If the debate is still on, I'd like to add three points, one on normative concepts about political parties, one about the correlation between electoral systems and political behavior and the third one about public subsidies.

Of course, ever since Weber, we are trying to avoid embracing normative ideas about our objects of study. (Though to define democracy as a function of "the individual's ability to co-determine his own life" comes rather close.) However, we can hardly ignore that normal people hold such ideas and that much political action is at least in part guided by ideal notions of what should be. That Ozawa & Co were able to turn the corruption debate into one on electoral reform which is primarily designed to increase the conservatives' electoral chances, and at the same time dupe most scholars at at home and abroad, as well as most of the Japanese media into supporting these reforms, surely has a lot to do with previously existing ideas about what a democracy "should" look like and what role political parties "should" play in it. While I accept the general notion that the Japanese have admired the British system for a long time, I am still a little puzzled how this admiration could survive for so long, given the fact, that Britain is not generally a model these days, either economically, or politically.

There are plenty of Japanese scholars who believe that the electoral system has no more than a marginal impact on political behaviour, that historical and cultural factors are more important. Factions, for example, are said to survive.
They would be less clear-cut than they have been in the past, but could still serve the function of bridging the seniority gap that is an important element of all social organisation in Japan. They may even function as a break on the much heralded dictatorship of the party executives, if they manage to rotate executive positions among faction heads, for example. Like the internal organisation, the external appearance of parties may change less than people think. I believe I am expanding on a point Prof. Lehmbruch made, when I say that political party models may actually precede the electoral system. Strong party labels have always existed in the German party landscape, even though the electoral system changed from SMD to pure PR, and again to mitigated PR. Yes, Japanese parties might be wise to turn into policy entrepreneurs, but there is nothing in the new rules to prevent them from chosing the hard route of organising the vote rather than building coherent policy platforms.

Public subsidies to political parties are likely to add to the power of the party executives, though less so than is sometimes thought. It appears that this money is just about replacing the dwindling Keidanren etc. money that was at the disposal of the party exective anyway. More interestingly, the introduction of subsidies has failed to address internal party structures (other countries managed to introduce interesting incentives: Sweden distributes money only at the local level, Germany at the local, state and national level) because of a pre-war fear that the bureaucrats might meddle in the internal affairs of the parties. (A party law regulating the use of the subsidies may nevertheless be on the agenda very soon.) But this fear misses the point. If the German experience of 40 years of extensive subsidies is any guide, state hand-outs will make the parties more similar in their funding interests, more similar in their internal structures, and less partial--i.e. more likely to seek the median voter. The state has captured political parties.

One final comment. The 200 PR seats have not attracted the attention they deserve. First, they are not easy to get: Depending on the district, it takes between 3% and 10% of the vote to be elected in the PR districts. Second, there may well be a very pronounced cleavage between politicians from the two sides of the trench: local notables versus party soldiers, big party politicians vs. small/regional party politicians etc.. Or, third, PR membership may fall totally under the sway of the more powerful SMD politicians, who divvy up the lists according to faction or similar methods.

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