It looked like the end of business as usual in Japan as the ruling Liberal Democratic Party lost power in 1993. After the Diet, Japan's parliament, passed a no-confidence motion and new elections were held, a coalition of former opposition parties, former LDP members, and new parties entered into the first non-LDP government since the party was created in 1955. However, by summer 1994, the LDP was the leading party in a coalition government. After then, the party continued to be at the center of every government, with only a small party or two joining it in a coalition. As of the early 2000s, the LDP remained the dominant party in Japan, with a substantial advantage over its potential competitors.

The continuation of one-party dominance in Japan went against a worldwide trend. At the same time that former communist and authoritarian regimes were overcoming their nondemocratic legacies, one-party dominant regimes in long-time democracies were undergoing major changes, as their leading parties lost the grip on power they had held for decades. Among the clearest cases of this change was Italy, where the longtime ruling Christian Democratic Party disintegrated and was replaced by new alternatives. Even in Mexico – often left out of discussions of one-party dominance because of questions over the degree to which Mexico had been democratic – the longtime ruling PRI, which dominated politics to a greater degree than any party in Italy or Japan, lost its firm grasp on power.