This study examines the impact of China's growingterritorial ambitions on Japanese public opinion. Byexperimentally manipulating perceived territorialthreats from China, we tested two potentialmechanisms of increased support for a conservativeincumbent leader in Japan. The first is the “rally’round the flag” model, in which threats universallyboost support for the leader through emotion. Thesecond is the “reactive liberal” model, in whichsupport from conservatives remains constant, butthreatened liberals move toward supporting theconservative leader. Two survey experiments providedno support for the emotion-based “rally ’round theflag” model, but they lent support for the reactiveliberal model in explaining the impact on Japanesepublic opinion. However, the second experimentindicated that priming with an image of the primeminister that highlights his role as the supremecommander of the national defense forces completelyeliminated the gain in approval rates amongliberals.
