Yukio Hatoyama in the context of "Yoshihiko Noda"

General elections were held in Japan on August 30, 2009 to elect the 480 members of the House of Representatives. The opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) defeated the ruling coalition – Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and New Komeito Party – in a landslide, winning 221 of the 300 constituency seats and receiving 42.4% of the proportional block votes for another 87 seats, a total of 308 seats to only 119 for the LDP (64 constituency seats and 26.7% of the proportional vote).

Under the Constitution of Japan, this result virtually assured DPJ leader Yukio Hatoyama would be the next prime minister of Japan. He was formally named to the post on September 16, 2009. Prime Minister Tarō Asō conceded late on the night of August 30, 2009, that the LDP had lost control of the government, and announced his resignation as party president. A leadership election was held on September 28, 2009.

Naoto Kan (菅 直人, Kan Naoto; born 10 October 1946) is a Japanese former politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan and President of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) from June 2010 to September 2011.

Kan was the first Prime Minister since the resignation of Junichiro Koizumi in 2006 to serve for more than one year, with his predecessors Yukio Hatoyama, Tarō Asō, Yasuo Fukuda, and Shinzo Abe either resigning prematurely or losing an election. On 26 August 2011, Kan announced his resignation. Yoshihiko Noda was elected as his successor.

Kazuo Hatoyama (鳩山 和夫, Hatoyama Kazuo; 6 May 1856 – 3 October 1911) was a Japanese lawyer and politician who served as Speaker of the House of Representatives from 1896 to 1897. He was the patriarch of the prominent Hatoyama family, father of Prime Minister Ichiro Hatoyama, great-grandfather of Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.