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88-534: Opposition (12) The Kyoto Prefectural Assembly ( 京都府議会 , Kyōto-fu Gikai ) is the prefectural parliament of Kyoto Prefecture . Kyoto Prefecture is a stronghold of the Japanese Communist Party , which continued with the revolutionary government of Torazō Ninagawa over the seventh term over 28 years. The two-person district was called the "co-reserved seat" (the Kyoto at-large district

176-636: A baseball. Since leaving office, he has defended his decision to send Japanese troops to Iraq. In the North Korean abductions and nuclear development issues, Koizumi took more assertive attitudes than his predecessors. Although Koizumi did not initially campaign on the issue of defense reform, he approved the expansion of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) and in October 2001 they were given greater scope to operate outside of

264-589: A central government agency]") as in Hokkaidō). The central government wanted to have greater control over all local governments due to Japan's deteriorating position in World War II – for example, all mayors in the country became appointive as in the Meiji era – and over Tokyo in particular, due to the possibility of emergency in the metropolis. After the war, Japan was forced to decentralise Tokyo again, following

352-752: A common practice known as omiai . The wedding ceremony at the Tokyo Prince Hotel was attended by about 2,500 people, including Takeo Fukuda (then Prime Minister), and featured a wedding cake shaped like the National Diet Building . The marriage ended in divorce in 1982, as Kayoko was reportedly unhappy with her married life for several reasons. After this divorce, Koizumi never married again, saying that divorce consumed ten times more energy than marriage. Koizumi had custody of two of his three sons: Kōtarō Koizumi and Shinjirō Koizumi , who were reared by one of his sisters. Shinjiro

440-501: A distant third. Since leaving office as prime minister, Koizumi has not granted a single request for an interview or television appearance, although he has given speeches and had private interactions with journalists. Koizumi returned to the national spotlight in October 2013, after seven years of largely avoiding attention, when he gave a speech to business executives in Nagoya in which he stated: "We should aim to be nuclear-free... If

528-611: A final tally of 298 to 155 votes. He was made Prime Minister of Japan on 26 April, and his coalition secured 78 of 121 seats in the Upper House elections in July. Within Japan, Koizumi pushed for new ways to revitalise the moribund economy, aiming to act against bad debts with commercial banks, privatize the postal savings system, and reorganize the factional structure of the LDP. He spoke of

616-536: A large tattoo on his body, was Minister of Posts and Telecommunications under Prime Ministers Hamaguchi and Wakatsuki and an early advocate of postal privatization. Born in Yokosuka, Kanagawa on 8 January 1942, Koizumi was educated at Yokosuka High School . He graduated with a Bachelor of Economics degree from Keio University . He attended University College London before returning to Japan in August 1969 upon

704-567: A majority in the House of Representatives. Koizumi's popularity rose almost twenty points after he dissolved the House and expelled rebel LDP members. Opinion polls ranked the government's approval ratings between 58 and 65 percent. The electorate saw the election in terms of a vote for or against reform of the postal service, which the Democratic Party and rebel LDP members were seen as being against. The September 2005 elections were

792-410: A new dō was created to cover it. The Meiji government originally classified Hokkaidō as a "Settlement Envoyship" ( 開拓使 , kaitakushi ) , and later divided the island into three prefectures (Sapporo, Hakodate, and Nemuro). These were consolidated into a single Hokkaido Department ( 北海道庁 , Hokkaido-chō ) in 1886, at prefectural level but organized more along the lines of a territory. In 1947,

880-715: A nuclear waste disposal facility in Finland, where he learned that nuclear waste would have to be sealed up for 100,000 years. A poll by the Asahi Shimbun in November 2013 found that 54% of the public supported Koizumi's anti-nuclear statements. Koizumi told one reporter that he felt lied to by the Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan , which characterized nuclear power as a safe alternative to fossil fuels, stating that "we certainly had no idea how difficult it

968-573: A populist version of neoliberalism (or as a variant of the populist right) rather than neoliberal populism." Although Koizumi's foreign policy was focused on closer relations with the United States and UN-centered diplomacy, which were adopted by all of his predecessors, he went further, supporting the US policies in the War on Terrorism . He decided to deploy the Japan Self-Defense Forces to Iraq, which

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1056-609: A prefecture, e.g. [aꜜitɕi] and [keꜜɴ] become [aitɕi̥ꜜkeɴ] ) . The Classical Chinese character from which this is derived carries a rural or provincial connotation, and an analogous character is used to refer to the counties of China , counties of Taiwan and districts of Vietnam . The different systems of parsing frame the ways in which Japanese prefectures are perceived: The prefectures are also often grouped into eight regions (地方, chihō ). Those regions are not formally specified, they do not have elected officials, nor are they corporate bodies. But

1144-737: Is Senior Advisor of the Tokyo Elvis Presley Fan Club. Koizumi and his brother helped finance a statue of Presley in Tokyo's Harajuku district. On 30 June 2006, Koizumi visited Presley's estate, Graceland , accompanied by U.S. President George W. Bush, and First Lady Laura Bush . After arriving in Memphis aboard Air Force One , they headed to Graceland. While there, Koizumi briefly sang a few bars of his favourite Presley tunes, whilst warmly impersonating Presley, and wearing Presley's trademark oversized golden sunglasses. Koizumi

1232-541: Is a combination of the four terms. Tokyo , capital city of Japan is referred to as to ( 都 , [toꜜ] ) , which is often translated as "metropolis". The Japanese government translates Tōkyō-to ( 東京都 , [toːkʲoꜜːto] ) as "Tokyo Metropolis" in almost all cases, and the government is officially called the "Tokyo Metropolitan Government". Following the capitulation of the Tokugawa shogunate in 1868, Tōkyō-fu (an urban prefecture like Kyoto and Osaka)

1320-510: Is also a fan of Finnish composer Jean Sibelius . On 8 September 2006, he and Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen visited the Sibelius' home , where Koizumi showed respect to the late composer with a moment of silence. He owns reproductions of the manuscripts of all seven symphonies by Sibelius. In 2009, Koizumi made a voice acting appearance in an Ultra Series feature film, Mega Monster Battle: Ultra Galaxy Legend The Movie , playing

1408-475: Is also a fan of the heavy metal band X Japan , with the LDP having even used their song " Forever Love " in television commercials in 2001. It was also reported that he was influential in getting the museum honoring X Japan's deceased guitarist Hide made. Koizumi is also a noted fan of Elvis Presley , with whom he shares a birthday (8 January). In 2001, he released a collection of his favorite Presley songs on CD, with his comments about each song. His brother

1496-399: Is derived implies a core urban zone of national importance. Before World War II, different laws applied to fu and ken, but this distinction was abolished after the war, and the two types of prefecture are now functionally the same. 43 of the 47 prefectures are referred to as ken ( 県 , pronounced [keꜜɴ] when a separate word but [ꜜkeɴ] when part of the full name of

1584-506: Is occasionally used to differentiate the government from the island itself. The prefecture's government calls itself the "Hokkaidō Government" rather than the "Hokkaidō Prefectural Government". Osaka and Kyoto Prefectures are referred to as fu ( 府 , pronounced [ɸɯꜜ] when a separate word but [ꜜɸɯ] when part of the full name of a prefecture, e.g. [kʲoꜜːto] and [ɸɯꜜ] become [kʲoːtoꜜɸɯ] ) . The Classical Chinese character from which this

1672-489: Is set tightly by national laws, and prefectures and municipalities are only autonomous within that framework. Historically, during the Edo period , the Tokugawa shogunate established bugyō -ruled zones ( 奉行支配地 ) around the nine largest cities in Japan, and 302 township-ruled zones ( 郡代支配地 ) elsewhere. When the Meiji government began to create the prefectural system in 1868, the nine bugyō-ruled zones became fu ( 府 ) , while

1760-417: Is still used today and was kept during the period of Japanese rule .) Hokkai-dō ( 北海道 , [hokkaꜜidoː] ) , the only remaining dō today, was not one of the original seven dō (it was known as Ezo in the pre-modern era). Its current name is believed to originate from Matsuura Takeshiro , an early Japanese explorer of the island. Since Hokkaidō did not fit into the existing dō classifications,

1848-564: Is the sixth-longest serving Prime Minister in Japanese history. Widely seen as a maverick leader of the LDP upon his election to the position in 2001, Koizumi became known as a neoliberal economic reformer, focusing on reducing Japan's government debt and the privatisation of its postal service . In the 2005 election , Koizumi led the LDP to win one of the largest parliamentary majorities in modern Japanese history . Koizumi also attracted international attention through his deployment of

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1936-602: Is the representative for Kanagawa's 11th district , a position his father has also filled, while Kotaro is an actor. The youngest son, Yoshinaga Miyamoto, now a graduate of Keio University, was born following the divorce and did not meet Koizumi for many years. Yoshinaga is known to have attended one of Koizumi's rallies, but was turned away from trying to meet his father. He was also turned away from attending his paternal grandmother's funeral. Koizumi's ex-wife Kayoko Miyamoto also asked unsuccessfully several times to meet their two eldest sons. Yoshinaga met his father and brothers for

2024-636: Is to control nuclear energy." Koizumi reportedly approached Morihiro Hosokawa, who served as prime minister in an anti-LDP coalition cabinet in the 1990s, to run for Governor of Tokyo in the February 2014 gubernatorial election on the platform of opposing the Abe government's pro-nuclear policy. Hosokawa ran in the election with Koizumi's support, but lost to the LDP-supported candidate Yōichi Masuzoe . Koizumi and Hosokawa continued their collaboration in

2112-462: The 2009 elections , when most were defeated. Koizumi announced that he would step down from office in 2006, per LDP rules, and would not personally choose a successor as many LDP prime ministers have in the past. On 20 September 2006, Shinzo Abe was elected to succeed Koizumi as president of the LDP. Abe succeeded Koizumi as prime minister on 26 September 2006. Koizumi remained in the Diet through

2200-466: The Japan Self-Defense Forces to Iraq, and through his visits to the Yasukuni Shrine that fueled diplomatic tensions with neighbouring China and South Korea. Koizumi resigned as prime minister in 2006. Although Koizumi maintained a low profile for several years after he left office, he returned to national attention in 2013 as an advocate for abandoning nuclear power in Japan , in the wake of

2288-545: The Miyazawa cabinet) and 1996–1998 (Minister of Health and Welfare in the Hashimoto cabinets). In 1994, with the LDP in opposition, Koizumi became part of a new LDP faction, Shinseiki , made up of younger and more motivated parliamentarians led by Taku Yamasaki , Koichi Kato and Koizumi, a group popularly dubbed "YKK" after the zipper manufacturer YKK . After Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa resigned in 1994 and

2376-464: The Yamagata - Mosse laws on local government and the simultaneous Great Meiji merger was performed in 1889, the 15 -ku became wards of Tokyo City , initially Tokyo's only independent city (-shi) , the six rural districts of Tokyo were consolidated in 85 towns and villages. In 1893, the three Tama districts and their 91 towns and villages became part of Tokyo. As Tokyo city's suburbs grew rapidly in

2464-625: The fiefdoms they encountered there. Its original sense in Portuguese, however, was closer to " municipality " than " province ". Today, in turn, Japan uses its word ken ( 県 ), meaning "prefecture", to identify Portuguese districts while in Brazil the word "Prefeitura" is used to refer to a city hall . Those fiefs were headed by a local warlord or family. Though the fiefs have long since been dismantled, merged, and reorganized multiple times, and been granted legislative governance and oversight,

2552-511: The " Union of Kansai governments " (Kansai kōiki-rengō) which has been established by several prefectural governments in the Kansai region. There are some differences in terminology between Tokyo and other prefectures: police and fire departments are called chō ( 庁 ) instead of honbu ( 本部 ) , for instance. But the only functional difference between Tōkyō-to and other prefectures is that Tokyo administers wards as well as cities. Today, since

2640-547: The 1920s, each prefecture (then only 3 -fu and 42 -ken ; Hokkaidō and Okinawa-ken were subject to different laws until the 20th century) was subdivided into cities ( 市 , shi ) and districts ( 郡 , gun ) and each district into towns ( 町 , chō/machi ) and villages ( 村 , son/mura ) . Hokkaidō has 14 subprefectures that act as General Subprefectural Bureaus ( 総合振興局 , sōgō-shinkō-kyoku, "Comprehensive Promotion Bureau" ) and Subprefectural Bureaus ( 振興局 , shinkō-kyoku, "Promotion Bureau" ) of

2728-609: The 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster , which contrasted with the pro-nuclear views espoused by the LDP governments both during and after Koizumi's term in office. Koizumi is a third-generation politician of the Koizumi family . His father, Jun'ya Koizumi , was director general of the Japan Defense Agency and a member of the House of Representatives . His grandfather, Koizumi Matajirō , called "Tattoo Minister" because of

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2816-408: The 35 wards were reorganised into the 23 special wards , because many of its citizens had either died during the war, left the city, or been drafted and did not return. In the occupation reforms, special wards, each with their own elected assemblies ( kugikai ) and mayors ( kuchō ), were intended to be equal to other municipalities even if some restrictions still applied. (For example, there was during

2904-451: The House of Representatives and called for snap elections . He expelled rebel LDP members for not supporting the bill. The LDP's chances for success were initially uncertain; the secretary general of New Komeito (a junior coalition partner with Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party) said that his party would entertain forming a coalition government with the Democratic Party of Japan if the DPJ took

2992-455: The Japanese public referred to him as Jun-chan (the suffix "chan" in the Japanese language is used as a term of familiarity, typically between children, "Jun" is a contraction of Junichiro). In June 2001, he enjoyed an approval rating of 80 percent. In January 2002, Koizumi fired his Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka , replacing her with Yoriko Kawaguchi . Tanaka had enjoyed high public approval ratings. A few days before her dismissal, when she

3080-643: The LDP returned to power in a coalition government, Koizumi and Hosokawa teamed up with Shusei Tanaka of New Party Sakigake in a strategic dialogue across party lines regarding Japan becoming a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council . Although this idea was not popular within the LDP and never came to fruition, Koizumi and Hosokawa maintained a close working relationship across party lines, with Hosokawa tacitly serving as Koizumi's personal envoy to China during times of strained Sino-Japanese relations. Koizumi competed for

3168-469: The LDP's largest victory since 1986, giving the party a large majority in the House of Representatives and nullifying opposing voices in the House of Councilors. In the following Diet session, the last to be held under Koizumi's government, the LDP passed 82 of its 91 proposed bills, including postal privatization. A number of Koizumi-supported candidates known as " Koizumi Children " joined the Diet in this election and supported successive LDP governments until

3256-486: The Liberal Democratic Party were to adopt a zero-nuclear policy, then we'd see a groundswell of support for getting rid of nuclear energy." He recalled Japan's reconstruction in the wake of World War II and called for the country to "unite toward a dream of achieving a society based on renewable energy." Koizumi had been a proponent of nuclear power throughout his term as prime minister, and was one of

3344-534: The Lower House for Kanagawa's 2nd district, a seat previously held by his father. He joined Fukuda's faction within the LDP. Since then, he has been re-elected ten times. Koizumi gained his first senior post in 1979 as Parliamentary Vice Minister of Finance, and his first ministerial post in 1988 as Minister of Health and Welfare under Prime Ministers Noboru Takeshita and Sōsuke Uno . He held cabinet posts again in 1992 (Minister of Posts and Telecommunications in

3432-736: The Metropolitan government. For example, the Tokyo Fire Department which was only responsible for the 23 special wards until 1960 has until today taken over the municipal fire departments in almost all of Tokyo. A joint governmental structure for the whole Tokyo metropolitan area (and not only the western suburbs of the special wards which are part of the Tokyo prefecture/Metropolis") as advocated by some politicians such as former Kanagawa governor Shigefumi Matsuzawa has not been established (see also Dōshūsei ). Existing cross-prefectural fora of cooperation between local governments in

3520-547: The NPL ratio of major banks approaching half the level of 2001. The Japanese economy has been through a slow but steady recovery, and the stock market has dramatically rebounded. The GDP growth for 2004 was one of the highest among G7 nations, according to the International Monetary Fund and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development . Takenaka was appointed as a Postal Reform Minister in 2004 for

3608-455: The Tokyo metropolitan area are the Kantō regional governors' association (Kantō chihō chijikai) and the " Shutoken summit" (formally "conference of chief executives of nine prefectures and cities", 9 to-ken-shi shunō kaigi ). But, these are not themselves local public entities under the local autonomy law and national or local government functions cannot be directly transferred to them, unlike

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3696-497: The YKK trio, which gave him leverage over the reform-minded wing of the party. On 24 April 2001, Koizumi was elected president of the LDP. He was initially considered an outside candidate against Hashimoto, who was running for his second term as prime minister. However, in the first poll of prefectural party organizations, Koizumi won 87 to 11 percent; in the second vote of Diet members, Koizumi won 51 to 40 percent. He defeated Hashimoto by

3784-618: The administrations of Abe and Yasuo Fukuda , but announced his retirement from politics on 25 September 2008, shortly following the election of Taro Aso as prime minister. He retained his Diet seat until the next general election , when his son Shinjiro was elected into the same seat representing the Kanagawa 11th district in 2009. Koizumi supported Yuriko Koike in the LDP leadership election held earlier in September 2008, but Koike placed

3872-540: The challenge of economic stagnation CEFP took an integrated approach, a worldwide economic view, and, promoted greater transparency; its philosophy was neoliberal. In the fall of 2002, Koizumi appointed Keio University economist and frequent television commentator Heizō Takenaka as Minister of State for Financial Services and head of the Financial Services Agency (FSA) to fix the country's banking crisis. Bad debts of banks were dramatically cut with

3960-410: The completion of disposal facilities... We had failed to secure sites for final disposal even before an accident occurred," concluding that "it's better to spend money on developing natural energy resources—citizens are more likely to agree with that idea—than using such large amounts of expenses and energy to advance such a feckless project [as nuclear power]." He explained that in August, he had visited

4048-522: The country, were further subdivided into urban units/towns/neighbourhoods (-chō/-machi) and rural units/villages (-mura/-son) . The yet unincorporated communities on the Izu (previously part of Shizuoka ) and Ogasawara (previously directly Home Ministry-administrated) island groups became also part of Tokyo in the 19th century. When the modern municipalities – [district-independent] cities and [rural] districts containing towns and villages – were introduced under

4136-614: The country. Some of these troops were dispatched to Iraq . Koizumi's government also introduced a bill to upgrade the Defense Agency to ministry status; finally, the Defense Agency became the Japanese Ministry of Defense on 9 January 2007. Koizumi has often been noted for his controversial visits to the Yasukuni Shrine , starting on 13 August 2001. He visited the shrine six times as prime minister. Because

4224-461: The death of his father. He stood for election to the lower house in December; however, he did not earn enough votes to win election as a Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) representative. In 1970, he was hired as a secretary to Takeo Fukuda , who was Minister of Finance at the time and was elected as prime minister in 1976. In the general elections of December 1972, Koizumi was elected as a member of

4312-490: The decades. But it was not until the year 2000 that the special wards were fully recognised as municipal-level entities. Independently from these steps, as Tokyo's urban growth again took up pace during the postwar economic miracle and most of the main island part of Tokyo "Metropolis" became increasingly core part of the Tokyo metropolitan area , many of the other municipalities in Tokyo have transferred some of their authority to

4400-400: The department was dissolved, and Hokkaidō became a full-fledged prefecture. The -ken suffix was never added to its name, so the -dō suffix came to be understood to mean "prefecture". When Hokkaidō was incorporated, transportation on the island was still underdeveloped, so the prefecture was split into several "subprefectures" ( 支庁 , shichō ) that could fulfill administrative duties of

4488-583: The early 20th century, many towns and villages in Tokyo were merged or promoted over the years. In 1932, five complete districts with their 82 towns and villages were merged into Tokyo City and organised in 20 new wards. Also, by 1940, there were two more cities in Tokyo: Hachiōji City and Tachikawa City . In 1943, Tokyo City was abolished, Tōkyō-fu became Tōkyō-to , and Tokyo-shi's 35 wards remained Tokyo-to's 35 wards, but submunicipal authorities of Tokyo-shi's wards which previously fell directly under

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4576-467: The economy recovered. His proposal to cut pension benefits as a move to fiscal reform turned out to be highly unpopular. Two visits to North Korea to solve the issue of abducted Japanese nationals only somewhat raised his popularity, as he could not secure several abductees' returns to Japan. In the House of Councilors elections in 2004 , the LDP performed only marginally better than the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), winning 32 more seats than

4664-485: The first pro-nuclear politicians to change his stance on the issue in the wake of the Fukushima disaster of 2011. His dramatic remarks were widely covered in the Japanese media, with some tabloids speculating that he may break away from the LDP to form a new party with his son Shinjiro. Economy Minister Akira Amari characterized Koizumi's stance as pure but simplistic, while other LDP administration officials downplayed

4752-457: The first time in 2010, at a meeting arranged by Shinjiro. Koizumi and his two elder sons also attended Yoshinaga's wedding in 2013. Koizumi is known to have a cousin in Brazil, and was overwhelmed to the point of tears when he visited Brazil in 2004 and was met by a group of Japanese immigrants. Koizumi is a fan of German composer Richard Wagner and has released a CD of his favorite pieces by contemporary Italian composer Ennio Morricone . He

4840-405: The formal extent of the local autonomy law suggests, because of national funding and policies. Most of municipalities depend heavily on central government funding – a dependency recently further exacerbated in many regions by the declining population which hits rural areas harder and earlier (cities can offset it partly through migration from the countryside). In many policy areas, the basic framework

4928-495: The general terms of democratisation outlined in the Potsdam Declaration . Many of Tokyo's special governmental characteristics disappeared during this time, and the wards took on an increasingly municipal status in the decades following the surrender. Administratively, today's special wards are almost indistinguishable from other municipalities. The postwar reforms also changed the map of Tokyo significantly: In 1947,

5016-532: The government consolidate the current prefectures into about 10 regional states (so-called dōshūsei ). The plan called for each region to have greater autonomy than existing prefectures. This process would reduce the number of subprefecture administrative regions and cut administrative costs. The Japanese government also considered a plan to merge several groups of prefectures, creating a subnational administrative division system consisting of between nine and 13 states, and giving these states more local autonomy than

5104-509: The large districts (97 small districts) covered the former city area of Edo. When the ancient ritsuryō districts were reactivated as administrative units in 1878, Tokyo was subdivided into 15 [urban] districts (- ku ) and initially six [rural] districts ( - gun ; nine after the Tama transfer from Kanagawa in 1893, eight after the merger of East Tama and South Toshima into Toyotama in 1896). Both urban and rural districts, like everywhere in

5192-443: The latter obtained. In 2005, the House of Councilors rejected the contentious postal privatization bills . Koizumi previously made it clear that he would dissolve the lower house if the bill failed to pass. The Democratic Party, while expressing support for the privatization, made a tactical vote against the bill. Fifty-one LDP members also either voted against the bills or abstained. On 8 August 2005, Koizumi, as promised, dissolved

5280-501: The media than his prior visits while he was in office. On 15 August 2005, the sixtieth anniversary of the end of World War II, Koizumi publicly stated that "I would like to express keen remorse and heartfelt apologies" and vowed Japan would never again take "the path to war". Koizumi was an extremely popular leader at certain points in his tenure. His outspoken nature and colourful past contributed to that, and his nicknames included "Lionheart" and "Maverick". During his time in office,

5368-564: The municipality, with the municipality now abolished, fell directly under prefectural or now "Metropolitan" authority. All other cities, towns and villages in Tokyo-fu stayed cities, towns and villages in Tokyo-to. The reorganisation's aim was to consolidate the administration of the area around the capital by eliminating the extra level of authority in Tokyo. Also, the governor was no longer called chiji , but chōkan (~"head/chief [usually: of

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5456-460: The need for a period of painful restructuring in order to improve the future. To design policy initiatives in 2001 he used the new Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy (Keizai Zaisei Seisaku Tanto Daijin) or CEFP. It issued an annual planning document, "Basic Policies for Economic and Fiscal Management and Reform" . It planned a major reorganization of the central government, and shaped economic policy in cooperation with key cabinet members. To meet

5544-497: The next prime minister Abe visited China and South Korea in October 2006. In China, the visits led to massive anti-Japanese riots. The president, ruling and opposition parties, and much of the media of South Korea openly condemned Koizumi's pilgrimages. Many Koreans applauded the president's speeches criticizing Japan, despite the South Korean President's low popularity. When asked about the reaction, Koizumi said

5632-407: The occupation a dedicated municipal police agency for the 23 special wards/former Tokyo City , yet the special wards public safety commission was not named by the special ward governments, but by the government of the whole "Metropolis". In 1954, independent municipal police forces were abolished generally in the whole country, and the prefectural/"Metropolitan" police of Tokyo is again responsible for

5720-589: The organization of the prefectural police force, the supervision of schools and the maintenance of prefectural schools (mainly high schools), prefectural hospitals, prefectural roads , the supervision of prefectural waterways and regional urban planning. Their responsibilities include tasks delegated to them by the national government such as maintaining most ordinary national roads (except in designated major cities), and prefectures coordinate and support their municipalities in their functions. De facto, prefectures as well as municipalities have often been less autonomous than

5808-435: The potential impact of Koizumi's views. Former prime minister Naoto Kan , however, expressed hope that Koizumi's status as then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe 's "boss" would help put pressure on the government to minimize or eliminate nuclear power in Japan. Koizumi defended his change of stance, stating in November that "it is overly optimistic and much more irresponsible to think nuclear power plants can be maintained just with

5896-450: The practice of ordering prefectures based on their geographic region is traditional. This ordering is mirrored in Japan's International Organization for Standardization (ISO) coding. From north to south (numbering in ISO 3166-2:JP order), the prefectures of Japan and their commonly associated regions are: Here are some territories that were lost after World War II. This does not include all

5984-406: The prefectural government and keep tight control over the developing island. These subprefectures still exist today, although they have much less power than they possessed before and during World War II. They now exist primarily to handle paperwork and other bureaucratic functions. "Hokkaidō Prefecture" is, technically speaking, a redundant term because dō itself indicates a prefecture, although it

6072-569: The prefecture. Some other prefectures also have branch offices that carry out prefectural administrative functions outside the capital. Tokyo , the capital of Japan , is a merged city-prefecture; a metropolis, it has features of both cities and prefectures. Each prefecture has its own mon for identification, the equivalent of a coat of arms in the West. The West's use of "prefecture" to label these Japanese regions stems from 16th-century Portuguese explorers and traders use of "prefeitura" to describe

6160-506: The prefectures currently enjoy. As of August 2012, this plan was abandoned. Japan is a unitary state . The central government delegates many functions (such as education and the police force ) to the prefectures and municipalities , but retains the overall right to control them. Although local government expenditure accounts for 70 percent of overall government expenditure , the central government controls local budgets, tax rates , and borrowing. Prefectural government functions include

6248-421: The presidency of the LDP in September 1995 and July 1998, but he gained little support losing decisively to Ryutaro Hashimoto and then Keizō Obuchi , both of whom had broader bases of support within the party. However, after Yamasaki and Kato were humiliated in a disastrous attempt to force a vote of no confidence against Prime Minister Yoshirō Mori in 2000, Koizumi became the last remaining credible member of

6336-419: The privatization of Japan Post , operator of the country's Postal Savings system. Koizumi moved the LDP away from its traditional rural agrarian base toward a more urban, neoliberal core, as Japan's population grew in major cities and declined in less populated areas, although under current purely geographical districting, rural votes in Japan are still many times more powerful than urban ones. In addition to

6424-489: The privatization of Japan Post (which many rural residents fear will reduce their access to basic services such as banking), Koizumi also slowed down the LDP's heavy subsidies for infrastructure and industrial development in rural areas. These tensions made Koizumi a controversial but popular figure within his own party and among the Japanese electorate. Considering both his neoliberal policies and his appeal to populist ideas, Koizumi's political ideology has been characterized "as

6512-572: The rough translation stuck. The Meiji government established the current system in July 1871 with the abolition of the han system and establishment of the prefecture system ( 廃藩置県 , haihan-chiken ) . Although there were initially over 300 prefectures, many of them being former han territories, this number was reduced to 72 in the latter part of 1871, and 47 in 1888. The Local Autonomy Law of 1947 gave more political power to prefectures, and installed prefectural governors and parliaments. In 2003, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi proposed that

6600-494: The second party with three more seats, such as the first elected winner in Yawata City in the two-member district. Prefectures of Japan Each prefecture's chief executive is a directly elected governor ( 知事 , chiji ) . Ordinances and budgets are enacted by a unicameral assembly ( 議会 , gikai ) whose members are elected for four-year terms. Under a set of 1888–1890 laws on local government until

6688-680: The shrine honors Japan's war dead, which also include many convicted Japanese war criminals and 14 executed Class A war criminals , these visits drew strong condemnation and protests from both Japan's neighbours, mainly China and South Korea, and many Japanese citizens. China and South Korea's people hold bitter memories of Japanese invasion and occupation during the first half of the 20th century. China and South Korea refused to have their representatives meet Koizumi in Japan and their countries. There were no mutual visits between Chinese and Japanese leaders from October 2001, and between South Korean and Japanese leaders from June 2005. The standstill ended when

6776-546: The shrine's guestbook as prime minister. He visited the shrine annually in fulfillment of a campaign pledge. Koizumi's last visit as prime minister was on 15 August 2006, fulfilling a campaign pledge to visit on the anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II. Eleven months after his resignation as prime minister, Koizumi revisited the shrine on 15 August 2007, to mark the 62nd anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II . His 2007 visit attracted less attention from

6864-468: The special wards have almost the same degree of independence as Japanese cities, the difference in administration between Tokyo and other prefectures is fairly minor. In Osaka, several prominent politicians led by Tōru Hashimoto , then mayor of Osaka City and former governor of Osaka Prefecture , proposed an Osaka Metropolis plan , under which Osaka City, and possibly other neighboring cities, would be replaced by special wards similar to Tokyo's. The plan

6952-560: The speeches were "for the domestic (audience)". Although Koizumi signed the shrine's visitor book as "Junichiro Koizumi, the Prime Minister of Japan", he claimed that his visits were as a private citizen and not an endorsement of any political stance. China and Korea considered this excuse insufficient. Several journals and news reports in Japan, such as one published by Kyodo News Agency on 15 August 2006, questioned Koizumi's statement of private purpose, as he recorded his position on

7040-500: The territories of the Empire of Japan such as Manchukuo . Junichiro Koizumi Junichiro Koizumi ( / k ɔɪ ˈ z uː m i / koy- ZOO -mee ; 小泉 純一郎 , Koizumi Jun'ichirō [ko.iꜜzɯmi (d)ʑɯɰ̃.iꜜtɕiɾoː] ; born 8 January 1942) is a Japanese retired politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan and president of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) from 2001 to 2006. He retired from politics in 2009. He

7128-571: The township-ruled zones and the rest of the bugyo-ruled zones became ken ( 県 ) . Later, in 1871, the government designated Tokyo , Osaka , and Kyoto as fu , and relegated the other fu to the status of ken. During World War II , in 1943, Tokyo became a to, a new type of pseudo-prefecture. Despite the differences in terminology, there is little functional difference between the four types of local governments. The subnational governments are sometimes collectively referred to as todōfuken ( 都道府県 , [todoːɸɯ̥ꜜkeɴ] ) in Japanese, which

7216-569: The wake of this defeat, organizing an anti-nuclear forum to be held in May 2014. Koizumi traveled to the United States in 2016 in support of a lawsuit by Operation Tomodachi participants who claimed illness from radiation exposure caused by the Fukushima disaster. Koizumi lives in Yokosuka , Kanagawa. Koizumi married 21-year-old university student Kayoko Miyamoto in 1978. The couple had been formally introduced to each other as potential spouses,

7304-438: The whole prefecture/"Metropolis" and like all prefectural police forces controlled by the prefectural/"Metropolitan" public safety commission whose members are appointed by the prefectural/"Metropolitan" governor and assembly.) But, as part of the "reverse course" of the 1950s some of these new rights were removed, the most obvious measure being the denial of directly elected mayors. Some of these restrictions were removed again over

7392-563: Was also called that). In the 2007 Kyoto Prefectural Assembly election , the Democratic candidate defeated the Liberal Democratic Party candidate in the one-person constituency of Ayabe, Kyoto , and made a breakthrough in the second party. For this reason, for a period of time, the composition of Kyoto's own "Community vs. Anti-Community" was becoming "Land vs. Democracy vs. Communism". The Communist Party moved up to

7480-429: Was filmed crying after a dispute with government officials, Koizumi generated controversy with his statement "tears are women's ultimate weapons". Following an economic slump and a series of LDP scandals that claimed the career of YKK member Koichi Kato , by April Koizumi's popularity rating had fallen 30 percentage points since his nomination as prime minister. Koizumi was re-elected in 2003 and his popularity surged as

7568-507: Was narrowly defeated in a 2015 referendum , and again in 2020 . Hokkaidō is referred to as a dō ( 道 , [doꜜː] ) or circuit . This term was originally used to refer to Japanese regions consisting of several provinces (e.g. the Tōkaidō east-coast region, and Saikaido west-coast region). This was also a historical usage of the character in China. (In Korea, this historical usage

7656-539: Was set up and encompassed the former city area of Edo under the Fuhanken sanchisei . After the abolition of the han system in the first wave of prefectural mergers in 1871/72, several surrounding areas (parts of Urawa , Kosuge , Shinagawa and Hikone prefectures ) were merged into Tokyo, and under the system of (numbered) "large districts and small districts" (daiku-shōku) , it was subdivided into eleven large districts further subdivided into 103 small districts, six of

7744-529: Was the first military mission in active foreign war zones since the end of the World War II . Many Japanese commentators indicated that the favorable US-Japan relation was based on the Koizumi's personal friendship with the US President George W. Bush . White House officials described the first meeting between Koizumi and Bush at Camp David as "incredibly warm", with the two men playing catch with

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