Japanese House of Councillors election, 2004

Japanese House of Councillors election, 2004

July 11, 2004
121 (73 SNTV, 48 proportional) of 242 seats in the House of Councillors
First party Second party   Leader Junichiro Koizumi Katsuya Okada Party Liberal Democratic Democratic Last election 111 59 Seats won 115 82 Seat change +4 +23 Popular vote 16,797,684 (result for 48 PR seats) 21,138,032 (result for 48 PR seats) Percentage 30.0% (result for 48 PR seats) 37.8% (result for 48 PR seats)
seats won by ■ - DPJ ■ - LDP ■ - New Komeito ■ - SDP ■ - Independent factions ■ - No election
President of the House of Councillors before election Hiroyuki Kurata Liberal Democratic Elected President of the House of Councillors Chikage Oogi Liberal Democratic

Elections to the House of Councillors, the upper house of the legislature of Japan, were held on July 11, 2004. The House of Councillors consists of 242 members who serve six-year terms. Approximately half the members are elected every three years. At these elections 121 members were elected. Of these 73 were elected from the 47 prefectural districts and 48 were elected from a nationwide list by proportional representation.

Parties

Government

• Liberal Democratic Party (conservative)
• New Komeito (theocratic Buddhist, conservative)

Opposition

• Democratic Party (social-democratic/liberal)
• Japanese Communist Party (communist)
• Social Democratic Party (social-democratic)

Results

The opposition Democratic Party won a plurality of the popular vote and seats contested in the election, sweeping the liberal urban areas. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party failed to win in its strongholds but once more received most of its support from the agrarian areas. New Komeito did well, reaching its goals, as did the Social Democratic Party. The Japanese Communist Party did not reach its goals, while independents won the rest of the seats. The Liberal League and Midori no kaigi failed to win any seats.

Complete list of prefectural races

Elected candidates in bold

Compiled from JANJAN's "The Senkyo"^[1] and MIC official results.^[2]

Notes:

• All incumbents not running for re-election in their prefectural electoral district are counted as retirements even if they ran in the nationwide proportional representation.
• In a multi-member district, there is no difference between Councillors elected with the highest and lower vote shares. Yet, "top tōsen", i.e. being elected with the highest vote, is considered a special achievement and thus noted where changed from the previous election for the same class of Councillors (1998).
• Niigata is counted as an SDP hold because the elected Councillor joined the SDP parliamentary group.

References