls this Sunday, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s decision to call an early election just weeks after taking office is turning out to be a high-stakes gamble. Polls predict that the ruling Liberal Democratic Party could lose seats, or even the majority, after ruling the country for all but four of the past 65 years.
“The opposition parties are hammering the LDP over the political fundraising scandal,” says Eurasia Group’s Japan Director David Boling, referring to the discovery of undisclosed political funds and kickbacks within the LDP, news that has rattled public trust at a time when inflation is biting and living costs are soaring.
Earlier polls showed that the LDP and its coalition partner Komeito would maintain their majority, but a weekend poll indicating they could lose 50 of their 247 seats has left Ishiba on shaky ground.
If the LDP loses its majority, it could be forced to make concessions on monetary policy. The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, LDP’s biggest opposition, proposes modifying the Bank of Japan’s inflation target from 2% to one “exceeding zero,” which would leave room for rate hikes even if inflation dips.
Beyond having to abandon its economic agenda, Boling warns that “if the LDP-Komeito coalition loses its majority, the prime minister’s deathwatch may begin for Ishiba.”
Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida speaks at a news conference during the 77th UN General Assembly in New York.
Will Japan's PM avoid the "danger zone" after Abe funeral?
Japan held a controversial state funeral Tuesday for former PM Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated in early July. Now that the ceremony is over, one attendee who'll feel some relief is Fumio Kishida, the embattled current prime minister.
How did we get here? Since seeing his popularity soar to a record high after responding to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with unusual toughness, three months ago Kishida’s approval rating started to slip. It was mainly over the economy — with many Japanese people starting to panic over inflation after 20 years of deflation.
Abe’s assassination swept the ruling Liberal Democratic Party to a decisive victory in the upper house election three days later, but soon after that, the blowback from his tragic death made the Japanese public sour on the PM. First, Abe's assassin blamed his family's financial ruin on the Unification Church, a cult-like religious movement born in South Korea whose members are known as Moonies (after founder Sun Myung Moon).
The revelation sparked a public outcry against the Moonies, which have long been cozy with the LDP — including Abe himself. Kishida, who has no ties to the church, responded to the backlash by firing his cabinet ministers with Moonie baggage, but the scandal just won't go away.
At the same time, Kishida waded into an unforeseen culture war by authorizing a state funeral for Abe. That struck a sour note for the majority of Japanese voters who oppose the taxpayer-funded $11.5 million ceremony because it’s an honor traditionally reserved for members of the Imperial Family.
Until Abe, only Shigeru Yoshida, Japan’s first postwar PM, had received a funeral with all the state bells and whistles. While Abe fans might argue that he deserves the same treatment as the country’s longest-serving PM, David Boling, Eurasia Group’s lead Japan analyst, says the backlash shows that Abe’s hawkish politics were always divisive. (To get an idea of how much, days ago an elderly man set himself on fire in central Tokyo to protest the funeral.)
Also, the economy has gone from bad to worse. Last week, the Bank of Japan intervened for the first time since 1998 to prop up the yen after the currency hit a new low, having lost one-fifth of its value against the dollar in 2022. Japan is not the only country grappling with high inflation and a weak currency, but it has stubbornly refused to raise interest rates in response.
Annual core inflation reached 2.8% in August, which may not sound like much yet is historically very high for Japan. Boling says that rising prices — which the government can do little about — and the central bank dragging its feet on rate hikes make Kishida look ineffective.
Is the PM in real danger of losing his job? Not yet, but for Boling he's close to the "danger zone" with an average approval rating of about 37%. If Kishida’s numbers go down even more a month from now, "that becomes a bigger concern, and he really hits the panic button."
Still, Kishida has two things going for him.
First, the PM doesn't have an election on the horizon. That’s what doomed his predecessor, Yoshihide Suga, who stepped down with a similar approval rating a year ago. Kishida then won the LDP leadership race and captained the party to a comfortable majority in the October 2021 lower house election.
Second, Boling says that the opposition remains disorganized and fragmented. Meanwhile, the LDP's so-called Abe faction, the main ruling party bloc that might seek to challenge Kishida in the near term, is leaderless.
Kishida also has a personal reason to stay. Next year, Japan takes over the presidency of the G7, which will hold its 2023 summit in Hiroshima, the PM’s electoral district. Kishida wants to use the symbolism of the location to make a big splash about nuclear weapons non-proliferation.
Finally, Boling says Kishida’s low numbers don’t necessarily reflect his personal popularity among the Japanese public. He is perceived as someone who listens more and is less in-your-face than Abe or Suga — the flip side is that he's also seen as rather bland and indecisive on policy.
The upshot: Since 2000, only two of Japan’s prime ministers have served more than 15 months in office: the larger-than-life Abe and the flamboyant Junichiro Koizumi, famous for serenading then-US President George W. Bush with Elvis songs. The more low-key Kishida hardly has their charisma, yet could follow in their footsteps if he weathers the current storm.
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Japan's assertive foreign and economic policy reflect Abe's legacy
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
With Japanese people mourning former PM Shinzo Abe, how will his death further influence Japan's politics?
Well, we've already seen a fairly easy majority win by Abe's own Liberal Democratic Party. He had been stumping for them when he was assassinated. His two legacies are things that the Japanese are moving on. One, Abenomics, the three arrows of fiscal policy and monetary policy and growth really underpin the new style of capitalism that Prime Minister Kishida's been talking about. I think that they will more assertively align towards those, even though the BOJ at this point, The Bank of Japan doesn't have a lot of flexibility given the indebtedness levels. But also the Quad, the CPTPP, the desire of the Japanese, the prime minister to go to NATO for the summit a couple weeks ago. I mean, all of these were really kicked off by Abe wanting a more assertive foreign policy, normalizing their defense capabilities. You might even see a move now towards reforming the constitution on the defense side, something Abe wanted to do but didn't have the votes for. Now the LDP does. I expect to see Japan increasingly assertive on the global stage like you've seen Germany under Olaf Scholz.
Does recent polling indicate both Democrats and Republicans will ditch Biden and Trump in 2024?
No, but it definitely indicates that both of those men, in their late seventies today, will have significant primary challenges. It's too early to talk about DeSantis from Florida is sort of out in front and challenging Trump. At this point in the 2016 race, everyone was talking about Chris Christie is out in front. Things change, and they change a lot as people get to know other political contenders. But I think the lack of popularity of Biden in the Democratic Party and the desire to move on from Trump in the Republican Party... In the case of Biden, the difficulties in the economy and his age. In the case of Trump, the way that January 6th committee has played out, I think does create space and means that both of these primaries are going to be competitive. Frankly, I think in both cases, that would be good for democracy in the United States. But if you made me bet at this point, I'd still say incumbent for Biden and Trump getting another run at it is still the way you would bet against anybody else simply because it's too early to say and they're by far the most well known.
The euro and the dollar are equal. Is it time for Americans to visit Europe?
Has to be, right? I mean, sort of a dollar parody. Everything in Europe is looking pretty cheap. I mean, it sounds like a great time for a vacation in Italy and sort of go and buy some fashion. Why not, and help the European economies, except for the fact of course, that there is a war going on in Ukraine and there are big energy challenges. So I'm not sure that Germany in the winter sounds so great right now, but for Americans that are looking to get the hell out for a week or two, Europe is cheaper now than it's been at any point in 20 years. One thing I would say, though is don't go to the UK. Heathrow is an utter disaster, and they're telling them not to take any more flight reservations because they can't handle all the inbound.
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