reslog: online politics Japanese style

The other day I came across this rather exceptional bit of news implying that online elections are/will be soon illegal in Japan. Reportedly:

According to an article in the online version of Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, Internet campaigning for the upcoming Lower House elections are prohibited by the Public Offices Election Law. Candidates may not update Web sites or report activities in e-mail magazines.

The reason, says the article, is that the Liberal Democratic party fears that online campaigning will "disadvantage parties with elderly supporters," and "the system could be abused to slander candidates."

Blimey, I thouhgt, this sounds harsh. Better ask the expert.
Leslie Tkach-Kawasaki, that is [try here] , who has looked at online elections in Japan for quite some time [e.g. read this, or this]. Here's the response:

Quoting from the GovTech site, it is true that "candidates may not update Web sites or report activities in e-mail magazines" during the 10- to 12- day period prior to an election. Candidates usually do one of
the following:

* Completely stop updating their websites for that period -- more than 50%
(About 10 to 15% of these candidates have a notice on their websites regard ing this).

* Take the entire website off the web (so you get broken links when you try to access the site). Less than 50% of the candididates do this.

Parties are allowed to update their websites during the same period, but are very careful to avoid updating "election-related" content. Most update current events and "political education" news items.

The second article states: "They're [parties] not even permitted to announce when candidates will be giving a speech or upload their party platforms." The first half of that sentence is true. The second half, however, is contro versial. It probably refers to the controversy during the 2003 general election.

The main opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, wanted to publicize its manifesto (election platform) on its website as well as send it out via postal mail. The government countered that this was in contravention of the section in the POEL (Public Offices Election Law), that prohibits the distribution of election platforms to an unlimited (uncountable) number of people.

Remember, the POEL was initially brought to enable *costing* of election-related materials so that an even playing field could be assured to all candidates. During this particular election campaign period in 2003, the DPJ eventually succeeded in having the POEL changed to allow them to send out their manifesto in pamphlet format, but the POEL has never been changed to address new media technologies such as the web.

Confusing? It's supposed to be.