Japan Oct 22 2017

[Vega]

If CDP and HP were magically merged into one party with one list, and merging all of their support together, what would the results look like?

See: Democratic Party, DPJ (2014 and 2016), worse if Koike was backing them, as she has turned out to be a toxic influence. The new party would lose the soft LDP support that the HP has and the fairly substantial left-wing vote that the CDP has.

[jaichind]

If CDP and HP were magically merged into one party with one list, and merging all of their support together, what would the results look like?

On the PR side the sum will be the same of the sums of the two parts.  On the district side I can see at best the unified party winning perhaps 5-8 more seats.  And most likely it will be less then that due to the fact that both voting blocs will not merge that easily.  Main issue here is a unified CDP-HP will not have the JCP alliance which would constrain how many more seats this bloc can win.

Right now there are onlg 49 seats where CDP (plus pro-CDP independents) and HP are both running candidates.  Only around 21 of them are "winnable"  (LDP vote share in 2014 was 48% or less).  And out of that 21  CDP (plus pro-CDP independnts) are on track to win 7-10 of them anyway.  So the opportunity to win additional district seats by having a unified CDP-HP candidate is only around 10 seats or so.

With the current voting structure only a united HP-CDP-JCP alliance can bring down LDP-KP.

[jaichind]

In the 2nd district very pro-LDP 岡山(Okayama)

the election posters changed from



to



Note that the HP candidate who is on the bottom left (ex-DP MP who has been elected 5 times already with 3 times losing the district but winning on the PR slate including 2014) went from having the HP party name being very prominent to not being mentioned at all.    Shows the decline of the HP brand.

The LDP candidate, on the upper right, also does not prominently show the LDP label.  The HRP candidate (upper left) and JCP candidate (bottom right) use the party label much more prominently.  It does show that even in a very pro-LDP prefecture the LDP candidate wins less on the party label but more on local connections.

[jaichind]

Early voting hits 14.71% which is not final yet.  Up from 9.77% in 2014.

[Lachi]

What if, say, the CDP got a seat total out of the 11 PR blocks that was higher then the amount of candidates they actually put up for election? Let's say they got 80 seats in total. Would the 2 seats that they don't have candidates for just not be filled, or would another party win them?

[jaichind]

What if, say, the CDP got a seat total out of the 11 PR blocks that was higher then the amount of candidates they actually put up for election? Let's say they got 80 seats in total. Would the 2 seats that they don't have candidates for just not be filled, or would another party win them?

The next party on the list gets them ...  That happen to DPJ and YP in 2009.  DPJ won 308 seats and YP won 5 seats in 2009 when DPJ should have won 312 seats and YP 7 seats.

[jaichind]

Seat milestones for LDP

233   LDP majority
244   LDP safe majority (LDP majority on all committees)
261   LDP gets all committee chairmanships
279   LDP de facto ahead of 2014 elections in terms of ratio of seats up for election (475 vs 465)
284   Number of LDP MPs when the Lower House was dissolved
310   LDP 2/3 majority by itself
332   Number of LDP candidates

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Have there been boundary changes to the fptp constituencies since the last election?

[jaichind]

Have there been boundary changes to the fptp constituencies since the last election?

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

青森(Aomori) LDP lose 1


岩手(Iwate) anti-LDP lose 1


三重(Mie) LDP lose 1


奈良(Nara) LDP lose 1


熊本(Kumamoto) LDP lose 1


鹿児島(Kagoshima) anti-LDP lose 1

[jaichind]

Due to hurricane some cities will close polls at 7pm vs the normal 8pm. 

[Filuwaúrdjan]

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

Ah, o.k - so only those small modifications? Nowhere gained seats?

[Vega]

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

Ah, o.k - so only those small modifications? Nowhere gained seats?

Yes, a more complete redistricting will be done following the 2020 census.

[jaichind]

Turnout by time in 2012 and 2014.  This way we can calibrate as turnout are announced.

            2014      2012
11:00　11.08　14.03
14:00　22.66　27.40
16:00　29.11　34.87
18:00　34.98　41.77
19:30　37.72　45.42
20:00   42.89   50.46
Early      9.77     8.86
Final  　52.66　59.32

Early vote in 2017 is 14.71

[Filuwaúrdjan]

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

Ah, o.k - so only those small modifications? Nowhere gained seats?

Yes, a more complete redistricting will be done following the 2020 census.

Excellent - I can sort out the basemap pretty much immediately then

[Filuwaúrdjan]

[Oryxslayer]

Have there been boundary changes to the fptp constituencies since the last election?

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

However, 10 members were removed from the diet. Which 4 at large seats were cut - I'm making a base-map for a different site BTW.

[jaichind]

My latest projection. 

It seems given the early voting numbers and the hurricane turnout will more likely be around 54%.  If so that would help LDP-KP a lot.   Lower turnout will hurt HP and JRP.  JRP was already in decline and lower turnout pushed it below the threshold in a couple of PR districts with LDP gaining instead.  And that is on top of gains for LDP due to lower turnout and as a result a higher LDP vote share.   In some district seats there have been some late swings against LDP so the net is a wash for LDP-KP at 290 seats.


              District     PR     Seats             PR vote
LDP          192         66      258             32.2%
KP               9         23        32             13.1%
NPD             0           0         0               0.3%  (Hokkaido regional LDP splinter, pro-LDP this time)
JRP              6           6       12                5.9%
HP             33         32        65              18.0%
CDP           17         33        50              19.2%
SDP             1           0         1                1.4%
JCP              1         16       17                9.2%
Ind(LDP)      5           0         5      (LDP rebels or pro-LDP independents)
Ind(HP)        9           0         9     (pro-HP ex-DP independents w/o support of JCP-SDP)
Ind(OPPN)  13           0       13      (Joint opposition candidates)
Ind(CDP)      1          0         1      (pro-CDP independents w/o support of HP)
Ind(LP)        2           0         2      (pro-HP ex-LP independents with support of JCP-SDP)
------------------------------------------------
              289        176      465

If it looks like turnout becomes something like 51% I might have to up the LDP-KP numbers.  If it seems turnout will become something like 57% I will have to lower the LDP-KP numbers.

[jaichind]

Have there been boundary changes to the fptp constituencies since the last election?

No.  Other than 6 prefectures lost 1 seat each

However, 10 members were removed from the diet. Which 4 at large seats were cut - I'm making a base-map for a different site BTW.

Corect.  The PR section shifts were

北海道 (Hokkaido)                               8   ->   8
東北(Tohoku)                                     14  -> 13 (lost a seat)
北関東 (Kitakanto or North Kanto)       20  ->  19 (lost a seat)
南関東 (Minamikanto or South Kanto)  22  ->  22
東京 (Tokyo)                                     17  ->  17
北陸信越 (Hokurikushinetsu)               11  ->  11
東海 (Tokai)                                      21  -> 21
近畿 (Kinki)                                      29  ->  28  (lost a seat)
中国(Chugoku)                                  11 ->  11
四国 (Shikoku)                                    6  ->   6
九州 (Kyūshū)                                   21  ->  21  (lost a seat)

[jaichind]

Polls close 8PM Tokyo time (7AM EST)

Links to results

NHK  -> https://www.nhk.or.jp/senkyo/database/shugiin/2017/
Ashai -> http://www.asahi.com/senkyo/senkyo2017/
Yomiuri -> http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/election/shugiin/
Mainichi -> https://mainichi.jp/senkyo/48shu/
Nikkei -> https://vdata.nikkei.com/newsgraphics/shuinsen2017-live/
Sankei -> http://www.sankei.com/politics/election2017.html
NNN/NTV -> http://www.ntv.co.jp/election2017/
JNN/TBS -> http://www.tbs.co.jp/senkyo2017/
FNN -> http://senkyo.fnn-news.com/2017/headline/

Will post link to live NHK coverage where they will present exit polls when I find it.

[jaichind]

Given the high expectations set by all these media projections I would say that if

a) LDP-KP crosses 310 -> 2/3 majority for LDP-KP which is a significant victory
b) LDP-KP crosses 300 -> still considered a victory
c) LDP-KP falls below 300-> minor setback
d) LDP-KP falls below 280 -> significant setback

[jaichind]

Weather pattern by PR section/prefecture



Okinawa will get hurricane weather starting 10/21
九州 (Kyūshū) South will get heavy rain 10/21 and hurricane weather morning of 10/22
九州 (Kyūshū) North will get heavy rain 10/21 and hurricane weather noon of 10/22
四国 (Shikoku) will get heavy rain morning of 10/22 and hurricane weather noon of 10/22
中国(Chugoku) and 北陸信越 (Hokurikushinetsu)  will get heavy rain and hurricane weather noon of 10/22
近畿 (Kinki), 東海 (Tokai), 北関東 (North Kanto) and 南関東 (South Kanto)  will get heavy rain morning of 10/22 but hurricane weather morning of 10/23
東北(Tohoku) will get heavy rain noon of 10/22 but hurricane morning of 10/23
北海道 (Hokkaido)  will get hurricane weather noon of 10/23

Southern turnout will be lower than normal while Northern Japan maybe flat.

[Sestak]

Oh, it would be great if they decided to pull a Theresa May now.

[jaichind]

Polls opened at 7am (24 min ago).

[Oryxslayer]

Oh, it would be great if they decided to pull a Theresa May now.

That would require some heavy vote splitting...but voters were happy enough to move from HP to CDP earlier despite one being a a party on the right, the other on the left - so perhaps it is possible. Or perhaps HP has shed enough of DP/Anti-LDP brand with the rise of CDP that they get more At-Large seats in the traditional LDP strongholds due to soft LDP voters wanting to tell the LDP to remove Abe - something some of the regional polls from last week might have suggested. Or perhaps the high early vote bodes well for the opposition. We don't know, and none of these are likely. This is all of course referring to a substantially reduced - LDP-KP majority, not an actual defeat mind you.

BTW, thank you jaichind for your coverage in the past month. I wouldn't be able to state the above with any level of confidence without your coverage. I eagerly wait the results!

[jaichind]

Oh, it would be great if they decided to pull a Theresa May now.

Unlikely given the structure of this election.  Too many seats are safe LDP seats for this to take place. Best the anti-Abe crowd can hope for is getting LDP-KP somewhat below 280 which is possible if it turns out to be a disastrous night for LDP.  In such a situation Abe continues as LDP but might get kicked out in the Sept 2018 LDP Prez elections.