Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is one of major actors in the policy making process in Japan. Many students of Japanese politics have pointed out that LDP is a coalition of factions whose leaders are candidates for the presidency of LDP. They also emphasize that portfolios are allocated to each Diet member of LDP not on the basis of their ability needed Cabinet member, but in simple proportion to the size of each faction to which qualified members belong.
Three major factions such as Tanaka faction, Kouchikai and Fukuda faction, however, have acquired much more portfolios and top-leadership in LDP than others. In adition to this fact, these factions have accumulated much influence over the different policy arena from each other. This is so because leaders of these factions have had the different policy concerns. They demand not only the some amounts of portfolios, but also the kind of them over which they desire to have influence. As a consequence, there is a kind of the division of labor among factions in the Japanese policy making process. Therefore, factions of LDP should be the essential subunits in that process while many students still underestimate a role of policy making which factions have performed.
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