Womanhood in Japan (June 2023)

“Womanhood in Japan” series column rounds up Japanese news related to women’s daily experiences of sexism here and considers what we can do to increase the pace of change.

Japan falls further on Global Gender Gap Index

On June 20, the World Economic Forum released its Global Gender Gap Index for 2023 showing that Japan fell nine places from last year to 125 out of 146 countries. This second consecutive year of decline in the ranking puts Japan at its lowest reading ever. While Japan did well in the education and health subindexes (47 and 59 respectively), for political empowerment, it was just eight places from the bottom, at 138. The report notes that currently just 10% of parliamentary positions and 8.3% of ministerial positions in Japan are held by women.

In economic participation and opportunity, which looks at workforce participation, wage equality and income, Japan was 123th. Within the region of East Asia and the Pacific, it ranked last overall, at 19.

It seems that Japan’s continued dismal performances in rankings like these are having some effect. This month, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party compiled a plan to boost the ratio of its female lawmakers to 30% from the current 11.8%. And the government released a policy draft that will ask the Tokyo Stock Exchange to revise its rules by the end of this year to require companies listed on its leading Prime Market to have at least one woman in an executive position by around 2025, and women in at least 30% of executive positions by 2030.

We know that external pressure can be effective in provoking change in Japan: the nation, and its people, generally care about how they are seen. This may be a dynamic that we can also apply on a smaller scale than a national one. For example, if companies competing with the one you work at give their employees benefits that yours doesn’t – like some kind of childcare assistance or menstruation allowance – pointing out your employers’ laggard status could help trigger change.

Investors push companies to add female directors

Investors, too, are increasingly pushing Japanese companies to add women to their boards to help them better manage an increasingly fluid and diverse society.

“If there are no women at board level, the approval rating for proposals to elect top management tends to drop (at general shareholders’ meetings),” Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corp.’s Miki Akasaka told the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper. The article gives the example of Canon Inc.’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Fujio Mitarai receiving just 50% approval from attendees at the firm’s annual general shareholders’ meeting for his reappointment in March.

It also says that Daiwa Asset Management Co., an institutional investment trust management company, recently set rules requiring at least one female board member on Prime Market-listed firms for it to invest in them.

So, there are ways in which we can influence companies’ actions in terms of gender equality. Money talks, right? So, become invested – in both companies and the cause.

Women in their 40s and older feel less valued at work

The Tokyo Shimbun newspaper this month reported survey results that reflect the different experiences in the workplace between women and men in their 40s and beyond.

A survey of 66,000 men and women conducted by corporate services company Lafool nationwide throughout 2021 found that a gap emerged between the sexes from their 40s onward in the three areas of receiving a salary and bonuses commensurate with one’s work; receiving an appropriate evaluation from one’s manager; and the sense that each employee is respected as a member of the workplace regardless of whether they work part-time, fulltime or casual. Needless to say, the figures were lower for women than for men. Women are more likely than men to work in a non-fulltime capacity, of course, most often due to childcare issues.

A striking comment from the survey was from a woman in her late 30s who said, “For the six years that I worked reduced hours due to childrearing I met my numerical targets by 120%, but that wasn’t reflected in my pay and my rise to managerial status was delayed.” Even after returning to fulltime work, the pay gap compared to her male colleagues never closed.

The article says that woman is now pushing her company to ensure that other men and women who take childcare leave or work reduced hours are not disadvantaged like she was. This is something we can all do. Especially if we are able to speak from experience, advocating for change and for others can be very effective. Particularly in Japan, where advocating for oneself is often viewed negatively as seeking special treatment, advocating for others is easier to do.

Japan to allow prescription-free morning-after-pill on trial basis

In late June Japanese media reported that the health ministry plans to allow over-the-counter sales of emergency contraceptives on a trial basis as early as this summer. Currently a doctor’s prescription is required to get the medication.

Despite overwhelming public support for such easier access to the drug, broadcaster NHK reports that “critics are concerned it could encourage irresponsible or abusive use of the drug.” To help the ministry decide whether to actually approve over-the-counter sales of the morning-after-pill, during the trial period, purchasers will be asked to fill out a questionnaire. Which makes you wonder what kind of questions it might contain.

The news came just a few days after a court case in Osaka heard a 33-year-old woman on charges of abandoning her newborn baby tell the court that it was the 12th time she had given birth. Those occasions included miscarriages, but the babies that were born healthy were put into institutional care, she said, according to reports. The woman works in the sex industry and has no fixed address.

It’s a very sad story of an unloved child growing up to be an adult unsuccessfully seeking love, but, as we saw in April abandonment of newborns is a longstanding problem in Japan. For the government to be so slow with considering making the morning-after-pill available OTC is unconscionable.

In response to the court case, on Twitter, young business man and media personality Yūta Misaki received praise for pointing out the role of the men who made those pregnancies happen, saying that men who don’t take responsibility for these actions are also guilty.

“It’s not right that it’s only women who bear the responsibility of pregnancy and birth,” he wrote.

Perhaps this is an age-old discussion that, short of compiling a gene registry of the male population (as one user on Twitter responded), may never be resolved, but the government needs to do more to empower women. That is especially true for women like the one currently in court, who only graduated from junior high school. Training programs aimed at that demographic would make a difference very quickly.

In the meantime, using social media to express a broader view on public issues – rather than just blaming the people caught up in them – can help shape public understanding. When online, be prudent, be kind.