How Abe performs matters more than usual. At home, he is under unprecedented pressure. A pair of scandals that have tarnished his administration refuse to die. Barely a day goes by without the revelation of another detail that undermines Abe’s record as, arguably, the most successful postwar prime minister of Japan. Things have become so bad that Junichiro Koizumi, a former prime minister and mentor of Abe, recently suggested that it could be time for Abe to step down, while on Saturday several thousand people took part in by far the largest protest to date, holding signs that said “Abe quit!”
The first of these scandals arose last year when it emerged that the finance ministry had sold a plot of public land to Moritomo Gakuen, a company that runs private schools of a nationalistic bent, at a bargain-basement price. Officially, the plot was sold at a steep discount because, the finance ministry claimed, the land was contaminated and would cost a great deal to clean up. Despite denials from Abe and the finance ministry, many suspect that the deal was so advantageous to Moritomo Gakuen because Yasunori Kagoike, then head of the company, was a friend of Abe and, especially, of his wife, Akie. The affair seemed to have blown over, until last month, when a newspaper revealed that ministry officials had doctored fourteen documents presented to Japan’s national legislature during inquiries it held last year. [...]
Shinzo Abe has done much good for Japan, unexpectedly so. When, after a miserable first term as prime minister in 2006–2007 marred by scandals and illness, Abe returned to power in 2012, he appeared to have learned some lessons. By the cautious standards of Japan’s salaryman-like leaders, Abe is bold and decisive. His plan to reinvigorate Japan and foster a sense of national pride comes with some worrying baggage—notably, his revisionist view of wartime history that refuses to acknowledge some of Japan’s aggressions and questions whether those who worked as “comfort women” in Japanese military brothels were forced to do so—but the country badly needed invigoration. “Abenomics,” his plan to revitalize the economy by pumping money into the economy, fiscal stimulus, and structural reforms, has fallen short of its promises—in particular, a target of holding inflation to 2 percent and reforms of the labor market and Japan’s social security system. Even so, the country is enjoying its longest stretch of economic growth in years and wages are rising.
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