Aspiration for the good society - Religion and Politics in Contemporary Japan - page 86

reason for voting for Komeito becomes, yes of course policies, but also
the sincerity and sense of purpose of Komeito politicians that I don ' t

know if Minshut - politicians have.
(conversation with Koichi, 01/07/2004)

There are ideological di erences between the major parties (the LDP and

Minshut - ) and Komeito, but their policy proposals are relatively similar.
Those of the LDP being more right-wing, Komeito pulling more towards the
centre and Minshut -

having politicians that straddle between the left and

right, re ecting a party made up of old LDP members and former Social

Democratic Party members.
As indicated by Sachiko, there were young people who supported Komeito
because Soka Gakkai supports it and they were enthusiastic and active Soka
Gakkai members. Such support was linked to a strong trust in Ikeda as the
sensei, or mentor they admired and as the person who had initially estab-
lished Komeito. Ami elaborated on this way of thinking by saying that, rst,

I thought I should support Komeito because I am a Soka Gakkai member and I
trust Ikeda-sensei. However, when I started to study the policies I found more
reasons why I should support

' At

(conversation with Ami, 08/07/2004).
Twenty-year-old Ami was an SU student whose parents were both executive
leaders of Soka Gakkai. Her father being the daikokubashira (the breadwin-
ner, see Matsunaga 2000) was an employee of Soka Gakkai, and her mother,
although doing more or less the same

'

' '

job in the WD, typically volunteered

her time without being paid. 5
It was not only people who supported who admired Ikeda.

All active young people in Soka Gakkai regarded Ikeda as the exemplary
Buddhist whose behaviour they often aspired to emulate. Yet how they
expressed that admiration and trust di

' unhesitatingly '

ered. For Ami, there seemed to have

been this initial stage of trust, or perhaps more accurately, trust based

on her own experience of growing up as a member of Soka Gakkai who
trusted that people had integrity and did what they said. Beginning to study
the political issues substantiated Ami

' naïve '

s trust and made her arguments more
sophisticated. Ami had participated in the

'

study group that gath-
ered to study political issues and policies. A young man, Masa, who had also
participated, explained laughingly,

' under 20 '

' we learn that Komeito is the best party …

but we also study about other parties (conversation with Masa, 01/07/2004).

Other people who initially trusted Komeito because of their trust in Ikeda and
their organisation responded in di

'

erent ways as they observed Komeito
operating in the world of real politics. Some felt that responding to Ikeda ' s call

for creating a more humanistic society, something they read about more speci cally

in his yearly peace proposals to the United Nations, also meant to question
Komeito. Thus some young people regarded supporting Komeito as part of
being a Soka Gakkai member, while others thought it was their responsibility
to keep an eye on Komeito. Acquiring more knowledge about policies and
politics mostly recon rmed their reasons for supporting Komeito.