The role of the liberal democratic party factions in Japan's foreign policy

Japan is one of the advanced democracies of Northeast Asia that has been able to achieve high living standards, guarantee security and prosperity for the population, as well as build a competitive economy. Japan's political system is, in fact, unique - its democratic institutions have a number of intrinsic characteristics that influence public policy. The aim of the paper is to assess the impact of intra-party factionalism in the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan on the country’s foreign policy. The authors set the following tasks: to reveal the theoretical basis of factionalism as a feature of the party structure; to describe the factional division in the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan and to trace the manifestations of factionalism in the foreign policy of the recent prime ministers. The method of analysis, induction and synthesis is widely used in the work. As a result, a high degree of factionalism influences Japan’s foreign policy and identifies its ideological features and personnel manifestations.