Parties at both ends of the political spectrum are still grappling with former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's multifaceted legacy, a year after he was fatally shot while delivering a stump speech in Nara Prefecture.
To his supporters, Abe was the embodiment of a charismatic politician unafraid to antagonize large swaths of the public in the pursuit of conservative causes at home, all the while striving to restore Japan’s position in the eyes of its allies and rivals abroad.
But for his detractors, Abe was instead a symbol of opaque governing practices, with his critics decrying his tight control over the bureaucracy and attempts to dismantle Japan’s postwar pacifism.