Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seemed confident on Dec. 24 when he relaunched his Cabinet following the landslide victory of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in the Dec. 14 Lower House election.

Abe, with an apparently stronger grip on power, boasted that his administration "garnered the great power of the confidence of the people."

The LDP won 291 of the 475-seat chamber and Abe is now in a position to extend his tenure by as much as four years. But key questions arise for 2015 : Will Abe's nationalistic stripes exert a greater influence over his decisions? And will he pursue his long-held quest to amend the pacifist Constitution?