Eisaku Satō

Eisaku Satō
Eisaku Satō
佐藤栄作
	Official portrait, 1964
Prime Minister of Japan
	In office; 9 November 1964 – 7 July 1972
Monarch	Hirohito
Preceded by	Hayato Ikeda
Succeeded by	Kakuei Tanaka
President of the Liberal Democratic Party
	In office; 1 December 1964 – 5 July 1972
Vice President	Shojiro Kawashima
Secretary-General	Takeo Miki; Kakuei Tanaka; Takeo Fukuda; Kakuei Tanaka; Shigeru Hori;
Preceded by	Hayato Ikeda
Succeeded by	Kakuei Tanaka
Member of the House of Representatives
	In office; 23 January 1949 – 3 June 1975
Constituency	Yamaguchi 2nd
Personal details
Born	27 March 1901; Tabuse, Yamaguchi, Empire of Japan
Died	3 June 1975 (aged 74); Tokyo, Japan
Political party	Liberal Democratic Party (1955–1975)
Other political; affiliations	Liberal Party (1949–1955)
Spouse	Hiroko Satō (m. 1926)
Children	2, including Shinji
Relatives	Nobusuke Kishi (brother); Shinzo Abe (grandnephew); Nobuo Kishi (grandnephew)
Alma mater	Tokyo Imperial University
Awards	Nobel Peace Prize (1974)
Signature
Japanese name
Shinjitai	佐藤栄作
Kyūjitai	佐藤榮作
Kana	さとうえいさく
Romanization
Transcriptions
Romanization	Satō Eisaku

Eisaku Satō (佐藤栄作, Satō Eisaku, 27 March 1901 – 3 June 1975) was a Japanese politician who served as prime minister of Japan from 1964 to 1972. He is the third longest-serving prime minister, and ranks second in longest uninterrupted service as prime minister.

Satō entered the National Diet in 1949 as a member of the Liberal Party. Gradually rising through the ranks of Japanese politics, he held a series of cabinet positions. His brother Nobusuke Kishi served as prime minister from 1957 to 1960. In 1964 he succeeded Hayato Ikeda as prime minister, becoming the first prime minister to have been born in the 20th century. Satō was the second prime minister to come from the Satō–Kishi–Abe family.

As prime minister, Satō presided over a period of rapid economic growth. He arranged for the formal return of Okinawa (Ryukyu Islands; occupied by the United States since the end of the Second World War) to Japanese control. Satō brought Japan into the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize as a co-recipient in 1974.

Early life

Satō was born on 27 March 1901, in Tabuse, Yamaguchi Prefecture, the third son of businessman Hidesuke Satō and his wife Moyo. His father had worked in the Yamaguchi Prefectural Office, but quit in 1898, and started a sake brewing business in Kishida, Tabuse. The family had a history in sake brewing and had held the right for sake brewing for generations.^[1] Sato's great-grandfather was a samurai of the Chōshū Domain, with their outsized influence in Meiji era Japan, with more Meiji and Taisho prime ministers coming from Yamaguchi than any other prefecture. His two older brothers were Ichirō Satō, who would become a vice admiral, and Nobusuke Kishi, who served as prime minister from 1957-1960.^[2]

Satō studied German law at Tokyo Imperial University and in 1923, passed the senior civil service examinations. Upon graduation the following year, he became a civil servant in the Ministry of Railways. He served as Director of the Osaka Railways Bureau from 1944 to 1946 and Vice-Minister for Transport from 1947 to 1948.^[3]

Satō entered the Diet in 1949 as a member of the Liberal Party.

He served as Minister of Postal Services and Telecommunications from July 1951 to July 1952. Sato gradually rose through the ranks of Japanese politics, becoming chief cabinet secretary to then prime minister Shigeru Yoshida from January 1953 to July 1954. He later served as minister of construction from October 1952 to February 1953.

After the Liberal Party merged with the Japan Democratic Party to form the Liberal Democratic Party, Satō served as chairman of the party executive council from December 1957 to June 1958, followed by a post as minister of finance in the cabinet of his brother Nobusuke Kishi from 1958-1960. As minister of finance, Sato requested the US to fund conservatives.^[4]

Satō also served in the cabinets of Kishi's successor as prime minister, Hayato Ikeda. From July 1961 to July 1962, Satō was Minister of International Trade and Industry. From July 1963 to June 1964 he was concurrently head of the Hokkaidō Development Agency and of the Science and Technology Agency.

Prime minister

Satō succeeded Ikeda after the latter resigned due to ill health.^[5] He would go on to serve the longest stint of any prime minister up until that time, and by the late 1960s he appeared to have single-handed control over the entire Japanese government. He was a popular prime minister due to the growing economy; his foreign policy, which was a balancing act between the interests of the United States and China, was more tenuous. Student political radicalization led to numerous protests against Satō's support of the United States–Japan Security Treaty, and Japanese tacit support for American military operations in Vietnam. This opposition peaked with the 1968–1969 Japanese university protests, which eventually forced Satō to close the prestigious University of Tokyo for a year in 1969.^[6]

After three terms as prime minister, Satō decided not to run for a fourth. His heir apparent, Takeo Fukuda, won the Sato faction's support in the subsequent Diet elections, but the more popular MITI minister, Kakuei Tanaka, won the vote, ending the Satō faction's dominance.

Relations with China and Taiwan

Satō is the last Prime minister of Japan to visit Taiwan during his term. In 1965, Satō approved a US$150 million loan to Taiwan. He visited Taipei in September 1967. In 1969, Satō insisted that the defense of Taiwan was necessary for the safety of Japan. Satō followed the United States in most major issues, but Satō opposed the Nixon visit to China.^[7] Satō also bitterly opposed the entry of the PRC into the United Nations in 1971.

Relations with South Korea

On 22 June 1965, the Satō government and South Korea under Park Chung Hee signed the Treaty on Basic Relations Between Japan and the Republic of Korea, which normalized relations between Japan and South Korea for the first time. Relations with Japan had previously not been officially established since Korea's decolonization and division at the end of World War II.

Nuclear affairs

In the 1960s Sato argued that Japan needed nuclear weapons to match those of China, but the United States opposed such. The Johnson administration pressed Japan to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, ending, for then, Japan's nuclear ambitions.^[8]

Satō introduced the Three Non-Nuclear Principles on 11 December 1967, which means non-production, non-possession, and non-introduction of nuclear weapons. He later suggested the "Four-Pillars Nuclear Policy".^{[clarification needed]} During the prime ministership of Satō, Japan entered the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The Diet passed a resolution formally adopting the principles in 1971. For this he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974.

However, recent inquiries show that behind the scenes, Satō was more accommodating towards US plans of stationing nuclear weapons on Japanese soil. In December 2008, the Japanese government declassified a document showing that during a visit to the US in January 1965, he was discussing with US officials the possibility of using nuclear weapons against the People's Republic of China.^[9] In December 2009, his son reported that his father agreed in a November 1969 conversation with US President Nixon to allow the stationing of nuclear warheads in Okinawa once it was restored to Japanese sovereignty.^[10]

Okinawa issues

Since the end of the Second World War, Okinawa had been occupied by the United States. While visiting the United States in January 1965, Satō openly asked President Lyndon Johnson to return Okinawa to Japan. In August 1965, Satō became the first post-war prime minister of Japan to visit Okinawa.

In 1969, Satō struck a deal with U.S. president Richard Nixon to repatriate Okinawa and remove its nuclear weaponry: this deal was controversial because it allowed the U.S. forces in Japan to maintain bases in Okinawa after repatriation.^[11] Okinawa was formally returned to Japan on 15 May 1972, which also included the Senkaku Islands (also known as the Diaoyu Islands in China and the subject, since 1971, of a Sino-Japanese sovereignty dispute; see Senkaku Islands dispute).

Relations with Southeast Asia

During Satō's term, Japan participated in the creation of the Asian Development Bank in 1966 and held a ministerial level conference on Southeast Asian economic development.^[12] It was the first international conference sponsored by the Japanese government in the postwar period. In 1967, he was also the first Japanese prime minister to visit Singapore. He was largely supportive of the South Vietnamese government throughout the Vietnam War.

Later life

Upon leaving the premiership in 1972 to an approval rating of 19% (by April) and a fractured party, Satō moved back to his home in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo, staying out of the eyes of the media but remaining in the Diet. His reputation, however, quickly began to be rehabilitated, starting in November of that year with his awarding of the Grand Cordon of the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum. Satō opened up to the media after the award, with outlets noting his visual image change, with a longer hairstyle reminiscent of the post-presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson.^[13]

Satō quickly settled into his life as an elder statesman. In January 1973, Satō and his wife were invited to President Richard Nixon's second inauguration. Satō maintained close relations with Nixon, sending him his personal condolences upon his resignation, and Nixon attended his funeral.^[14]

Upon returning to Japan, his successor, the initially-popular Kakuei Tanaka, who had been handed a rebuke with 17 seat losses in the 1972 Japanese general election, looked to Satō to repair relations within the LDP, especially towards his rival Takeo Fukuda. Both men were Satō's protegés, and Satō advised Tanaka in the forming of his post-election cabinet, notably including Fukuda as director-general of the Administrative Agency. Although privately critical towards Tanaka's government, Satō remained in the public eye a unifier within the LDP.^[15]

Satō shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Seán MacBride in 1974. He was awarded for representing the Japanese people's will for peace, and for signing the nuclear arms Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1970.^[16] He was the first Asian to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. (In 1973, Vietnamese politician Le Duc Tho had become the first Asian to win the prize, but Tho had rejected it.^[17]) Satō began working with McBride shortly after, joining Amnesty International.^[18]

In April 1975, as part of his last foreign visit before his death, Satō was chosen as the LDP representative to attend the funeral of Chiang Kai-Shek. However, upon protest from the Chinese government of Satō's role as "official envoy of the LDP president", his role was relegated to a "friendship representative".^[19]

Death

On 19 May 1975, Satō attended a dinner in Shikiraku, a restaurant in Tokyo's Tsukiji district, attended by Fukuda. During the event, he suffered a massive stroke, resulting in a coma. He was held in an emergency unit in the restaurant for four days before being moved to hospital.^[20] He died at 12:55 a.m. on 3 June at the Jikei University Medical Center, aged 74. After a public funeral, his ashes were buried in the family cemetery at Tabuse.

Satō was posthumously honored with the Collar of the Order of the Chrysanthemum, the highest honor in the Japanese honors system.

Personal life

Satō married Hiroko Matsuoka (松岡寛子, 5 January 1907 – 16 April 1987) in 1926 and had two sons, Ryūtarō and Shinji. Hiroko's father, Matsusuke Satō, was Eisaku's paternal uncle. After Matsusuke died in 1911, Hiroko was raised by her maternal uncle, diplomat Yōsuke Matsuoka. Their son Shinji followed his father into politics, serving in both houses and as a cabinet minister. Shinji's son-in-law, Masashi Adachi, currently serves in the House of Councillors, and formerly worked as an aide for his cousin-in-law, Eisaku's grandnephew, Shinzo Abe.

In a 1969 Shukan Asahi interview with novelist Shūsaku Endō, Hiroko accused Satō of being a rake and a wife-beater.^[21] His hobbies included golf, fishing, and the Japanese tea ceremony.^[3] Nobusuke Kishi (his older brother) and Shinzō Abe (his grandnephew) were also both prime ministers.^[22]

Honours

Satō received the following awards:

Golden Pheasant Award of the Scout Association of Japan (1970)^[23]
Grand Cordon of the Order of the Chrysanthemum (3 November 1972)
Nobel Peace Prize (12 May 1974)^[3]
Collar of the Order of the Chrysanthemum (3 June 1975; posthumous)
Junior First Rank (3 June 1975)

Foreign honours

Spain: Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic (23 February 1965)^[24]
Malaysia: Honorary Grand Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm (S.M.N.) (1967)^[25]
Singapore: The Order of Temasek (25 September 1967)^[26]
Mexico: Sash of the Order of the Aztec Eagle (9 March 1972)
Paraguay: Grand Cross of National Order of Merit (5 April 1972)
South Korea: Order of Diplomatic Service Merit (1969)^[27]
Laos: Order of the Million Elephants and the White Parasol (1966)
Indonesia: Star of the Republic of Indonesia, 2nd Class (1973)

References

^ Yamada, Eizō; 山田栄三 (1988). Seiden Satō Eisaku. Shinchōsha. p. 23. ISBN 4-10-370701-1. OCLC 20260847.
^ Kurzman, Dan (1960). Kishi and Japan: The Search for the Sun. Obolensky. ISBN 9780839210573.
^ ^a ^b ^c "The Nobel Peace Prize 1974". Nobel Prize. Retrieved 6 January 2013.
^ Weiner, Tim (9 October 1994). "C.I.A. Spent Millions to Support Japanese Right in 50's and 60's". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 16 July 2022.
^ Kapur, Nick (2018). Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 98. ISBN 978-0674984424.
^ Feilier. Learning to Bow. Page 80
^ MacMillan. Nixon and Mao: The Week that Changed the World
^ "Imagine This: Japan Builds Nuclear Weapons". 25 May 2019.
^ "Editorial: The U.S. nuclear umbrella, past and future". Archived from the original on 19 January 2021. Retrieved 9 January 2011.
^ "Document on secret Japan-U.S. nuclear pact kept by ex-PM Sato's family". Archived from the original on 17 October 2018. Retrieved 9 January 2011.
^ Ambrose. The Rise to Globalism. Page 235
^ Hoshiro, Hiroyuki (7 May 2007). "Postwar Japanese and Southeast Asian History - A New Viewpoint". Research and Information Center for Asian Studies. Retrieved 6 January 2013.
^ Tsuda 2023, pp. 8–9.
^ Tsuda 2023, p. 12.
^ Tsuda 2023, pp. 13–14.
^ "Eisaku Sato". Nobel Prize. The Norwegian Nobel Institute. Retrieved 21 January 2015.
^ Pace, Eric (14 October 1990). "Le Duc Tho, Top Hanoi Aide, Dies at 79". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 October 2013.
^ Tsuda 2023, pp. 18–19.
^ Tsuda 2023, p. 13.
^ Tsuda 2023, p. 19.
^ "The Wife Tells All". Time. 10 January 1969. Archived from the original on 17 December 2007. Retrieved 6 January 2013.
^ "1986 dual elections offer clue to Abe's plans".
^ 䝪䞊䜲䝇䜹䜴䝖日本連盟きじ章受章者 [Recipient of the Golden Pheasant Award of the Scout Association of Japan] (PDF). Reinanzaka Scout Club (in Japanese). 23 May 2014. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 August 2020.
^ "Boletín Oficial del Estado" (PDF).
^ "Semakan Penerima Darjah Kebesaran, Bintang dan Pingat". Archived from the original on 19 July 2019. Retrieved 24 August 2018.
^ "Indonesia President Yudhoyono Conferred The Singapore Order of Temasek (First Class)". 11 September 2014.
^ South Korean Government Decorated 12 Japanese Extreme Right Figures

Books

Tsuda, Taro (17 October 2023). "Elder statesman as a jack-of-all-trades: The case of Satō Eisaku in 1970s Japan". Contemporary Japan. doi:10.1080/18692729.2023.2247735.

External links

Film Footage of Eisaku Sato's State Visit to Washington DC Archived 26 July 2014 at the Wayback Machine
Eisaku Satō on Nobelprize.org including the Nobel Lecture 11 December 1974 The Pursuit of Peace and Japan in the Nuclear Age
Satō Eisaku EB article
Japanese government home page
Brief summary of the debate around Eiskau Sato's Nobel Prize at OpenLearn Archived 7 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine

Political offices
Preceded by Gizo Tomabechi	Chief Cabinet Secretary 1948–1949	Succeeded by Kaneshichi Masuda
Preceded by Bunkichi Tamura	Minister of Posts and Telecommunications 1951–1952	Succeeded by Sotaro Takase
Preceded by Bunkichi Tamura	Minister of Telecommunications 1951–1952	Succeeded by Post abolished
Preceded by Uichi Noda	Minister of Construction 1952–1953	Succeeded by Kuichiro Totsuka
Preceded by Uichi Noda	Head of the Hokkaido Development Agency 1952–1953	Succeeded by Kuichiro Totsuka
Preceded by Hisato Ichimada	Minister of Finance 1958–1960	Succeeded by Mikio Mizuta
Preceded by Etsusaburo Shiina	Minister of International Trade and Industry 1961–1962	Succeeded by Hajime Fukuda
Preceded by Tsuruyo Kondo	Head of the Science and Technology Agency 1963–1964	Succeeded by Hayato Ikeda
Preceded by Shojiro Kawashima	Head of the Hokkaido Development Agency 1963–1964	Succeeded by Hayato Ikeda
Preceded by Hayato Ikeda	Prime Minister of Japan 1964–1972	Succeeded by Kakuei Tanaka
Party political offices
Preceded by Takayoshi Aoki	Chairman of the Policy Research Council, Democratic Liberal Party 1949–1950	Merged into Liberal Party
New political party	Chairman of the Policy Research Council, Liberal Party 1950	Succeeded by Ryūtarō Nemoto
Preceded by Jōji Hayashi	Secretary General of the Liberal Party 1950–1951	Succeeded by Kaneshichi Masuda
Preceded by Kozen Hirokawa	Secretary General of the Liberal Party 1953–1954	Succeeded by Hayato Ikeda
Preceded by Shigemasa Sunada	Chairman of the General Council, Liberal Democratic Party 1957–1958	Succeeded by Ichirō Kōno
Preceded by Hayato Ikeda	President of the Liberal Democratic Party 1964–1972	Succeeded by Kakuei Tanaka

[1] Yamada, Eizō; 山田栄三 (1988). Seiden Satō Eisaku. Shinchōsha. p. 23. ISBN 4-10-370701-1. OCLC 20260847.

[Sun-2] Kurzman, Dan (1960). Kishi and Japan: The Search for the Sun. Obolensky. ISBN 9780839210573.

[nobelprize.org-3] "The Nobel Peace Prize 1974". Nobel Prize. Retrieved 6 January 2013.

[4] Weiner, Tim (9 October 1994). "C.I.A. Spent Millions to Support Japanese Right in 50's and 60's". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 16 July 2022.

[5] Kapur, Nick (2018). Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 98. ISBN 978-0674984424.

[6] Feilier. Learning to Bow. Page 80

[7] MacMillan. Nixon and Mao: The Week that Changed the World

[8] "Imagine This: Japan Builds Nuclear Weapons". 25 May 2019.

[9] "Editorial: The U.S. nuclear umbrella, past and future". Archived from the original on 19 January 2021. Retrieved 9 January 2011.

[10] "Document on secret Japan-U.S. nuclear pact kept by ex-PM Sato's family". Archived from the original on 17 October 2018. Retrieved 9 January 2011.

[11] Ambrose. The Rise to Globalism. Page 235

[hoshiro-12] Hoshiro, Hiroyuki (7 May 2007). "Postwar Japanese and Southeast Asian History - A New Viewpoint". Research and Information Center for Asian Studies. Retrieved 6 January 2013.

[FOOTNOTETsuda20238–9-13] Tsuda 2023, pp. 8–9.

[FOOTNOTETsuda202312-14] Tsuda 2023, p. 12.

[FOOTNOTETsuda202313–14-15] Tsuda 2023, pp. 13–14.

[16] "Eisaku Sato". Nobel Prize. The Norwegian Nobel Institute. Retrieved 21 January 2015.

[17] Pace, Eric (14 October 1990). "Le Duc Tho, Top Hanoi Aide, Dies at 79". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 October 2013.

[FOOTNOTETsuda202318–19-18] Tsuda 2023, pp. 18–19.

[FOOTNOTETsuda202313-19] Tsuda 2023, p. 13.

[FOOTNOTETsuda202319-20] Tsuda 2023, p. 19.

[21] "The Wife Tells All". Time. 10 January 1969. Archived from the original on 17 December 2007. Retrieved 6 January 2013.

[22] "1986 dual elections offer clue to Abe's plans".

[reinanzaka-23] 䝪䞊䜲䝇䜹䜴䝖日本連盟きじ章受章者 [Recipient of the Golden Pheasant Award of the Scout Association of Japan] (PDF). Reinanzaka Scout Club (in Japanese). 23 May 2014. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 August 2020.

[24] "Boletín Oficial del Estado" (PDF).

[25] "Semakan Penerima Darjah Kebesaran, Bintang dan Pingat". Archived from the original on 19 July 2019. Retrieved 24 August 2018.

[26] "Indonesia President Yudhoyono Conferred The Singapore Order of Temasek (First Class)". 11 September 2014.

[27] South Korean Government Decorated 12 Japanese Extreme Right Figures

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v t e Laureates of the Nobel Peace Prize
1901–1925	1901: Henry Dunant / Frédéric Passy 1902: Élie Ducommun / Charles Gobat 1903: Randal Cremer 1904: Institut de Droit International 1905: Bertha von Suttner 1906: Theodore Roosevelt 1907: Ernesto Moneta / Louis Renault 1908: Klas Arnoldson / Fredrik Bajer 1909: A. M. F. Beernaert / Paul Estournelles de Constant 1910: International Peace Bureau 1911: Tobias Asser / Alfred Fried 1912: Elihu Root 1913: Henri La Fontaine 1914 1915 1916 1917: International Committee of the Red Cross 1918 1919: Woodrow Wilson 1920: Léon Bourgeois 1921: Hjalmar Branting / Christian Lange 1922: Fridtjof Nansen 1923 1924 1925: Austen Chamberlain / Charles Dawes
1926–1950	1926: Aristide Briand / Gustav Stresemann 1927: Ferdinand Buisson / Ludwig Quidde 1928 1929: Frank B. Kellogg 1930: Nathan Söderblom 1931: Jane Addams / Nicholas Butler 1932 1933: Norman Angell 1934: Arthur Henderson 1935: Carl von Ossietzky 1936: Carlos Saavedra Lamas 1937: Robert Cecil 1938: Nansen International Office for Refugees 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944: International Committee of the Red Cross 1945: Cordell Hull 1946: Emily Balch / John Mott 1947: Friends Service Council / American Friends Service Committee 1948 1949: John Boyd Orr 1950: Ralph Bunche
1951–1975	1951: Léon Jouhaux 1952: Albert Schweitzer 1953: George C. Marshall 1954: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1955 1956 1957: Lester B. Pearson 1958: Georges Pire 1959: Philip Noel-Baker 1960: Albert Luthuli 1961: Dag Hammarskjöld 1962: Linus Pauling 1963: International Committee of the Red Cross / League of Red Cross Societies 1964: Martin Luther King Jr. 1965: UNICEF 1966 1967 1968: René Cassin 1969: International Labour Organization 1970: Norman Borlaug 1971: Willy Brandt 1972 1973: Lê Đức Thọ (declined award) / Henry Kissinger 1974: Seán MacBride / Eisaku Satō 1975: Andrei Sakharov
1976–2000	1976: Betty Williams / Mairead Corrigan 1977: Amnesty International 1978: Anwar Sadat / Menachem Begin 1979: Mother Teresa 1980: Adolfo Pérez Esquivel 1981: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1982: Alva Myrdal / Alfonso García Robles 1983: Lech Wałęsa 1984: Desmond Tutu 1985: International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War 1986: Elie Wiesel 1987: Óscar Arias 1988: UN Peacekeeping Forces 1989: Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama) 1990: Mikhail Gorbachev 1991: Aung San Suu Kyi 1992: Rigoberta Menchú 1993: Nelson Mandela / F. W. de Klerk 1994: Shimon Peres / Yitzhak Rabin / Yasser Arafat 1995: Pugwash Conferences / Joseph Rotblat 1996: Carlos Belo / José Ramos-Horta 1997: International Campaign to Ban Landmines / Jody Williams 1998: John Hume / David Trimble 1999: Médecins Sans Frontières 2000: Kim Dae-jung
2001–present	2001: United Nations / Kofi Annan 2002: Jimmy Carter 2003: Shirin Ebadi 2004: Wangari Maathai 2005: International Atomic Energy Agency / Mohamed ElBaradei 2006: Grameen Bank / Muhammad Yunus 2007: Al Gore / Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2008: Martti Ahtisaari 2009: Barack Obama 2010: Liu Xiaobo 2011: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf / Leymah Gbowee / Tawakkol Karman 2012: European Union 2013: Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons 2014: Kailash Satyarthi / Malala Yousafzai 2015: Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet 2016: Juan Manuel Santos 2017: International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons 2018: Denis Mukwege / Nadia Murad 2019: Abiy Ahmed 2020: World Food Programme 2021: Maria Ressa / Dmitry Muratov 2022: Ales Bialiatski / Memorial / Center for Civil Liberties 2023: Narges Mohammadi 2024: Nihon Hidankyo

v t e 1974 Nobel Prize laureates
Chemistry	Paul Flory (United States)
Literature (1974)	Eyvind Johnson (Sweden) Harry Martinson (Sweden)
Peace	Seán MacBride (Ireland) Eisaku Satō (Japan)
Physics	Martin Ryle (United Kingdom) Antony Hewish (United Kingdom)
Physiology or Medicine	Albert Claude (Belgium) Christian de Duve (Belgium) George Emil Palade (United States)
Economic Sciences	Gunnar Myrdal (Sweden) Friedrich Hayek (Austria)
Nobel Prize recipients 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979

v t e Japanese Nobel laureates
Chemistry	Kenichi Fukui (1981) Hideki Shirakawa (2000) Ryōji Noyori (2001) Koichi Tanaka (2002) Osamu Shimomura (2008) Ei-ichi Negishi / Akira Suzuki (2010) Akira Yoshino (2019)
Literature	Yasunari Kawabata (1968) Kenzaburō Ōe (1994)
Peace	Eisaku Satō (1974) Nihon Hidankyo (2024)
Physics	Hideki Yukawa (1949) Shin'ichirō Tomonaga (1965) Leo Esaki (1973) Masatoshi Koshiba (2002) Makoto Kobayashi / Toshihide Maskawa (2008) Isamu Akasaki / Hiroshi Amano (2014) Takaaki Kajita (2015)
Physiology or Medicine	Susumu Tonegawa (1987) Shinya Yamanaka (2012) Satoshi Ōmura (2015) Yoshinori Ohsumi (2016) Tasuku Honjo (2018)

v t e Finance ministers of Japan
Minister of Finance (大蔵卿, Ōkura-kyō) under the Daijōkan system of the Meiji Government	Matsudaira Date Ōkubo Ōkuma Sano Matsukata
Minister of Finance (大蔵大臣, Ōkura Daijin) under the Constitution of the Empire of Japan	Matsukata Watanabe Matsukata Watanabe Matsukata Inoue Matsuda Matsukata Watanabe Saionji Sone Sakatani Matsuda Katsura Yamamoto Wakatsuki Takahashi Wakatsuki Taketomi Terauchi Shōda Takahashi Ichiki Inoue Shōda Hamaguchi Hayami Naoharu Takahashi Mitsuchi Inoue Takahashi Fujii Takahashi Machida Baba Yūki Kaya Ikeda Ishiwata Aoki Sakurauchi Kawada Ogura Kaya Ishiwata Tsushima Hirose Tsushima Shibusawa Ishibashi
Minister of Finance (大蔵大臣, Ōkura Daijin) under the Constitution of Japan	Katayama Yano Kurusu Kitamura Yoshida Izumiyama Ōya Ikeda Mukai Ogasawara Ichimanda Ikeda Ichimanda Satō Mizuta Tanaka Fukuda Mizuta Fukuda Mizuta Ueki Aichi Tanaka Fukuda Ōhira Bō Murayama Kaneko Takeshita Watanabe Takeshita Miyazawa Takeshita Murayama Hashimoto Kaifu Hata Hayashi Fujii Takemura Kubo Mitsuzuka Matsunaga Miyazawa
Minister of Finance (財務大臣, Zaimu Daijin)	Miyazawa Shiokawa Tanigaki Omi Nukaga Ibuki Nakagawa Yosano Fujii Kan Noda Azumi Jojima Asō Suzuki Katō
Italics denote acting Ministers of Finance

v t e Liberal Democratic Party of Japan
Leaders	Hatoyama Ishibashi Kishi Ikeda Satō Tanaka Miki T. Fukuda Ōhira Nishimura Suzuki Nakasone Takeshita Uno Kaifu Miyazawa Kōno Hashimoto Obuchi Mori Koizumi Abe Y. Fukuda Asō Tanigaki Abe Suga Kishida Ishiba
Leadership elections	Apr 1956 Dec 1956 1957 1959 1960 1962 Jul 1964 Nov 1964 1966 1968 1970 1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1987 Jun 1989 Aug 1989 1991 1993 1995 1998 1999 2000 [ja] 2001 [ja] 2003 [ja] 2006 2007 2008 2009 2012 2015 2018 2020 2021 2024
Factions	Heisei Kenkyūkai Kōchikai Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyūkai Shikōkai Shisuikai
Preceding parties	Liberal Party Japan Democratic Party
Absorbed parties	Okinawa Liberal Democratic Party [ja] (1970) New Liberal Club (1986) New Conservative Party (2003) Party for Japanese Kokoro (2018)
Split parties	New Liberal Club (1976) Japan New Party (1992) Japan Renewal Party (1993) New Party Sakigake (1993) People's New Party (2005) Your Party (2009) Sunrise Party (2010) New Renaissance Party (2010) Japan Restoration Party (2012)
Italics denote acting leader.