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About meReformer without friends?
Abe had a reform agenda, he just had zero skill in actually communicating it to the public, or pushing it through his own party. This is a theme I’ve seen in some recent commentary. Clay Chandler, the Asia editor for Fortune, writes in this post about someone else who agrees:
As news of Abe’s abdication broke, Fortune International Editor Robert Friedman and I happened to meet with Heizo Takenaka, the economics professor who served as economic policy czar under Abe’s predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi. Takenaka, who withdrew from politics after Abe replaced Koizumi, speculated Abe had finally come to grips with the fact that he had no allies within the party. “I am sympathetic to him,” said Takenaka. “He is a reformer. But he was surrounded by enemies.” Takenaka fears Abe’s departure could be the death knell for economic reforms championed by Koizumi. “I’m quite concerned about the effect this could have on economic policy,” he said. “Politicians from the old guard are coming back. The policy tribes have returned. Interest groups pushing for more public spending see their chance.”
Now that the DPJ has found it can win elections by promising pork to the countryside, will the LDP jump back into that same game? The country’s productive urban residents might once again get the rubber end of the plunger as the resources flow into the nonperforming sinkholes of rural Japan.
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