Okada was appointed on July 8, 1934, after his predecessor Saitō Makoto had resigned over the Teijin Incident. Okada's appointment dashed hopes for a revival of political party influence. His cabinet was the second "national unity cabinet" (kyokoku itchi naikaku) after the Saitō Cabinet that had marked the end of the party rule of the 1920s and early 1930s, which was the so-called Taishō Democracy. Key ministers came from the bureaucracy and the military, and other posts were held by politicians mostly from the minority Minseitō and the Shōwakai, a militarist breakaway group from the majority Seiyūkai that had refused to let its members join the Okada Cabinet.

After the attempted coup d'état in the February 26 Incident in 1936, the Okada Cabinet resigned. Following Genrō Kinmochi Saionji's recommendation, the emperor appointed foreign minister Hirota Kōki as successor leading to the formation of the Hirota Cabinet, another "national unity cabinet".

• Kantei, Japanese Cabinet: Okada Cabinet (in Japanese)
• National Diet Library: Modern Japan in Archives, Crisis in Constitutional Politics