La novation de l'économie politique au Japon : la victoire de Koizumi à l'automne 2005 marquera-t-elle le tournant d'une social-démocratie souterraine à une social-démocratie citoyenne

The recent electoral victory won by Mr. Koizumi in Japan is an opportunity to propose a reflection on the modalities of articulation between the political and the economic in this country and the changes underway. In the first part of this text, we will try to survey the electoral results and offer a synthetic reading, by relying on political comments from the main Japanese newspapers. This election also suggests a significant shift of the regime in the mode of articulation between politics and economics. To understand the current movement, we must first recall the nature of the politico-economic regime that has imposed itself since the end of the Second World War. This will be the subject of the second part. On the basis of this, we will be able to point out the difficulties linked to the arbitration between general interest and local accommodation within the extremely compartmentalized State, due to the nature of the "corporatism" put in place and its consequences on the - difficult - control of public finances during the crisis years. We will finally see how the economic and political stakes are articulated, in a new conjuncture where Japan must orient itself - the aging society obliges it - towards the "welfare state" rather than towards the neoliberal regime.