I really enjoyed this piece Tobias, one of the best I have read on contemporary Japanese politics. I was struck you wrote the LDP is wedded to bureaucratism - given the last bureaucratic premier was Miyazawa. Does not the supremacy of party politicians suggest something different?

Thanks Andrew! I think if we're thinking more about the content than the players it resembles what Najita describes -- and given how many have been 世襲, maybe there's just the emergence of a distinct political class that interlocks with other elites.