Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
16
Nakaue Masanobu was Director of the Soka Gakkai-Komeito Liaison O
ce (in
2003
-
04). This view is echoed by Nishiguchi Hiroshi (Metraux 2000).
17
Soka Gakkai also became active in the worldwide NPT movement.
20
Between December 1994 and December 1997 Komeito was half-in, half-out of
Shinshint
-
.Ocially, the Komeito organisation was dissolved, but in the House of
Councillors it carried the name Komei. It also continued to exist at the local level.
Shinshint
-
was unable to encompass the running of the Komei Newspaper and its
relatively vast institutionalised operations, including its headquarters and local
oces, and it served as a backup should anything go wrong.
2 Aspiration for the good society
1
This echoed one gathering of the UNRC I was later to attend at Soka University,
where the MC made fun of this Japanese custom by doing the same thing.
2
This view is reflected in the opinion polls (see Kabashime 2003), but as we shall see
4
Non-payment of politicians into the pension funds is discussed below.
5
Such gender di
erences will be discussed in
Chapter 5.
6
In general, Ikeda does not talk much directly about Komeito or about supporting
Komeito.
7
Komeito managed to get the LDP to agree to not lowering the bene
ts to less than
50% of income, although this was still not popular, and also to start the process of
changing a pension system in which huge amounts are paid out to politicians and
civil servants after only seven years of service (Asahi Shinbun, 22/12/2004).
8
Kan was to become prime minister in June 2010.
9
See Asahi Shinbun (30/04/2004) for the reception Kan had to endure at the hands
of labour union supporters over the non-payment issue. Kan in return undertook a
two-week temple pilgrimage on foot in order to reflect on himself.
3 A case of interpretation?
1
See, for example, Asahi Shinbun (27/05/2006); Yomiuri Shinbun (15/06/2006); or
Masaki (2005), among many others.
2
No SDF personnel were killed in Iraq during their deployment, which lasted until
mid-2006.
3
My own daily reading of the Komei Shinbun during that period showed that there
was little critical reflection on the legality of the war itself. Articles were rather
concerned with how to deal with Saddam Hussein as a repeat offender against UN
demands. After the invasion, Komeito supported sending SDF to Iraq for huma-
nitarian reconstruction. Promotional videos during the election campaign also
focused on this. It is dicult to say that the Iraq War was not at the centre of
attention, but as is rather typical of the Japanese media in general, Komeito arti-
cles lacked any real critical discussion of the issues, which could be taken as
implicit compliance with the standpoint of the US government.
4
Yomiuri Shinbun also carried a survey on the di
erences among the parties with regards
to their support for the right to collective self-defence and revision of Article 9.
5
Being under 20 it is not legal to engage in election activities in Japan. Everyone I
met who was under 20 years of age was very strict about following this law.
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