Japan Delays Plan to Increase the Number of Women in Leadership Roles

Japan’s plan to increase the number of women in leadership roles to 30% this year has been delayed to 2030 because of a failure to make their deadline. The plan is part of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s campaign to empower women and diversify the workforce by expanding their roles in the economy and politics, referred to as “womenomics.” 

Vice-chair of Goldman Sachs Japan Kathy Matsui came up with the term, which is defined as a strategy to reignite Japan’s economy by boosting women’s roles in the workplace. In 2018, she told the Japan Times more has to be done to encourage companies to promote women into leadership roles and acknowledge gender inequality in the workplace as women are hired in temporary roles for less pay.

Currently, only 15% of women hold senior and leadership roles in the country. The Prime Minister’s own cabinet, which is made up of 19 members, only has two female ministers and less than 10% of female lawmakers in Parliament’s lower house. 

The Realist Woman’s take:

I think this campaign to boost women into leadership roles is great but without some kind of mandate to make this happen, the timeline was unrealistic. It was never going to happen by 2020 because Japan, like most countries in this world, is a deeply conservative and patriarchal society, and this kind of change is going to take time. Men in this society would have to value women and their contributions to the workforce. 

It’s interesting because while women are undervalued in this society, the answer to their economic growth is women. Women taking on leadership roles is key to Japan’s growth strategy. Women have always been capable of leadership roles and have always been valuable, but it takes a country’s concerns about its economic future to realize that.