Mixed messages

On Wednesday, September 3, the Japanese Prime Minister announced his first government reshuffle, changing two-thirds of his cabinet and more than doubling the number of female ministers. The previous cabinet, dissolved earlier in the day, was the longest-serving cabinet in post-WWII Japan.

The changes come after PM Shinzo Abe's popularity dropped in polls from a 70 percent high last year to some 50 percent this year, a figure that is still well above the average for Japanese prime ministers. The timing is also set to coincide with a new push of his "Abenomics" plan and before the Japanese parliament – the Diet – session restarts.

Yuki Tatsumi, senior associate in the East Asia program at the Stimson Center in Washington, says the reshuffle offers an opportunity to as many Diet members as possible to serve in key positions in government while the ruling party remains in power.

On a smaller level, it is also a chance to prepare for the upcoming session and some difficult decisions ahead, Tatsumi says. For that, she says, a woman has been chosen. "Yuko Obuchi, the new Minister for Economy, Trade and Industry, is expected to be a public face for his government to reassure public about the safety of atomic power plants that will resume operation after a long freeze on nuclear power generation following the Fukushima accident."

Obuchi is the daughter of former PM Keizo Obuchi, and her appointment falls in line with Abe's Liberal Democratic Party's (LDP) practice of oppointing people from political families. There are other factors to Obuchi's choice: "Obuchi is a woman and a mother of a small child. Abe probably calculated that the Japanese people will find the government's explanation for restarting nuclear operations more credible if it comes from the cabinet minister they can relate to, such as her," says Tatsumi.

Mixed message on women

Obuchi holds one of the two main ministries given to the five women in Abe's new cabinet, says Kristin Surak, a Japan expert at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London. She points out that "while the key cabinet posts are still held by men, two women have taken on influential roles: the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, and the Ministry of Justice," which is now overseen by Midori Matsushima.

The other three ministries given to women – which Surak says are "soft" - are Internal Affairs and Communication, held by Sanae Takaichi; Abduction Issues, National Public Safety and Disaster Prevention, given to Eriko Yamatami; and Measures for Women's Active Participation, Declining Birthrate, given to Haruko Arimura.

The last appointment is not without controversy, however. Arimura, is known for her conservative stance on women's issues, says Surak: she opposes female succession within the imperial family and is a member of a policy group that opposes wives and husbands having different surnames. Surak says Arimura is a "safe" selection when it comes to promoting women's issues, given that the LDP is a conservative party. But the opposition has criticized the choice, with many calling it a contradiction in terms.

A woman's world

Women in Japan lead conservative lives: most are expected to be stay-at-home wives and mothers. These expectations continue to be present in the younger generations. In a poll conducted in July by the Meiji Yasuda Institute of Life and Wellness, 40 percent of 20 to 40 year-olds - men and women - said that they believed women should stay at home while their husbands work full time. In the survey, more women (43 percent) held this view than men (39.3 percent).

The women's labor force participation rate is low, says Surak: only about 60 percent of women work. Women hold about 75 percent of all temporary and part-time jobs with low pay and few benefits, the academic adds.

Despite this, part-time is a rapidly growing segment of the Japanese labor market, accounting for about a third of all jobs. Surak adds that the current legislation also keeps women in these jobs: the tax and the pension systems create incentives for married women to stay in part-time work. "Families receive a substantial tax benefit, as well as pension benefits, if a spouse earns less than 10,000 USD per year," Surak says, adding that the difficulty in finding childcare in the east Asian nation probably doesn't really help either.

'Womenomics'

The Prime Minister wants to see this change: in a speech to female executives in the Women in Business Summit in Tokyo this May, he said "Abenomics won't succeed without 'womenomics,'" seeing women as an integral part of the "third arrow" of the administration's economic plan.

For that, he is pushing to have 30 percent of women in leadership positions by 2020 – something that has warranted criticism from the business sector, with the likes of Goldman Sachs Japan already stating that they will not be able to meet the target for lack of suitable candidates. Tatsumi goes further, saying that the Prime Minister's specific policy initiatives in this area are "rather devoid of reality, and do not reflect the needs of the working women." Rather than emphasizing the number of women in his cabinet, he should focus more on the substance of his policies, she says.

Even if the policy goals are unrealistic, the PM's math is right, according to Takeo Hoshi, Senior Fellow in Japanese Studies at Stanford University in California. The inclusion of women in the job market can make a "big difference and it can increase the potential growth rate of the Japanese economy significantly," the economist says. Aging and population decline, which he calls the "big problem of Japan," can be fought with higher productivity and more workers, Hoshi says. "Relying on women to work more is an excellent idea because the Japanese economy has underutilized women's talents in the past," he adds.