Morihiro Hosokawa

Successive bribery scandals, Recruit and Sagawa Kyubin among them, ended 38 years of Liberal Democratic rule in 1993, and Hosokawa led the eight-party coalition that replaced it. His 1994 political reform laws replaced multi-member constituencies with a mix of single seats and proportional lists, introduced public funding for parties and tightened rules on corporate donations. They remain the basis of Japanese elections. He resigned within a year over a loan scandal of his own, which shows how hard the repair was.