Kyōto 3rd district is a constituency of the House of Representatives

House of Representatives of Japan

The is the lower house of the Diet of Japan. The House of Councillors of Japan is the upper house.The House of Representatives has 480 members, elected for a four-year term. Of these, 180 members are elected from 11 multi-member constituencies by a party-list system of proportional representation,...

 in the Diet of Japan

Diet of Japan

The is Japan's bicameral legislature. It is composed of a lower house, called the House of Representatives, and an upper house, called the House of Councillors. Both houses of the Diet are directly elected under a parallel voting system. In addition to passing laws, the Diet is formally...

. It is located in South central Kyoto

Kyoto Prefecture

is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of the island of Honshu. The capital is the city of Kyoto.- History :Until the Meiji Restoration, the area of Kyoto prefecture was known as Yamashiro....

 and consists of Kyoto city's Fushimi ward

Fushimi-ku, Kyoto

is one of the eleven wards in the city of Kyoto, in Kyoto Prefecture, Japan. Famous places in Fushimi include the Fushimi Inari Shrine, with thousands of torii lining the paths up and down a mountain; Fushimi Castle, originally built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, with its rebuilt towers and gold-lined...

, the cities of Mukō

Muko, Kyoto

is a city located in Kyoto, Japan.As of 2008, the city had an estimated population of 55,031 and the density of 6,977.57 persons per km². The total area is 7.67 km².The city was founded on October 1, 1972...

 and Nagaokakyō

Nagaokakyo, Kyoto

is a city located in Kyoto, Japan.As of 2008, the city has an estimated population of 79,306 and the density of 4,070.96 persons per km². The total area is 19.18 km²....

 and the town of Ōyamazaki

Oyamazaki, Kyoto

is a town located in Otokuni District, Kyoto, Japan.As of April 1, 2008, the town has an estimated population of 15,203 and a density of 2,527 persons per km²...

. As of 2009, 346,362 eligible voters were registered in the district.

Before the electoral reform of 1994, the area formed part of Kyōto 2nd district

Kyoto 2nd district (1947–1993)

Kyōto 2nd district was a multi-member constituency of the House of Representatives in the Diet of Japan. Between 1947 and 1993 it elected five Representatives by single non-transferable vote...

 where five Representatives had been elected by single non-transferable vote

Single non-transferable vote

The single non-transferable vote or SNTV is an electoral system used in multi-member constituency elections.- Voting :In any election, each voter casts one vote for one candidate in a multi-candidate race for multiple offices. Posts are filled by the candidates with the most votes...

 (SNTV).

Kyoto had been a traditional stronghold of the Japanese Communist Party

Japanese Communist Party

The Japanese Communist Party is a left-wing political party in Japan.The JCP advocates the establishment of a society based on socialism, democracy and peace, and opposition to militarism...

 (JCP); but following the electoral reform that replaced the SNTV multi-member districts with FPTP single-member districts, the 3rd district was the only one in Kyōto the JCP could win: Iwao Teramae was one of only two JCP candidates countrywide to win a district seat under the new system in the 1996 general election (the other being Kenjirō Yamahara in Kōchi 1st district). After Teramae's retirement in the 2000 election, Liberal Democrat Shigehiko Okuyama who had narrowly lost to Teramae in ’96 won the district in 2000 when the center-left to left vote was split between a Communist, a Social Democrat and a Democrat. In following elections, the Social Democratic Party did not nominate a candidate and the Communist vote share dropped below 20 percent and since 2003, Democrat Kenta Izumi

Kenta Izumi

is a Japanese politician of the Democratic Party of Japan, a member of the House of Representatives in the Diet . A native of Sapporo and graduate of Ritsumeikan University, he was elected to the House of Representatives for the first time in 2003 after an unsuccessful run in 2000.- External links...

 won the 3rd district three times.

List of Representatives

Representative	Party		Dates	Notes
Iwao Teramae		JCP Japanese Communist Party The Japanese Communist Party is a left-wing political party in Japan.The JCP advocates the establishment of a society based on socialism, democracy and peace, and opposition to militarism...	1996 – 2000	Retired from politics in 2000
Shigehiko Okuyama		LDP Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) The , frequently abbreviated to LDP or , is a centre-right political party in Japan. It is one of the most consistently successful political parties in the democratic world. The LDP ruled almost continuously for nearly 54 years from its founding in 1955 until its defeat in the 2009 election...	2000 – 2003	Failed reelection in the Kinki PR block
Kenta Izumi Kenta Izumi is a Japanese politician of the Democratic Party of Japan, a member of the House of Representatives in the Diet . A native of Sapporo and graduate of Ritsumeikan University, he was elected to the House of Representatives for the first time in 2003 after an unsuccessful run in 2000.- External links...		DPJ Democratic Party of Japan The is a political party in Japan founded in 1998 by the merger of several opposition parties. Its socially liberal platform is generally considered center-left in the Japanese political spectrum...	2003 –	Incumbent

Election results