Who’s Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s first feminine high minister? : NPR by means of NewsFlicks

Japan’s new high minister, Sanae Takaichi has labored in politics since 1993 and spent a few years within the past due Shinzo Abe’s management.

Kim Kyung-Hoon/Pool/Getty Photographs

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Kim Kyung-Hoon/Pool/Getty Photographs

Japan’s first-ever feminine high minister, Sanae Takaichi, is an ultraconservative with a conventional view of gender roles and a penchant for heavy steel tune.

Japan’s parliament elected Takaichi on Tuesday, a number of weeks after she was once selected to steer the conservative Liberal Democratic Birthday party (LDP), which has spent a lot of the ultimate seven a long time in energy. The LDP is noticed as moving additional to the precise: It was once solely ready to elect Takaichi by means of forming an alliance with a right-wing populist celebration, after dropping its longtime coalition spouse previous this month.

Takaichi, 64, is “probably the most conservative folks in Japan’s conservative LDP,” explains Jeffrey Corridor, a lecturer at Kanda College of Global Research in Japan.

She has advocated for more difficult immigration restrictions and embraced hawkish insurance policies on China. She has drawn comparisons to the past due British High Minister Margaret Thatcher, for whom she has often expressed her admiration and regularly wears blue fits in tribute.

However she additionally performed drums in a band in school, cites Deep Red and Iron Maiden as a few of her favourite bands, as soon as belted a rock anthem on nationwide TV and looks to deal with a robust affinity for bikes and vehicles.

“The ones are a part of the nature this is promoted by means of her, that [she is] extra than simply the sturdy Iron Woman, but in addition anyone who could have some a laugh,” Corridor says.

Here is what else to find out about Japan’s new chief.

Sanae Takaichi bows as she was once elected Japan’s new high minister all the way through a parliament consultation in Tokyo on Tuesday.

Eugene Hoshiko/AP

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Eugene Hoshiko/AP

1. She is not from a political circle of relatives

Takaichi was once born and raised within the central Eastern prefecture of Nara. Her dad labored for an car company, whilst her mother labored for the native police division.

“Not like maximum or lots of the politicians in her celebration who was high ministers, she got here from fairly modest manner,” Corridor says. “However she did find out about very tough when she was once younger, and she or he handed the doorway tests for some very elite personal universities in Japan.”

However he mentioned Takaichi’s oldsters refused to pay for her tuition to an elite college, who prefer that she attend a two-year school to save cash and reside nearer to house. She ended up attending Kobe College, a prestigious nationwide college, paying her personal manner via part-time jobs and making the six-hour round-trip go back and forth from her oldsters’ area.

In 1987, Takaichi moved to the U.S. to paintings as a congressional fellow within the administrative center of Rep. Pat Schroeder, a Democrat from Colorado — regardless of her personal conservative leanings, Corridor notes. After returning to Japan, she was once ready to marketplace herself as a professional in world politics and protected a role as a tv presenter.

“And from there, she segued clear of being a TV persona into a political candidate, which is a commonplace trail in Japan,” Corridor says. “If you are well-known on TV, you might have a lovely excellent probability of profitable elections.”

2. She’s spent a long time in politics 

Takaichi was once first elected to parliament in 1993, representing her fatherland of Nara as an unbiased.

She joined the LDP 3 years later and went directly to serve in a variety of key govt positions, together with minister of monetary safety.

Significantly, she served because the minister of world communications — which is accountable for telecommunications coverage and broadcast media rules — underneath the past due High Minister Shinzo Abe, from 2014 to 2017 and once more from 2019 to 2020.

“She served in that, I believe, longer than some other baby-kisser has ever served, since the Abe management was once an excessively lengthy management and he valued her competency,” Corridor says.

Abe was once Japan’s longest-serving high minister, keeping administrative center from 2006 to 2007 and 2012 to 2020, sooner than his assassination in 2022. He was once identified for his efforts to revitalize Japan’s economic system — nicknamed “Abenomics” — and rebuild its position at the international degree.

Takaichi “without a doubt depicts herself because the successor to Abe’s conservative legacy,” Corridor says, noting that she did get his endorsement within the celebration’s 2021 management election.

“I am not certain how shut buddies they had been, however they without a doubt had been at the identical web page ideologically when it got here to problems like China and the revisionist view of Global Struggle II that lots of the ultra-conservatives in Japan have,” he mentioned.

Takaichi appears on as incoming High Minister Shinzo Abe speaks to the media in Tokyo in 2012.

Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP by way of Getty Photographs

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Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP by way of Getty Photographs

3. Her perspectives have led to controversy

Takaichi subscribes to fashionable financial principle, “which says that you’ll be able to interact in deficit spending on necessary such things as protection and different portions of the finances,” Corridor says.

Whilst she isn’t as historically fiscally conservative as others in her celebration, he says, she is very conservative on social problems. For example, she needs to create methods to advertise having kids and does not suppose ladies will have to be allowed to stay their maiden names after marriage (although she has used hers in skilled and public existence).

She additionally has what Corridor describes as hardline perspectives on Japan’s WWII historical past. In remarks over time, she has downplayed Japan’s aggression all the way through the battle and criticized the battle crimes trials that the Allies held in a while to convict Japan’s wartime leaders.

Takaichi could also be identified to often seek advice from the arguable Yasukuni Shrine, the place the convicted battle criminals are buried and glorified. However she noticeably abstained from visiting all the way through ultimate week’s autumn pageant, sending a ritual providing as an alternative.

Takaichi has additionally courted controversy together with her disdain for immigrants or even vacationers, a unexpectedly rising trade in Japan. Whilst campaigning, she cited unconfirmed stories of holiday makers kicking sacred deer in Nara Park, a part of a bigger complaint of tourism that many noticed as xenophobic.

“It additionally ties right into a basic dislike of international folks and likewise immigrants who reside within the nation,” Corridor says.

She has advocated for an anti-espionage legislation, suggesting that Chinese language citizens of Japan might be possible spies for China’s govt. All the way through her marketing campaign, she referred to as for restrictions on non-Eastern folks purchasing belongings in Japan and a crackdown on unlawful immigration.

“People who find themselves very anti-immigration are kind of smiling on her turning into high minister, anticipating that she’s going to do something positive about it,” Corridor says, including he thinks this is not going on account of drive from Eastern companies who depend on immigration within the face of important exertions shortages.

4. She’s now not essentially a feminist 

Takaichi holds a notable position within the historical past books as the primary feminine high minister of a rustic the place ladies solely held about 10% of seats in parliament as of 2024.

Japan, the sector’s fourth greatest economic system, ranked 118th out of 148 nations when it comes to gender equality — the bottom of any Staff of Seven country — in step with the Global Financial Discussion board (WEF)’s 2025 International Gender Hole Document.

Alternatively, Takaichi seems not going to prioritize problems with gender equality. She has lengthy advocated for standard gender roles, opposes same-sex marriage and helps male-only succession to the Eastern throne.

“This isn’t going to be a length when ladies’s equality or different gender problems are aggressively complicated,” Corridor says. “However there may be, I suppose, some receive advantages to having a girl because the chief of your nation, to turn … younger ladies that someday they might develop into high minister, too.”

Takaichi has spoken about ladies’s rights, in particular advocating for the growth of sanatorium products and services for girls’s well being and opening up about her personal struggles with menopause signs.

Takaichi has additionally spoken about her struggles to conceive; She has no organic kids, however is a stepmother to 3 youngsters — and grandmother to 4 — from her husband’s earlier marriage. (She is married to former member of parliament and fellow LDP member Taku Yamamoto, who legally took her ultimate identify, a relative rarity in Japan.)

Takaichi had promised at the marketing campaign path to extend the selection of ladies in her cupboard to “Nordic ranges,” or nearer to 50%. However within the hours after taking administrative center, she appointed solely two.

Japan’s High Minister Sanae Takaichi poses together with her new cupboard individuals on the high minister’s administrative center in Tokyo on Tuesday. She appointed two feminine cupboard individuals, regardless of her marketing campaign guarantees to carry their illustration to “Nordic ranges.”

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Kiyoshi Ota/Pool Bloomberg

Corridor says Takaichi has needed to be extra conservative than her male colleagues with a purpose to take the helm of the celebration. Whilst she and her position type Margaret Thatcher fluctuate of their approaches to fiscal coverage, he says each are conservative, hawkish and “don’t need to be noticed as vulnerable.”

“She possibly, in some way, has modeled her upward push on Margaret Thatcher by means of being this very sturdy determine, regardless of coming [up] in a celebration of very conservative males who usually don’t advertise ladies to the absolute best positions,” he provides.

5. She seems pleasant towards Trump

Takaichi has indicated a friendliness towards President Trump, who referred to as her “a extremely revered particular person of significant knowledge and power” in a social media submit previous this month congratulating her on her upward push to celebration management and her anticipated ascension to high minister.

She replied with a submit of her personal, writing in each English and Eastern that she is “in reality hoping to paintings along side President Trump to make our alliance even more potent & extra wealthy, and to advance a Loose and Open Indo-Pacific.”

Corridor says Trump most probably has a excellent first impact of Takaichi already, on account of her popularity as an “anti-immigration, hard-line conservative who’s a respecter of his past due buddy Shinzo Abe.”

Abe was once some of the first international leaders to domesticate a dating with Trump all the way through his first time period. The two was buddies as they bonded over wagyu red meat burgers, sumo wrestling and golfing.

Trump is anticipated to fulfill Takaichi on a seek advice from to Japan later this month. Corridor predicts she’s going to practice the similar playbook as her predecessors:

“You be as great as conceivable to the president, you display him the utmost appreciate, you do not need public disagreements with him,” he says. “And whilst you do disagree over coverage, you do it in an excessively refined manner that does not look like you are telling the president he is flawed.”