Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was fatally gunned down a year ago today while delivering a campaign speech in Nara city.

In April, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was rushed to safety during an outdoor campaign speech after a young man lobbed an explosive device in his direction. No amount of denunciation is sufficient to condemn such cowardly acts.

Election campaigns are one of the pillars of any democracy. Ensuring they can be held safely is fundamental to safeguarding the freedom of citizens and society.

FAR CRY FROM INCLUSIVE POLITICS

What has Abe’s absence over the past year brought to Japanese politics?

His approach to politics had some distinctive features. One was a sharp distinction between friends and enemies.

While building close relations with his friends, Abe did not pull punches when he attacked people with different views. He once referred to voters who were critical of him as “such people” and ridiculed the previous government led by the now defunct Democratic Party as a “nightmare.”

His tactic of fueling confrontation generated the political energy he relied on for pushing his agenda forward.

Abe also displayed utter disrespect for the Diet. He gave many false answers to questions at the Diet and heckled opposition lawmakers questioning his administration. He made most important policy decisions only through discussions within his Cabinet. One most notable example was his decision to change the official interpretation of a constitutional provision related to Japan’s right to collective self-defense.

In contrast, Kishida initially pledged to promote a shift from politics of division to that of cooperation. In that regard, he stressed his “ability to listen.” He also cast the ruling Liberal Democratic Party as a “national party committed to diversity and inclusion.”

Indeed, Kishida is a mild mannered politician who avoids the combative and divisive political style that Abe relished. After Abe’s death, however, Kishida started showing a different side.

Kishida forged ahead with Abe’s controversial initiatives to significantly change the nation’s security policy and ramp up nuclear power generation again. During Diet sessions, he has often skimped on providing key information and avoided offering detailed explanations.

Kishida also decided to hold a state funeral for Abe without consulting the Diet, in defiance of divided public opinion over the matter.

It is hard not to feel that Kishida is doing no better or even worse than Abe in terms of incorporating diverse views and opinions into policymaking or building consensus through careful and meticulous debate.

WHAT DID ABE MEAN?

In “For a Beautiful Country,” a book Abe published while he was serving as chief Cabinet secretary under former Prime Minister Junichi Koizumi, he described his political stance as “conservatism.” He also wrote that people chanting reformist or anti-establishment slogans were “somewhat suspicious.”

What did Abe try to preserve through his conservative politics? There seems to be an answer to the question in the above-mentioned book, in which he referred to “traditions that were born and have been built up in Japan’s long history.”

While the old political landscape where conservatives and reformists were locked in bitter confrontation is long gone, there is no doubt that Abe cast fresh light on the question of what is conservatism.

Japanese dramatist and critics Tsuneari Fukuda (1912-1994) once argued in an essay that there could not be conservatism as a doctrine while there could be a conservative “attitude.” Conservatism is not an ideology, according to Fukuda.

Some of Abe’s policy initiatives, including his overzealous pursuit of constitutional amendments, smacked of rightist ideology. Some overseas media characterized him as a “radical” nationalist rather than a conservative.

Terms to describe politicians or the stances of political parties can be hard to strictly define, such as right, left, conservative, liberal and centrist. In many cases, a single politician or political party has multiple and complicated political views and positions.

Abe was no exception. His economic policy was tinged with leftist ideas. In the diplomatic arena, Abe liked to talk about such liberal principles as the rule of law, human rights and freedom.

Kishida, in contrast, seems to have no specific ideological colors. He only refers, from time to time, to his faction’s traditional principles of “liberal, freedom.”

But his “tough-minded pragmatism” supports his disturbing willingness to change without hesitation important political traditions Japan built up during the postwar period.

METICULOUS CONSIDERATION, NOT FORCEFUL ACTION

The LDP’s politics since the Abe administration have underscored a deep flaw in the governing system that allows the prime minister to take strong-arm political actions without meeting serious obstacles.

The legislature, defined by the Constitution as “the highest organ of state power,” has been relegated to the role as a “subcontractor” serving the Cabinet.

Is it acceptable to do nothing to fix the system that is incapable of preventing the government from taking excessive or dubious policy actions?

Dealing with structural problems concerning the nation’s checks-and-balances system and electoral systems is an urgent necessity. But no initiative is under way to tackle the challenges.

There was a time in the postwar era when politics were underpinned by a sense of balance and political sensibility. In those days, politicians avoided allowing things to veer to extremes and tried to find common ground. They also adopted a cautious and gradual approach to policy actions without rushing to destroy old systems or rules or build new ones.

But times have changed. The radical changes that have occurred in the global landscape since the end of the Cold War have put strong pressure on political leaders to make quick decisions and take swift actions.

Still, policy decisions based on meticulous consideration of related factors and careful implementation of decisions are as important as ever.

It is time for Japan to change its political course to switch from rough-and-tumble politics marked by division to moderate and staid politics.

--The Asahi Shimbun, July 8