New Trend in Campaign Strategy

The 2025 Upper House election may be marked as the first major charge of a small ultra-right party with internet-friendly campaign strategy in Japan. The Sanseito, meaning political participation party with nickname of “Party of Do It Yourself,” increased its seats in the House from 2 to 15, collecting votes which were skeptical about long-time leadership of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Despite its exclusive and discriminative speeches, Sanseito attracted the voters with live coverages through social networking services (SNS).

 

Sanseito was established in 2020 by its leaders, including current head, Sohei Kamiya. The party gained a seat in the Diet for the first time in the Upper House election in 2022. It added three lawmakers in the Lower House after the election in 2024. The party included another lawmaker in the Upper House in June 2025, fulfilling the condition of a political party which requires five lawmakers in the Diet.

 

Sanseito gained fourteen seats, seven in prefectural districts and seven in proportional constituency, in the Upper House election in July, 2025. It was estimated that voters who were disappointed with the LDP, which leadership has declined since the defeat in the Lower House election last October, supported Sanseito’s upsurge. Those voters were supposed to have had sympathy to Sanseito’s ultra-conservative policies.

 

The biggest reason of Sanseito’s victory must be skilled use of internet in its election campaign. It frequently uploaded leader’s speeches on SNS. The followers spread them to the public, sending eligible voters to polling stations. It is likely that those who realized Sanseito’s policies through SNS were the people who do not frequently read newspapers or watch television.

 

The Democratic Party for the People (DPP), which increased its seats in the Upper House from nine to twenty-two, was also successful in taking advantage of SNS. The party focused on young voters, who were frustrated with taxes and other payments to support highly aged society, upholding income and consumption tax cuts. Those two parties proved that an internet-friendly party can certainly appeal to the voters.

 

Another campaign strategy worked in the election was the extremism. Kamiya reiterated discriminative speeches, sayingthat old women cannot give births, or inserted a discriminatory word against Korean people. Those extreme speeches were accepted by some voters as a reasonable expression. Although the discriminatory speeches received firm oppositions, they were paid attention by voters. The DPP also advocated immediate increase of take-home pay in this summer to attract young voters.

 

It is undeniable that the campaign strategies of Sanseito and the DPP worked for the victory of them in the election, dividing the parties into winners or losers. Internet-friendly parties distinguished themselves from old parties with traditional campaign such as town meetings or chanting from campaign cars. The old parties are facing demands of new approaches to the voters.

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