Kishida's Approval Collapse: How Record-Low Ratings Rewrote Japan's 2024 Policy Agenda
Why Prime Minister Kishida's late-2023 approval collapse into the low 20s reset Japan's economic agenda and what it teaches foreign business about political risk in Tokyo.
When a Japanese prime minister’s approval rating drops into the low 20s across three major newspapers in the same week, the policy horizon shortens dramatically. That is exactly what happened to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in November 2023, and the approval collapse that followed reshaped the legislative calendar, stalled parts of the economic agenda, and set up the leadership churn that carried Japan from Kishida to Ishiba to Takaichi over the next two years.
For foreign companies operating in Japan, the episode is more than political trivia. It is a concrete case study in how public sentiment transmits through the Japanese political system into regulatory outcomes, and why government relations strategy has to be calibrated to political-cycle risk.
Context note: Kishida stepped down as LDP president in September 2024; Shigeru Ishiba succeeded him, and Sanae Takaichi became prime minister in late 2025. The polling numbers discussed below are from November 2023 and should be read as a case study in political risk dynamics, not a current snapshot.
What the late-2023 polls showed
On November 20, 2023, Japan’s three largest national dailies released approval-rating surveys taken over the preceding weekend. The results were unusually aligned, which is part of what made them politically damaging.
Cabinet approval at crisis levels
- Yomiuri Shimbun: 24%
- Asahi Shimbun: 25%
- Mainichi Shimbun: 21%
In Japanese political convention, cabinet approval ratings below 30% are considered the danger zone, a level at which a prime minister’s ability to push controversial legislation through the Diet starts to erode and intra-party succession talk becomes respectable. Ratings in the low 20s, as the Mainichi figure showed, are closer to collapse territory.
The public had turned on the economic package
The proximate cause was Kishida’s ¥17 trillion supplementary economic package, centered on a ¥40,000 (roughly $267) income tax rebate and cash handouts for low-income households. Polling showed that voters saw the rebate as a transparent ratings-boost maneuver rather than substantive relief, while fiscal hawks worried about the implications for a government already carrying the highest public debt burden in the OECD.
The political miscalculation was that a one-off handout, announced during a period of stubborn inflation and soft real wages, could not compete with the perception that structural cost-of-living pressures were going unaddressed.
International diplomacy failed to move the dial
Historically, Japanese prime ministers get a modest approval bump after major international summits. Kishida did not.
The San Francisco APEC summit
In mid-November, Kishida traveled to San Francisco for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, where he engaged with U.S. President Joe Biden and held a widely covered meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the first substantive Kishida–Xi exchange in over a year. On paper, the summit checked every box for a bounce: strategic dialogue with China, alliance maintenance with the U.S., and a visible role on the global stage.
The polls registered none of it. Voters were no longer crediting Kishida for foreign policy wins, a diagnostic that in Japanese politics usually signals that public dissatisfaction has moved past a single issue into a generalized loss of confidence.
The political chain reaction
Approval ratings in the low 20s set off predictable mechanics inside the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).
Leadership election speculation
With the LDP’s scheduled presidential election in September 2024 already on the horizon, the polling numbers accelerated internal conversations about whether Kishida could lead the party into the next general election. Names circulating as potential successors included Shigeru Ishiba, Shinjiro Koizumi, Taro Kono, Yoshihide Suga, and Sanae Takaichi, a field that eventually produced the leadership transitions of 2024 and 2025.
The LDP’s structural advantage
Even at historically weak cabinet approval, the LDP retained a commanding position in the broader partisan landscape. Opposition parties were polling in single digits individually, and the fragmented opposition landscape meant that an election held on short notice would likely have returned an LDP majority, possibly at a reduced margin. Kishida dismissed calls for an early general election and focused on implementing his economic package, holding the prime ministerial authority to dissolve the Lower House before the term expired in 2025.
The slush-fund scandal was the next blow
What Kishida could not foresee in November 2023 was that within weeks, the LDP political funds scandal would break open, triggering the December cabinet reshuffle and the dissolution of most LDP factions in early 2024. The approval collapse softened the ground; the scandal finished the job.
Lessons for public affairs strategy
The Kishida episode is a useful case study in how political risk manifests in Japanese government relations, even though the specific actors have moved on.
Approval ratings are a leading indicator for regulatory throughput
When a Japanese prime minister drops below 30% cabinet approval, controversial legislation slows and ministries become more conservative in advancing new rulemaking. Public affairs teams tracking specific bills should treat approval polling as an input into their timeline forecasting.
Economic packages are politically fragile
Kishida’s ¥17 trillion package illustrates a recurring pattern: one-off fiscal measures rarely move Japanese approval ratings, and can even backfire when voters read them as political theater. Foreign companies positioning around Japanese stimulus announcements should model structural policy continuity, not the headline dollar figure.
Diplomacy is not a sustainable approval lever
When a Japanese prime minister loses the ability to convert summit participation into domestic approval, the political runway for ambitious foreign policy shrinks. Multinationals whose Japan strategy depends on specific geopolitical positioning (chip export controls, defense cooperation, trade agreements) need to watch for this diagnostic.
Plan for leadership change
By late 2023 it was clear that the Kishida premiership had entered its endgame, even if the timing was uncertain. Building relationships beyond a single prime minister (into the LDP’s Policy Research Council, major faction leaders, and senior bureaucrats) is the structural hedge.
Forward look: from Kishida to the current cycle
The Kishida approval collapse was the opening chapter of a two-year leadership turnover. Ishiba inherited many of the same structural challenges (stubborn inflation, wage stagnation, demographic pressure, and a restless LDP) and his tenure was similarly short. Takaichi now leads a minority LDP government facing an even more fragmented legislative environment, with Komeito’s 26-year coalition agreement having ended.
The lesson carries forward: Japanese cabinet approval ratings are a real political constraint, not background noise. Foreign companies that treat them as such tend to build more resilient government relations programs.
Why this matters for public affairs in Japan
Political risk in Japan does not announce itself through dramatic events alone. It shows up quietly in approval polls, in the body language of ministerial press conferences, and in the tempo of Diet committee work. Reading those signals and translating them into adjusted stakeholder strategy is the core craft of public affairs in Tokyo.
Gemini Group advises multinationals, industry associations, and foreign governments on navigating political cycles, leadership transitions, and the public policy implications of shifting approval dynamics in Japan. For a tailored briefing on the current cycle, contact us.