As Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party prepares to select its next president. By extension, whoever wins will become Japan’s prime minister. 

The contest reveals more about the party’s structural challenges than its policy vision. The frontrunners, Takaichi Sanae and Koizumi Shinjiro, embody a stark generational and ideological divide, while other contenders including Hayashi Yoshimasa, Motegi Toshimitsu, and Kobayashi Takayuki offer experience but carry political baggage. Yet the real question isn’t who can navigate the LDP’s Byzantine internal politics, but who can address Japan’s mounting domestic crises and geopolitical challenges with concrete, implementable solutions.

The specter of Japan’s “revolving sushi” era looms large over this election. Between 2006 and 2012, six prime ministers cycled through office, paralyzing policymaking and diminishing Japan’s international influence. Only Shinzo Abe’s eight-year tenure restored stability and strategic direction. Even that longevity and policy continuity wasn’t enough to overcome entrenched interests in the party and in society.

 The LDP’s next leader must demonstrate not just the ability to win power, but to wield it effectively over time. This challenge requires managing the party’s octogenarian powerbrokers, satisfying educational credentialism, and navigating intergenerational rivalries among political dynasties.

Each candidate brings distinct advantages and vulnerabilities to this complex equation. Takaichi, at 63, represents continuity with Abe’s conservative legacy. Her experience as Economic Security Minister and Policy Research Council chair, combined with her hawkish stance on China and traditional social values, positions her as the establishment favorite. Her opposition to same-sex marriage and separate surnames for married couples may alienate younger voters, but it solidifies support among the LDP’s conservative base which is crucial for fending off challenges from upstart right-wing parties like Sanseito and the Mirai Party.

Koizumi offers generational change and broad public appeal. His environmental advocacy and volunteer work after the 2011 tsunami demonstrate genuine policy commitment. His connections to Washington through CSIS and his Columbia degree provide international credibility. Yet at 44, he faces skepticism from senior LDP members who view his Ivy League credential as compensating for an undistinguished undergraduate education, a form of academic laundering that matters in Japan’s prestige-conscious political culture that practices an informal educational caste system that imparts privilege, access and socio-political capital. His father’s legacy opens doors but also raises questions about whether he possesses the gravitas to manage party elders who’ve dominated Japanese politics for decades.

Hayashi brings perhaps the most impressive résumé: Harvard Kennedy School graduate, architect of the Mansfield Fellowship, and experience across six cabinet portfolios. His work on the Trans-Pacific Partnership and decades of international engagement make him exceptionally qualified. However, his leadership of the Japan-China Parliamentary Friendship Association until 2021 proves politically toxic in an era of hardening attitudes toward Beijing. In the current geopolitical climate, perceived softness toward China effectively disqualifies serious candidates.

Motegi’s credentials as a Harvard graduate, McKinsey alumnus, negotiator of both the CPTPP and Trump-era trade agreements demonstrates exceptional competence. His dissolution of his own faction after corruption scandals shows political courage. But his reputation for abrasive behavior has created enemies within the party, illustrating how personal temperament can undermine policy expertise in consensus-driven Japanese politics.

Kobayashi, though accomplished and internationally minded, faces the same age-related skepticism as Koizumi without compensating for public charisma or political pedigree. In the LDP’s gerontocracy, youth without either extraordinary popular support or powerful factional backing remains a decisive handicap.

Beyond personalities, however, Japan faces policy challenges that demand more than factional maneuvering. Demographically, the nation is aging faster than any major economy, with profound implications for economic growth, social services, and national security. Gender inequality persists despite decades of rhetoric about “womenomics,” limiting Japan’s economic potential. Real wages have stagnated since the bubble era, leaving younger generations worse off than their parents, a reversal of the postwar social contract that built modern Japan.

Young Japanese increasingly reject traditional employment patterns and relationships, creating a social crisis that transcends economics. The much-vaunted reforms of  “Abenomics” failed to restore broadly shared prosperity or address structural impediments to innovation and entrepreneurship. Yet none of the candidates has articulated comprehensive proposals to address these interconnected challenges.

On foreign policy, the stakes are equally high. The U.S.-Japan alliance requires adaptation to new threats from an assertive China, a nuclear North Korea, and a revisionist Russia. The momentum in Japan-India and Japan-South Korea relations needs sustained leadership to institutionalize these partnerships. The “authoritarian threesome” of China, Russia, and North Korea poses an existential challenge to the liberal international order Japan has thrived under since 1945.

Yet the candidates: foreign policy positions remain largely rhetorical. Takaichi’s hawkishness on China plays well domestically but lacks specifics on alliance management or economic security. Koizumi’s environmental focus, while important, seems peripheral to immediate security challenges. The others offer experience but no transformative vision for Japan’s role in a rapidly changing Indo-Pacific.

What Japan needs from its next prime minister isn’t just the ability to manage LDP factions or win elections. The country requires a leader with concrete, actionable plans for demographic revitalization, economic renewal, and strategic adaptation. This means controversial reforms: significant immigration despite public skepticism, radical changes to employment practices, genuine gender equality in workplace and society, and a foreign policy that balances American alliance commitments with Asian economic integration.

The LDP’s choice will reveal whether the party can transcend its internal dynamics to address national imperatives. Takaichi may offer stability and ideological clarity, while Koizumi represents generational change and public appeal. But neither has articulated the comprehensive reform agenda Japan desperately needs.

Perhaps more importantly, whoever wins must commit to implementing reforms over multiple years, resisting the factional pressures that have historically shortened prime ministerial tenures. This requires not just managing the LDP’s elderly kingpins but building public support for difficult changes. It demands policy expertise beyond narrow portfolios and the communication skills to explain complex tradeoffs to an increasingly skeptical electorate.

The tragedy of this leadership race is that it focuses on navigating the LDP’s internal pathologies rather than Japan’s external challenges. Educational pedigrees, factional allegiances, and generational rivalries dominate discussions while concrete policy proposals remain vague. The candidates seem more concerned with winning power than explaining how they’ll use it.

Japan cannot afford another “revolving sushi” era of political instability. But neither can it afford leaders who achieve longevity through policy timidity. The next LDP president must combine political durability with reform ambition, a rare combination in any democracy, but essential for Japan’s future.

As LDP members cast their votes, they should ask not just who can win, but who can govern. Who has specific plans for Japan’s demographic crisis? Who can articulate a foreign policy beyond slogans? Who possesses both the vision to see necessary changes and the political skills to implement them?

These questions matter more than age, gender, or educational background. Japan’s challenges are too serious for personality politics. The nation needs a leader who understands that managing the LDP is merely a means to an end the transformation of Japan to meet 21st-century realities. Whether any current candidate possesses this combination of vision and capability remains the crucial unanswered question as the LDP prepares to choose Japan’s future.

This article was first published on September 10, 2025, at the World Geostrategic Insights.