Yukio Hatoyama, the outgoing Japanese prime minister, quit earlier this week amid plummeting popularity ratings after he failed to deliver on a campaign promise to relocate a controversial US military base off the island of Okinawa.

The issue was at the centre of his election campaign last year and has been seen as responsible for his landslide victory.

He had been in office for barely eight months.

Inside Story asks if his resignation reflects growing political instability in Japan.

Presenter Hashem Ahelbarra is joined by: Tomohiko Taniguchi, a political analyst and professor at Keio University; Sheila Smith, a senior fellow for Japan Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations; Sean Curtin, a research fellow at the Japanese Institute of Global Communications.

This episode of Inside Story aired from Thursday, June 3, 2010.