Short Cuts: Japan at the Polls
Christopher Harding, 5 February 2026
Ahead of last year’s elections to the upper house of the Japanese parliament, Sanseito, a new party of the populist right, ran a ‘Japanese First’ campaign attacking foreign residents and tourists as well as the country’s establishment, which it accused of failing to defend Japan’s borders and interests. Sanseito has a charismatic frontman, Kamiya Sohei, a...

