Women in Social Movements in Japan : A study on women's changing roles and strategies in political participation since the 1970s

Abstract

Women in different regions of the world, have been seeking equal political opportunities where they can represent themselves by being involved directly in the decision-making process. Regardless of the strenuous efforts of the United Nations and many feminist organizations all over the world to provide women with more opportunities in politics, women are still grossly under-represented due to religious, cultural and societal reasons. Japan is not an exception, for, regardless of its technological development, Japan is still lagging behind not only the industrial democratic countries but the developing countries as well. The progress in achieving political equality for women in Japan has been very slow and even women who managed to acquire political positions were given peripheral roles. This raises the question of why women are still politically marginalized from participating in politics in an industrially developed country like Japan. This study is, therefore, an attempt to unravel the major reasons behind women’s political under-representation in politics in Japan. The study puts forward gender stereotypes, political culture and government recruiting policies as the main reasons behind women’s political under-representation. The first one is deeply entrenched in the structure of the Japanese patriarchal society, confining women’s roles within the framework of childrearing and household work. The second one is causally related to the first as, because of the surviving cultural stereotypes, women are still facing political marginalization because politics is considered as a male domain. As a result, even women who are in legislative positions are not able to shatter the glass ceiling of male dominance over political culture because their involvement in politics is still widely considered as a sort of tokenism rather than an actual representation. The third one is the recruiting policies of the government and political parties of female politicians based on their popularity rather than their qualifications and eagerness to act for women. Therefore, targeting the critical mass or descriptive representation of women in politics by following the same policies does not necessarily mean substantive changes for women in the society.

Keywords: Women, Social Movements, Japan, Legislative