This article questions how NHK presented its opinion poll showing a two-point decline in approval for the Abe administration while LDP support rose 3.3 points to 35.5 percent and Constitutional Democratic Party support fell 0.7 points to 4.2 percent. It also examines NHK’s reporting on COVID-19, China, and the arrests of pro-democracy figures in Hong Kong.

August 11, 2020
Between two exciting Pacific League baseball broadcasts, I watched NHK’s News 7 and News Watch 9.
I had long had serious questions about the way NHK conducted and presented its opinion polls.
On this particular day, the issue seemed especially clear to me.
A two-point decline in approval for the Abe administration was prominently reported.
Yet the same survey showed that support for the Liberal Democratic Party had risen by 3.3 percentage points to 35.5 percent.
Support for the Constitutional Democratic Party, then the largest opposition party, had fallen by 0.7 points to 4.2 percent.
I regarded those figures as politically significant.
Yet they did not appear to receive the same degree of headline emphasis as the fall in cabinet approval.
This raised a broader question about editorial selection.
An opinion poll is not simply a collection of numbers.
Which number becomes the headline?
Which figure is repeated?
Which result is treated as secondary?
Those editorial decisions influence how viewers understand the political landscape.
At the time, I also believed that sustained criticism of the Abe administration by major media organizations, including the Asahi Shimbun and NHK, had to be considered when discussing public approval.
It cannot be proved that a decline in approval was simply caused by media coverage.
But neither is it reasonable to assume that years of repeated editorial emphasis have no effect at all on public opinion.
【Questions About COVID-19 Coverage】
I had similar concerns about reporting on COVID-19.
Daily case counts received enormous attention.
But I felt that other information necessary for judging the actual level of risk received less emphasis.
Where were clusters occurring?
How many patients were severely ill?
How many cases were asymptomatic or mild?
How many tests were being conducted?
How did case counts relate to deaths?
A single headline number cannot provide a complete picture of an epidemic.
COVID-19 was a serious disease.
Precisely for that reason, journalists should explain what the numbers mean rather than merely using the numbers to generate alarm.
【Was China Subjected to Sufficient Scrutiny?】
From the early phase of the pandemic, I also felt that NHK had shown insufficient willingness to scrutinize the Chinese government.
The first major outbreak had occurred in Wuhan.
China’s initial response, information disclosure, and communication with the international community therefore required rigorous examination.
Yet when the Trump administration intensified its criticism of Beijing, I repeatedly heard explanations suggesting that the criticism was driven by the approaching U.S. presidential election.
Electoral politics could certainly have been one relevant factor.
But that question was separate from whether China’s early handling of the outbreak deserved investigation in its own right.
As a succession of senior U.S. officials later adopted increasingly explicit and structural criticism of Chinese policy, I believed it became difficult to explain the entire shift merely as election politics.
【Hong Kong and the Arrest of Agnes Chow】
Then there was Hong Kong.
In August 2020, pro-democracy activist Agnes Chow was arrested.
Media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai and others were also detained.
I did not feel that NHK responded with sufficient clarity in identifying and scrutinizing the Chinese political authorities responsible for the legal framework under which these events were taking place.
Guests and presenters spoke of the importance of “continuing to raise our voices.”
But I believed the crucial question was:
Raise our voices to whom?
If one discusses Hong Kong’s National Security Law without clearly identifying the political authority that imposed the framework, the central source of the problem can become blurred.
That troubled me.
When criticizing the Japanese government, the subject is usually explicit.
If language becomes more vague when the Chinese government is involved, that difference itself deserves explanation.
【Opinion Polls Are Also Editorial Choices】
My central concern that evening returned to the poll itself.
A two-point fall in approval for the Abe administration was newsworthy.
But so was a 3.3-point rise in LDP support to 35.5 percent.
And so was a 0.7-point fall in support for the Constitutional Democratic Party to 4.2 percent.
If one set of figures is highlighted while another significant movement is treated much more quietly, viewers receive a different picture of political reality.
News organizations have editorial discretion.
But editorial discretion cannot mean reshaping reality according to a preferred political narrative.
What was emphasized?
What was minimized?
Why?
News organizations should continually ask themselves those questions.
Watching NHK’s reporting on August 11, 2020, I felt the need for that scrutiny more strongly than ever.