In late August, far-right anti-immigrant protests broke out in Osaka and Tokyo in response to false rumors that African “hometowns” would be established in Japanese cities. This public expression of anti-Black xenophobia confounded many observers, as Africans constitute a minute fraction of Japan’s already-marginal 3% immigrant minority. It also attracted outsize attention from the Western far-right (up to and including Elon Musk), who have long been fascinated by Japanese ethnonationalism.
The protests came hot on the heels of the far-right Sanseito party’s stunning performance in July’s legislative election, which took them from one seat to 15 in the upper house. Sanseito draws inspiration explicitly from Western models like Trump’s MAGA movement and France’s National Rally. Some elements of its platform, like Covid conspiracy theories and a hyper-fixation on immigration, seem plucked wholesale from Western culture wars.
But are they really as novel a player as mainstream media make them out to be? When it comes to core issues like denying Japan’s WWII atrocities and revising its postwar constitution to allow military aggression, there’s no daylight between Sanseito and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). In fact, Sanseito’s leader started his career in the LDP and personally campaigned with former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. A notorious historical revisionist and staunch ally of Trump, Abe was the grandson of war criminal Nobusuke Kishi, who was personally rehabilitated and installed as Prime Minister by the US occupation.
When it comes down to it, Sanseito’s MAGA branding and nominal opposition to the government is just window dressing. It’s just as much a creature of the unholy alliance between US and Japanese imperialism.
