TOKYO: A stunning election win by Japan's Democratic Party (DPJ) may not yield radical policy changes but could revolutionize how the country is governed - if the new leaders bring elite bureaucrats to heel.

Yukio Hatoyama's Democrats made curbing the clout of bureaucrats a key plank in their platform for Sunday's election, when they trounced the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) that had ruled Japan for most of the past half-century.

They also want to focus spending directly on individual households rather than the industry groups and other special interest blocs that traditionally benefited from LDP largess.