Japan’s 2025 Populist Turn from Outside: Multi-Dimensional Well-Being and Value Depletion in Integrative Political Psychology
<p id="p1">Japan’s 2025 House of Councillors election provides a rare empirical window into how declines in subjective well-being (WB) and value-based resources align with contemporary populist realignment. Using national survey data linked to party support and seat-change patterns, this chapt...
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Book Chapter |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
IntechOpen
2026
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.intechopen.com/chapters/1246533 |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| Summary: | <p id="p1">Japan’s 2025 House of Councillors election provides a rare empirical window into how declines in subjective well-being (WB) and value-based resources align with contemporary populist realignment. Using national survey data linked to party support and seat-change patterns, this chapter shows that multi-dimensional WBs—spanning evaluative, affective, relational, and eudaimonic domains—together with value-related indicators (meaning, mattering, intrinsic versus material orientation, and sacralization) form a coherent psychological architecture behind Japan’s “populist turn from outside.” Lower WB and depleted meaning and mattering are consistently associated with stronger populist attitudes, outperforming ideology, socioeconomic grievance, and basic demographics. Three configurations are identified: (1) resentment-based populism, marked by elevated negative affect and collapsed meaning and mattering; (2) sacralized far-right populism, in which resentment is intensified by pseudo-religious purity and national-cultural sacralization; and (3) reform-oriented populism, where relatively high WB and future-oriented capability (hope, optimism, and agency) support efficacy-driven, market-focused dissatisfaction. These patterns indicate a generalizable mechanism linking WB and value erosion to democratic fragility in an advanced democracy. The chapter situates these findings within integrative positive political psychology, treating negative political phenomena as diagnostic signals of deficits in well-being and values—such as meaning and recognition—thereby clarifying targets for democratic resilience and flourishing-oriented renewal.</p> |
|---|---|
| ISBN: | 978-1-83634-209-0 |
| DOI: | 10.5772/intechopen.1014914 |