日本政治极化何以不彰?

Why Is Japan's Political Polarization Unnoticeable?

近年来日本的政治生态呈现“分化”现象,但“极化”现象并不突出。无论是与同时期欧美诸国还是与战后初期本国的政治生态相比,这一反差均较为明显。日本政治极化不彰的原因集中体现在政党和社会两个层面。政党层面的原因在于:缺乏长期稳定的、与自民党相抗衡的第一大在野党;主要政党的政策议题立场相对接近,且政党之间的议题分歧对普通选民的分化作用较弱;具有影响力的极左翼或极右翼政党尚未成型。从社会层面分析来看,尽管政治右倾化有所加剧,但由于中间选民增加和民众“去意识形态化”加速发展、“身份政治”在日本社会相对弱化、右翼势力成分多元等因素,政治极化的社会性动因有所缓解。

In recent years,the political ecology of Japan has exhibited a phenomenon of "fractionalization",which,however,is not very prominent This contrast is fairly distinctive,compared with America and the European countries during the same period or with its own in the early post-war era.The reasons for the unnoticeability of political polarization in Japan rest with both party politics and social factors.The reasons at the party level are mainly threefold:lack of a long-term stable primary opposition party capable of countering the Liberal Democratic Party(LDP) of Japan,the policy positions of the major parties are relatively similar,and the differences in issues between these parties have a relatively limited impact on the differentiation of ordinary voters,no influential far-left or far-right parties have taken shape yet.From a social perspective,although there has been an increase in political rightward drift,the social dynamics of political polarization have been mitigated by the increase in the number of median voters and the accelerated development of "deideologization" among the public,the relative weakening of "identity politics" in Japanese society,and the diversification of the right-wing forces.