The Women Leading Japan—and the Test Ahead

It’s unusual for a country to have both a female head of government and a woman in the key cabinet post of finance minister, simultaneously. Famously, there was Finland, when former Prime Minister Sanna Marin installed an all-female cabinet after she was elected in 2019 at the age of 34. And there’s been some noteworthy examples in Australia, Estonia and Honduras. But few other countries have had two women in such powerful positions at the same time, and it’s never happened in a Group of Seven nation — until current-day Japan.

But if there was some stereotype of what female leadership should look like, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama don’t fit neatly into that mold. Takaichi, the 65-year-old leader of the Liberal Democratic Party who took office in October, holds traditional values around family and gender (she opposes both legalizing same-sex marriage and having separate surnames for married couples). She also supports rebuilding Japan’s military after a period of post-World War II pacifism and wants Japan to play a stronger role in global politics (her cabinet has approved lethal weapons exports for the first time since the 1940s). And she’s pledged to stimulate growth through subsidies and investment.