Analysis: How DPJ victory will change Japan?

Watch Video

Play Video

With the Democratic Party of Japan ending the nation's five decades of virtual one-party rule, CCTV correspondent Wang Guan takes a look at what contributed to the victory as well as how the party's initiatives will change the Japanese political and economic landscape.

Change has been a catch phrase throughout the DPJ's election campaign. Handing cash to households to boost consumption, keeping the 5 percent consumption tax intact for the next four years, cutting wasteful spending and raising the birth rate amid a rapidly aging population. Those pledges helped the DPJ establish itself as a dynamic and reformist party out to change the structure of politics in Japan. And those promises certainly resonated with voters.

Jyunji Umezawa, a businessman, said, "I voted for the DPJ because I really wanted a change."

Toshio Otsuka, a businessman, said, "I'm looking foward to how much the DPJ can change now that the LDP is no longer in charge."

Some political pundits believe the DPJ's landslide win has a larger significance.

Tobias Harris, political analyst of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said, "Clearly that sends a signal, not just to the LDP, that the public was angry enough to throw them out of power, but I think it sends a signal to the bureaucracy, which will have to think twice about how it challenges a DPJ government that, would that mandate, with that kind of support behind them. The balance really will shift the politicians."

But it's always easier to talk the talk than walk the walk. Some analysts doubt that the DPJ can, in effect, cut wasteful spending once it takes charge and faces various real life issues.

They also point out that the world's economy has yet to recover from a recession which is affecting the export-dependent Japanese economy. In this light, whether the family subsidy program sufficiently stimulates domestic demand remains to be seen.