Word: dieting
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Hosokawa was cautious about the implications of his Diet victory. "There is a saying that 99 miles are only halfway for a traveler on a 100-mile journey," he said. "We're not halfway there yet." Political analysts contend, however, that change is irrevocably taking hold. "There is a progressive unraveling of the old system," says Kent Calder, director of the U.S.-Japan program at Princeton University. "I think we are in a reinforcing cycle of change, where one thing leads to another and unlocks new possibilities. It is a building revolution...
...Hosokawa taken on the rice farmers, one of the most powerful lobbies in Japan? The answer is shifting power. Unlike the long-ruling L.D.P., Hosokawa and his coalition are not beholden for their Diet seats to the ubiquitous nokyo (agricultural cooperatives). Moreover, under his reforms, the country's shrinking number of rice farmers will exercise still less influence in the future. Says Takeshi Sasaki, a political scientist at the University of Tokyo: "The old consensus was always to put domestic issues like rice first, but now political reform is breaking that consensus down. Also, when you are getting white-collar...
...much larger L.D.P. faces other difficulties. The creation of 274 single- member districts means that a hefty number of incumbent L.D.P. members will have no constituency the next time around. In Gunma prefecture, north of Tokyo, for example, eight Liberal Democrats hold Diet seats, but only five new constituencies are likely to be created in its place. Fear of being turfed from office is provoking talk of splits within the L.D.P. as anxious politicians begin shopping for new homes. Socialists are also looking for new patrons, and no one expects the dust to settle until after the next election...
Loss of the "control tower," as the Japanese press has nicknamed Ozawa, would be a sharp blow for the coalition and for Hosokawa, who depends heavily on Ozawa's intimate knowledge of political hardball in the Diet and elsewhere. "Every pot has its perfectly matched lid," says Tomoaki Iwai, a politics professor at Tokiwa University. "It is heaven's dispensation. They are one system...
WHEN THE GOVERNMENT'S POLITICAL-REFORM BILLS OFFICIALLY PASSED MUSTER last week, legislators of the ruling coalition cheered. But Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa looked impassive as he walked along the red-carpeted halls of the Diet building to the victory parties of his coalition members. No matter that this was a historic occasion; Hosokawa seemed above it all. "I have never met anyone who acts so nonchalant about being Prime Minister. He's such a natural," said Shinseito legislator Kozo Watanabe. "That accounts for his extreme popularity...