2017 Japanese general election

2017 Japanese general election

← 2014 22 October 2017 2021 →
All 465 seats in the House of Representatives 233 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	53.68% (1.02pp)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Shinzō Abe Yukio Edano Yuriko Koike Party Liberal Democratic CDP Kibō no Tō Last election 291 seats – – Seats won 284 55 50 Seat change 7 New New Popular vote 18,555,717 11,084,890 9,677,524 Percentage 33.28% 19.88% 17.36% Swing 0.17pp New New   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Natsuo Yamaguchi Kazuo Shii Ichirō Matsui Party Komeito Communist Ishin Last election 35 seats 21 seats – Seats won 29 12 11 Seat change 6 9 New Popular vote 6,977,712 4,404,081 3,387,097 Percentage 12.51% 7.90% 6.07% Swing 1.20pp 3.47pp New   Seventh party   Leader Tadatomo Yoshida Party Social Democratic Last election 2 seats Seats won 2 Seat change Popular vote 941,324 Percentage 1.69% Swing 0.77pp
Results of the election, shaded according to vote strength. Results of the election.
Prime Minister before election Shinzō Abe (Third Abe Cabinet) Liberal Democratic Prime Minister after election Shinzō Abe (Fourth Abe Cabinet) Liberal Democratic

General elections were held in Japan on 22 October 2017.^[1] Voting took place in all Representatives constituencies of Japan – 289 single-member districts and eleven proportional blocks – in order to appoint all 465 members (down from 475) of the House of Representatives, the lower house of the then 707-member bicameral National Diet of Japan. Incumbent Prime Minister Shinzō Abe's governing coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the Komeito party retained their seats in signs of what was perceived as weak opposition. The PM won his fourth term in office and held on to the two-thirds supermajority in order to implement policies on revising the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution.^[2]

The snap elections were called in the midst of the North Korea missile threat and with the largest opposition party, the Democratic Party, in disarray. Just hours before Abe's announcement of the snap election on 25 September, Governor of Tokyo Yuriko Koike launched a new conservative reformist party Kibō no Tō, the Party of Hope, which was seen as a viable alternative to the ruling coalition. It soon led to the dissolution of the Democratic Party and its party members defecting to the Kibō no Tō.^[3] However, the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, whose members Koike refused to nominate, formed the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) led by Yukio Edano, splitting the opposition in half.^[4] The elections turned into a three-way contest as the CDP joined with the Japanese Communist Party and Social Democratic Party on a common platform opposing the constitutional revision. While Kibō no Tō fell short of expectation, the CDP surged in the polls in the last days before the elections and beat Kibō no Tō to emerge as the largest opposition party.^[5]

Despite being disrupted by Typhoon Lan, the elections saw a slight increase in turnout rate of 53.68 percent but still was the second lowest in postwar Japan. The lowest ever turnout was recorded in 2014.^[6] They were also the first elections after the voting age was lowered from 20 to 18.^[7] Abe also became the first Prime Minister to win three consecutive general elections since 1953 and the first LDP leader to do so. He became the longest-serving Prime Minister in the history of the country in August 2020, but resigned shortly after achieving this due to health issues.^[8]