a292  1955  01 Jan 90
AM-Japan-US-Soviet,0484
Poll Says 51 Percent of Soviets Prefer Capitalism
    TOKYO (AP) - A newspaper reported Monday that more than half the
Soviet citizens who responded to a recent Japanese poll said they
preferred capitalism to socialism, and America ranked first among
their favorite foreign nations.
    The poll was conducted simultaneously in the Soviet Union, the
United States and Japan. It compared opinions in the three nations on
a range of issues, the newspaper Mainichi Shimbun said.
    According to the poll, 72 percent of Americans, 60 percent of Soviet
citizens and 41 percent of Japanese said they supported their
government.
    The government in Japan imposed a new sales tax last April and was
hit by bribery and sex scandals the past year.
    Americans also expressed the most happiness with their present
lifestyles, with 92 percent saying they were satisfied, compared with
73 percent of Japanese and 26 percent of Soviets, the newspaper said.
    The Soviets were asked if they believed capitalism or socialism was
superior. Fifty-one percent picked capitalism, 32 percent said
socialism and 17 percent said they didn't know, Mainichi Shimbun
reported.
    People polled in each nation were asked their favorite and
least-favorite foreign countries. The most popular nation in Japan
was the United States, favored by 30 percent of respondents, followed
by Switzerland, with 10 percent, and Australia, with 8 percent. The
Soviet Union ranked 10th, with less than 1 percent of positive
replies.
    Among Soviet respondents, the United States also placed first, with
32 percent, followed by Japan with 10.9 percent and Israel with 10.3
percent. The most popular communist nation, China, ranked 10th with 2
percent.
    Eighteen percent of Americans picked Canada as their favorite
foreign country. Next was Britain with 15 percent, with Japan a
distant third at 2 percent.
    The Soviet Union was the least-favorite nation of the Japanese
respondents, with 25 percent of the negative replies, while the
United States tied for third place with 4 percent.
    Afghanistan, where the Soviet Union stationed troops for 10 years,
ranked as the Soviets' most disliked nation with 9.5 percent, while
the largest number of Americans - 16 percent - picked the Soviet
Union.
    Would nuclear war occur in their lifetime? Ten percent of the
Japanese polled thought it would; 14 percent in the United States,
and 16 percent in the Soviet Union, the newspaper said.
    The survey was conducted by telephone from Nov. 28 to Dec. 12 and
included 4,001 Japanese, 3,015 Americans and 2,970 Soviets selected
randomly, the newspaper said. NTT Telemarketing Co. conducted the
polls in the United States and Japan, and those questioned were 20
years or older. The Soviet Sociology Academy's survey center
conducted the survey in the Soviet Union, including both Communist
Party and non-party members who were at least 18 years old.
    The newspaper provide no margin of error.
    
 
AP-NY-01-01-90 2245EST
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