Techno-optimist Japanese political party founded and led by Anno Takahiro, a software engineer and AI entrepreneur who wrote the prize-winning sci-fi story "Continuous Integration" (2019). Its platform centres on AI, robotics and self-driving vehicles. It is one of several new parties that have fragmented Japanese politics beyond the traditional LDP-versus-left axis; of ten main parties contesting the February 2026 election, only three existed before 2012.
Mirai won one upper-house seat after Anno's 2024 run for Tokyo governor (he finished fifth), and picked up 11 lower-house seats earlier in 2026. The average age of its candidates was 40, against 55 for the typical lower-house member. The ruling LDP holds 316 lower-house seats. Mirai was the only party to oppose cutting the consumption tax. Anno calls himself "neither right nor left" and draws inspiration from Audrey Tang, Taiwan's pioneering former digital minister. The party runs a "broad listening" effort that funnels social-media followers into an AI-based interview platform and uses AI to analyse the results.
Everything is worth precisely as much as a belch, the difference being that a belch is more satisfying.