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Japan: Growing Political Gender Gap (blog)

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Japan: Growing Political Gender Gap (blog)

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Three days before South Korea elected a woman president, Japanese voters significantly reduced the number of women in parliament. As a result of Sunday’s vote, the new lower house will have 38 women, or 7.9% of all lawmakers in that chamber. That’s down from 54, or 11.3% in the prior session, and even lower than the 43 elected the time before that in 2005. That ended a steady increase in the number of female MPs in the past three campaigns.

Japan’s low number is “embarrassing as an advanced country,” said Mieko Nakabayashi, a female candidate from the (no longer) ruling Democratic Party of Japan. She was first elected to parliament three years ago from Kanagawa Prefecture. She lost Sunday to a male opponent.

Read more at The Wall Street Journal, published 20 December 2012.

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Three days before South Korea elected a woman president, Japanese voters significantly reduced the number of women in parliament. As a result of Sunday’s vote, the new lower house will have 38 women, or 7.9% of all lawmakers in that chamber. That’s down from 54, or 11.3% in the prior session, and even lower than the 43 elected the time before that in 2005. That ended a steady increase in the number of female MPs in the past three campaigns.

Japan’s low number is “embarrassing as an advanced country,” said Mieko Nakabayashi, a female candidate from the (no longer) ruling Democratic Party of Japan. She was first elected to parliament three years ago from Kanagawa Prefecture. She lost Sunday to a male opponent.

Read more at The Wall Street Journal, published 20 December 2012.

News