Okayama 4th district

Okayama 4th District
Okayama 4th District
Parliamentary constituency; for the Japanese House of Representatives
	Numbered map of Okayama Prefecture; single-member districts
Prefecture	Okayama
Proportional District	Chūgoku
Electorate	405,558 (2022)
Current constituency
Created	1996
Party	LDP
Representative	Gaku Hashimoto

Okayama 4th district is a single-member electoral district for the House of Representatives, the lower house of the national Diet of Japan. It is located in central coastal Okayama and covers the city of Kurashiki and the town of Hayashima. As of September 2012, 367,702 eligible voters were registered in the district, giving it slightly below average vote weight.^[1]

The first representative for Okayama 4th district was Liberal Democrat Ryūtarō Hashimoto who had represented the five-member 2nd district before the electoral reform, as had his father Ryōgo before him. Hashimoto, hit by a scandal over political donations from the Japanese Dentists' Federation in 2004, retired from politics in the 2005 general election. His son Gaku tried to "inherit" the seat, but lost to Democrat Michiyoshi Yunoki by a margin of about 6,000 votes. Hashimoto won a seat in the Chūgoku proportional representation block. In his second attempt in the 2009 general election, he lost to Yunoki by an even wider margin (sekihairitsu 72.4) and also failed to win a proportional seat. In his third attempt in the landslide election of 2012, Hashimoto won the district.

List of representatives

Representative		Dates	Notes
Ryūtarō Hashimoto	LDP	1996–2005	Retired from politics
Michiyoshi Yunoki	Democratic	2005–2012	Re-elected to a proportional seat in the Chūgoku block
Gaku Hashimoto	LDP	2012–	Incumbent

Recent election results

2021^[2]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	LDP	Gaku Hashimoto	89,052	49.7	2.3
	CDP	Michiyoshi Yunoki (won PR seat)	83,859	46.8	5.0
	Independent	Tomoharu Nakagawa	6,146	3.4
Turnout				48.04	0.07
	LDP hold

2017^[3]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	LDP	Gaku Hashimoto	93,172	51.95	0.33
	Kibō no Tō	Michiyoshi Yunoki (won PR seat)	72,280	40.30	1.52
	JCP	Akinari Hirabayashi	13,907	7.75	0.18
Turnout				48.11	1.80
	LDP hold		Swing	0.9

2014^[4]
	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
LDP	Gaku Hashimoto	91,189	50.62	4.20
Democratic	Michiyoshi Yunoki (won PR seat)	75,338	41.82	9.80
JCP	Yūichi Kakiuchi	13,629	7.57	1.90
LDP hold		Swing	2.8

2012^[5]
	Candidate	Votes	%
LDP (Komeito)	Gaku Hashimoto	91,155	46.4
Democratic (People's New)	Michiyoshi Yunoki (won PR seat)	64,293	32.7
Restoration	Masaharu Akazawa	29,798	15.2
JCP	Nobuko Sumasu	11,125	5.7

2009^[6]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Democratic (People's New)	Michiyoshi Yunoki	134,319	57.0
	LDP (Komeito)	Gaku Hashimoto	97,284	41.3
	Happiness Realization	Miyuka Koiwai	3,929	1.7
Turnout			240,713	66.1

2005^[7]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Democratic	Michiyoshi Yunoki	102,370	47.4
	LDP	Gaku Hashimoto (elected by PR)	96,356	44.6
	JCP	Tsuyoshi Azuma	17,094	7.9
Turnout			223,514	62.4

2003^[8]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	LDP	Ryūtarō Hashimoto	104,653	56.5
	Democratic	Michiyoshi Yunoki	66,199	35.7
	JCP	Tsuyoshi Azuma	14,367	7.8
Turnout			192,293	54.3

References

^ 平成24年9月2日現在選挙人名簿及び在外選挙人名簿登録者数 [September 2, 2012 Current number of registrants on the electoral list and overseas electoral list] (in Japanese). Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.
^ 小選挙区岡山 4区 (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 11 June 2023.
^ 2017年10月、開票速報終了時点のデータ岡山４区 [October 2017, data as of the end of preliminary election counting Okayama 4 wards] (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 7 December 2021.
^ 2014衆院選 2014年12月14日(日) 投票岡山４区 [2014 House of Representatives Election December 14, 2014 (Sunday) Okayama 4th Ward] (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 7 December 2021.
^ 開票結果小選挙区岡山 [Election Results Single-seat constituency Okayama]. Yomiuri Shimbun (in Japanese). Retrieved 2013-05-15.
^ 第45回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [45th House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.
^ 第44回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [44th House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.
^ 第43回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [43rd House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.

[1] 平成24年9月2日現在選挙人名簿及び在外選挙人名簿登録者数 [September 2, 2012 Current number of registrants on the electoral list and overseas electoral list] (in Japanese). Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.

[2] 小選挙区岡山 4区 (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 11 June 2023.

[3] 2017年10月、開票速報終了時点のデータ岡山４区 [October 2017, data as of the end of preliminary election counting Okayama 4 wards] (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 7 December 2021.

[4] 2014衆院選 2014年12月14日(日) 投票岡山４区 [2014 House of Representatives Election December 14, 2014 (Sunday) Okayama 4th Ward] (in Japanese). NHK. Retrieved 7 December 2021.

[5] 開票結果小選挙区岡山 [Election Results Single-seat constituency Okayama]. Yomiuri Shimbun (in Japanese). Retrieved 2013-05-15.

[6] 第45回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [45th House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.

[7] 第44回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [44th House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.

[8] 第43回衆議院議員選挙 - 岡山4区 [43rd House of Representatives Election - Okayama District 4]. go2senkyo.com (in Japanese). K.K. VoiceJapan. Retrieved 2012-02-08.

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v t e First-past-the-post (FPTP) districts and proportional representation (PR) "blocks" for the Japanese House of Representatives of the National Diet (1996–present)
Speaker of the House of Representatives of Japan: Fukushiro Nukaga, Ibaraki 2nd Vice Speaker of the House of Representatives of Japan: Banri Kaieda, Tokyo PR
Hokkaidō (8 block seats, 12 district seats)	Hokkaidō 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Tōhoku (12 block seats, 21 district seats)	Aomori 1 2 3 Iwate 1 2 3 Miyagi 1 2 3 4 5 Akita 1 2 3 Yamagata 1 2 3 Fukushima 1 2 3 4
Kita- (North) Kantō (19 block seats, 33 district seats)	Ibaraki 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Tochigi 1 2 3 4 5 Gunma 1 2 3 4 5 Saitama 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Minami- (South) Kantō (23 block seats, 36 district seats)	Chiba 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Kanagawa 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Yamanashi 1 2
Tokyo (19 block seats, 30 district seats)	Tokyo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
Hokuriku-Shin'etsu (10 block seats, 18 district seats)	Niigata 1 2 3 4 5 Toyama 1 2 3 Ishikawa 1 2 3 Fukui 1 2 Nagano 1 2 3 4 5
Tōkai (21 block seats, 33 district seats)	Gifu 1 2 3 4 5 Shizuoka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Aichi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Mie 1 2 3 4
Kinki (28 block seats, 45 district seats)	Shiga 1 2 3 Kyoto 1 2 3 4 5 6 Osaka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Hyōgo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Nara 1 2 3 Wakayama 1 2
Chūgoku (10 block seats, 17 district seats)	Tottori 1 2 Shimane 1 2 Okayama 1 2 3 4 Hiroshima 1 2 3 4 5 6 Yamaguchi 1 2 3
Shikoku (6 block seats, 10 district seats)	Tokushima 1 2 Kagawa 1 2 3 Ehime 1 2 3 Kōchi 1 2
Kyūshū (20 block seats, 34 district seats)	Fukuoka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Saga 1 2 Nagasaki 1 2 3 Kumamoto 1 2 3 4 Ōita 1 2 3 Miyazaki 1 2 3 Kagoshima 1 2 3 4 Okinawa 1 2 3 4
Districts eliminated in the 2002 reapportionments	Hokkaido 13 Yamagata 4 Shizuoka 9 Shimane 3 Oita 4
Districts eliminated in the 2013 reapportionments	Fukui 3 Yamanashi 3 Tokushima 3 Kochi 3 Saga 3
Districts eliminated in the 2017 reapportionments	Aomori 4 Iwate 4 Mie 5 Nara 4 Kumamoto 5 Kagoshima 5
Districts eliminated in the 2022 reapportionments	Miyagi 6 Fukushima 5 Niigata 6 Shiga 4 Wakayama 3 Okayama 5 Hiroshima 7 Yamaguchi 4 Ehime 4 Nagasaki 4