One sunny Saturday afternoon in April 1996, I was discussing Japanese politics with a young lawmaker in a comfortable living room at his home in Denenchofu, a classy residential area of Tokyo.

“We have a choice: Either stick with the old way, which binds politics, bureaucracy and business together for mutual benefit, or drastically change the whole system so that it will work better for the benefit of regular citizens,” he said. He sounded naive at times during the talk, but he had a genuine tone and there was a sense of commitment in his words.

He also spoke in the friendly language of intellectuals, instead of the typically formatted, greasy clichés I had heard from many old-guard politicians. His charming wife joined us for afternoon tea, and his handsome Golden Retriever sat by him. We talked about our college life tainted with student riots in the late l960s and he told me how huge computers were back then. It was as if I were visiting a cousin from the same generation.
Today, Yukio Hatoyama, 62, still sounds like an idealist, and his agenda is, unsurprisingly, unchanged. The only difference is that he took office in mid-September as Japan’s new prime minister and launched a “new style of politics.”

The Democratic Party of Japan, which he heads, scored a stunning victory in the August general election for the powerful House of Representatives, which ended the almost uninterrupted rule of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party since 1955. Faced yet again with the gloomy prospect of the nation being led by an interchangeable array of LDP leaders, Japanese voters obviously wanted change.

Hatoyama’s leadership is untested, to be sure, but in the early stages of his administration, his public support rate was high – 78 percent and 77 percent, according to respective polls by the Asahi Shimbun and Mainichi Shimbun.

If Hatoyama succeeds in implementing the policies outlined in his party’s manifesto, Japan could truly be transformed into a more dynamic and responsive country.

As I look back, the points he made 13 years ago still make good sense. I interviewed him for an Asiaweek cover story (Japan’s New Spirit: Mavericks like Lawmaker Hatoyama Yukio Are Re-inventing Politics and Business, May 31, 1996). Hatoyama was then heading the tiny Sakigake Party in a Socialist-led coalition government. His idealistic remarks, made in his living room back then, have developed into his party’s core principles today.

“Change is taking place, as more people support our new-style politics,” Hatoyama said during the interview. “Lawmakers should shape policies in service to people, unlike ministry bureaucrats who draft policies for their and some LDP members’ vested interests.”

Earlier, during the 1990s, he was among the LDP’s young lawmakers and was best known for his family background. He is the grandson of a prime minister, Ichiro Hatoyama (1954-56), who in 1955 merged his Democratic Party with the Liberal Party to form the LDP. His grandfather on his mother’s side was a wealthy businessman who founded what is now Bridgestone Corp. His father, Iichiro, was a bureaucrat-turned-Upper House member who served as foreign minister (1976-77), while his younger brother, Kunio, is also a veteran member of the Lower House. Yukio was – and still is – the “prince” of one of the most glorious and wealthy political clans of Japan.

In the family, Yukio was a latecomer to politics. He studied computer engineering at the prestigious University of Tokyo and later at Stanford University in California, where he earned a Ph.D. in engineering. (He is, therefore, Japan’s first bona-fide scientist premier.) After teaching at some universities back in Japan, he worked as an aide to his father before winning a seat in the Diet in 1986.

During his years in the United States, he saw how Americans enthusiastically celebrated their nation’s 200th birthday and started thinking about the people and the nation.
“Looking at Japanese politics at one point, I thought I could make use of my background and experiences and make a contribution,” Hatoyama told me. He had little doubt about running as an LDP candidate and joining the large faction of then-Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka.

By the mid-1990s, Hatoyama saw no hope in the LDP-dominated political system, where ministerial posts were allocated to the party’s veteran members under the traditional seniority rule, and the power game among the factions in the ruling party was more important than policies. Growing tired of the LDP’s money politics, he made his first major headlines in 1993, when he left the party of his grandfather and created the Sakigake party with other rebels.

Three years later, Hatoyama was again in the media spotlight when he topped a survey made by 107 veteran political newspaper reporters who named him the most likely leader of Japan in the 21st century. The survey results were featured in the January issue of the Bungei Shunju, a popular conservative monthly. Also in the top 10 were Hajime Funada, who lost in the August election; Sadakazu Tanigaki (a contender for the LDP’s top job); Ichiro Ozawa, Hatoyama’s powerful partner in the DPJ; future Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi; and Yukio’s brother, Kunio.
The younger Hatoyama was recognized by those political writers as being distinct from traditional Nagatacho lawmakers. The political reporters who contributed to the Bungei Shunju survey described him as being “idealistic,” “willing to deliver his ideas and messages in his own words,” “cool in his outlook but passionate inside,” “untainted,” and “able to discuss politics in the language of average citizens.”

On the other hand, he also puzzled them. In 1995 Hatoyama told the Diet that Japanese politics needs ai (love) – a somewhat unfamiliar expression in the Japanese political lexicon. He later explained he meant it was Japan sorely needed a “communal spirit.” The country was suffering a “spiritual vacuum” amid the lingering post-bubble recession, he said. That year, a huge earthquake hit the Kobe area, and the Japanese were shocked by the heinous crimes of doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo.

Such fresh expressions, however, also won Hatoyama the nickname “alien.” He was like a creature from a different planet that spoke in a language that was indecipherable in the Japanese political context. In response, Hatoyama added an illustrated portrait of himself looking like an alien on his business cards. The media now fondly call him the “Alien PM.”

Lately, he has referred to the term yuai, which was favored by his grandfather, Ichiro. The popular prime minister in the l950s, he called for a yuai kakumei (fraternity revolution).

Hatoyama, back in 1996, predicted a further realignment of parties toward a two-party system. “If I am called upon in a natural way to take the top leadership in Japan in the 21st century, I think I should not turn it down,” he said in the interview with Bungei Shunju.

Later in the same year, Hatoyama formed the Democratic Party of Japan with other new-breed lawmakers, including grassroots leader Naoto Kan, and later Ozawa, the powerful strategist.

Hatoyama’s style was in evidence in his first speech as the nation’s leader on Sept. 16. He pledged to a new political leadership that would differ from the old bureaucrat-controlled politics and bring sovereignty to the people.
One TV news program announcer said in amazement: “He speaks in such plain language, and we can understand his message clearly.” Another commentator pointed out that Hatoyama used the expression “you, the people of Japan” no less than 18 times, with no hint of authoritarianism or patronization.
Unlike many of his predecessors, Hatoyama seems pretty open-minded, Westernized and non-traditional in many ways.

His wife, Miyuki, was married to someone else when they met. Most well-to-do families preferred arranged marriages at that time, but, according to her, Hatoyama chose the former Takarazuka Revue actress as a partner among “all womankind, not only among single women.” He is not bashful about their love, admiring the wife as his “Sun” and showing up with her to social events, often hand in hand. During my interview with him 13 years ago, he spontaneously placed his arm around her shoulders on the sofa when he posed for photographs. Right before the appointment, he had dropped by at a bakery shop with her in their neighborhood, not something most Japanese leaders are likely to do.

Miyuki is also a media star in her own right, quite unlike the “invisible,” reserved wives of most Japanese political leaders. The Shanghai-born, American-school-educated former actress is a popular speaker, a cookbook and essay writer and a TV personality. She casually wrote in one of her books that she “went to Venus on a triangular-shaped UFO,” one of many joke-like remarks that make conservatives look down on her. She was screaming “Arigato-o-o-o!” to supporters at Hatoyama’s office in Hokkaido on election night instead of bowing deep and silently behind her husband. She was found sitting among the other observers at the Diet when her husband was elected as the new prime minister. She made the headlines – alongside a nice photo – as she was the first Japanese political wife in memory to witness her husband’s ascent to the top.

Innovative reforms are already being carried out at various levels of the government. Hatoyama’s policies are designed to rebuild Japan in a “vertical” way, replacing the traditional “horizontal” system, and to provide more to individual citizens in need than to industry and the financial system.

He will face many hurdles before realizing his goals, particularly in reviving the economy and reinventing Japan’s relationship with the United States.

A few days after the general election, I asked up-and-coming LDP leader Taro Kono how he plans to help fix his party. Kono could be a Democrat, I thought. He is critical of his party’s old-style politics, of control by bureaucrats and wasteful government spending. That night, Kono was resentful that the LDP’s old guard had created such incompetent cabinets in the previous four years, which he blamed for the party’s heavy election defeat.
“It is too bad that too many incompetent party leaders and faction bosses returned to the House again in this election,” he said. “More should have disappeared.”

Kono was clear about one thing: Japan would rebuild itself only by a government that focused on economic development. He criticized the Democratic Party’s policies of giving away stipends to children, farmers, etc. He pledged to act according to his beliefs but would stick with the LDP if they went down the right road.

Kono’s words echoed those of Hatoyama 13 years ago. Could they point toward another future leader of Japan? ❶