Shinzo Abe’s project to revitalise Japan is entering a dangerous phase. Three of its key elements – the prime minister’s reflationary economic policy, his security strategy and his personal popularity – are all coming under heightened scrutiny at the same time.
The stakes are high. If the priorities are wrong, his term in office may come to be viewed as a brief interlude in the long saga of Japanese decline. But if he plays his cards well, he could be remembered as a Margaret Thatcher-style transformational leader. His record would include not just the conquest of deflation but the re-emergence of a confident and outward-looking Japan.
Mr Abe’s immediate problem is the plunge in the high levels of public support which had bullet-proofed him against critics and rivals alike. The gap between his approval and disapproval ratings has shrunk from 30 per cent at the start of the year to just 8 per cent. If the trend continues, he can expect emboldened opposition on all fronts, from the deflationists associated with the Bank of Japan’s ancien régime to farmers hostile to the Trans Pacific Partnership free trade agreement.