5 issues to find out about Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s first feminine prime minister

Japan’s first-ever feminine prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, is an ultraconservative with a standard view of gender roles and a penchant for heavy metallic music.

Japan’s parliament elected Takaichi on Tuesday, a number of weeks after she was chosen to steer the conservative Liberal Democratic Occasion (LDP), which has spent a lot of the final seven many years in energy. The LDP is seen as shifting additional to the suitable: It was solely capable of elect Takaichi by forming an alliance with a right-wing populist occasion, after shedding its longtime coalition companion earlier this month.

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

She has advocated for more durable immigration restrictions and embraced hawkish insurance policies on China. She has drawn comparisons to the late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, for whom she has ceaselessly expressed her admiration and sometimes wears blue fits in tribute.

However she additionally performed drums in a band in faculty, cites Deep Purple and Iron Maiden as a few of her favourite bands, as soon as belted a rock anthem on nationwide TV and seems to take care of a powerful affinity for bikes and vehicles.

“Those are part of the character that is promoted by her, that [she is] more than just the strong Iron Lady, but also somebody who can have some fun,” Corridor says.

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

1. She is not from a political household

Takaichi was born and raised within the central Japanese prefecture of Nara. Her dad labored for an automotive agency, whereas her mother labored for the native police division.

“Unlike most or many of the politicians in her party who became prime ministers, she came from rather modest means,” Corridor says. “But she did study very hard when she was young, and she passed the entrance exams for some very elite private universities in Japan.”

However he mentioned Takaichi’s mother and father refused to pay for her tuition to an elite college, preferring that she attend a two-year faculty to economize and stay nearer to dwelling. She ended up attending Kobe College, a prestigious nationwide college, paying her personal approach via part-time jobs and making the six-hour round-trip commute from her mother and father’ home.

In 1987, Takaichi moved to the U.S. to work as a congressional fellow within the workplace of Rep. Pat Schroeder, a Democrat from Colorado — regardless of her personal conservative leanings, Corridor notes. After returning to Japan, she was capable of market herself as an skilled in worldwide politics and safe a job as a tv presenter.

“And from there, she segued away from being a TV personality into a politician, which is a common path in Japan,” Corridor says. “If you’re famous on TV, you have a pretty good chance of winning elections.”

2. She’s spent many years in politics 

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

She joined the LDP three years later and went on to serve in quite a few key authorities positions, together with minister of financial safety.

Notably, she served because the minister of worldwide communications — which is chargeable for telecommunications coverage and broadcast media laws — underneath the late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, from 2014 to 2017 and once more from 2019 to 2020.

“She served in that, I think, longer than any other politician has ever served, because the Abe administration was a very long administration and he valued her competency,” Corridor says.

Abe was Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, holding workplace from 2006 to 2007 and 2012 to 2020, earlier than his assassination in 2022. He was identified for his efforts to revitalize Japan’s economic system — nicknamed “Abenomics” — and rebuild its function on the worldwide stage.

Takaichi “definitely depicts herself as the successor to Abe’s conservative legacy,” Corridor says, noting that she did get his endorsement within the occasion’s 2021 management election.

“I’m not sure how close friends they were, but they definitely were on the same page ideologically when it came to issues like China and the revisionist view of World War II that many of the ultra-conservatives in Japan have,” he mentioned.

3. Her views have brought about controversy

Takaichi subscribes to trendy financial idea, “which says that you can engage in deficit spending on important things like defense and other parts of the budget,” Corridor says.

Whereas she will not be as historically fiscally conservative as others in her occasion, he says, she is extraordinarily conservative on social points. As an example, she desires to create applications to advertise having youngsters and would not suppose ladies needs to be allowed to maintain their maiden names after marriage (regardless that she has used hers in skilled and public life).

She additionally has what Corridor describes as hardline views on Japan’s WWII historical past. In remarks through the years, she has downplayed Japan’s aggression through the struggle and criticized the struggle crimes trials that the Allies held afterward to convict Japan’s wartime leaders.

Takaichi can also be identified to frequently go to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, the place the convicted struggle criminals are buried and glorified. However she noticeably abstained from visiting throughout final week’s autumn pageant, sending a ritual providing as a substitute.

Takaichi has additionally courted controversy along with her disdain for immigrants and even vacationers, a quickly rising business in Japan. Whereas campaigning, she cited unconfirmed reviews of vacationers kicking sacred deer in Nara Park, half of a bigger criticism of tourism that many noticed as xenophobic.

“It also ties into a general dislike of foreign people and also immigrants who live in the country,” Corridor says.

She has advocated for an anti-espionage legislation, suggesting that Chinese language residents of Japan may very well be potential spies for China’s authorities. Throughout her marketing campaign, she referred to as for restrictions on non-Japanese individuals shopping for property in Japan and a crackdown on unlawful immigration.

“People who are very anti-immigration are sort of smiling on her becoming prime minister, expecting that she will do something about it,” Corridor says, including he thinks that’s unlikely due to strain from Japanese companies who depend on immigration within the face of vital labor shortages.

4. She’s not essentially a feminist 

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

Japan, the world’s fourth largest economic system, ranked 118th out of 148 nations by way of gender equality — the bottom of any Group of Seven nation — in line with the World Financial Discussion board (WEF)’s 2025 International Gender Hole Report.

Nevertheless, Takaichi seems unlikely to prioritize problems with gender equality. She has lengthy advocated for conventional gender roles, opposes same-sex marriage and helps male-only succession to the Japanese throne.

“This is not going to be a period when women’s equality or other gender issues are aggressively advanced,” Corridor says. “But there is, I guess, some benefit to having a woman as the leader of your country, to show … young women that in the future they could become prime minister, too.”

Takaichi has spoken about ladies’s rights, particularly advocating for the growth of hospital companies for ladies’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 youngsters, however is a stepmother to a few 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 final identify, a relative rarity in Japan.)

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

Corridor says Takaichi has needed to be extra conservative than her male colleagues as a way to take the helm of the occasion. Whereas she and her function mannequin Margaret Thatcher differ of their approaches to fiscal coverage, he says each are conservative, hawkish and “do not want to be seen as weak.”

“She maybe, in a way, has modeled her rise on Margaret Thatcher by being this very strong figure, despite coming [up] in a party of very conservative men who generally do not promote women to the highest positions,” he provides.

5. She seems pleasant towards Trump

Takaichi has indicated a friendliness towards President Trump, who referred to as her “a highly respected person of great wisdom and strength” in a social media publish earlier this month congratulating her on her rise to occasion management and her anticipated ascension to prime minister.

She responded with a publish of her personal, writing in each English and Japanese that she is “truly hoping to work together with President Trump to make our alliance even stronger & more prosperous, and to advance a Free and Open Indo-Pacific.”

Corridor says Trump possible has a great first impression of Takaichi already, due to her fame as an “anti-immigration, hard-line conservative who is a respecter of his late friend Shinzo Abe.”

Abe was one of many first international leaders to domesticate a relationship with Trump throughout his first time period. The two turned pals as they bonded over wagyu beef burgers, sumo wrestling and golf.

Trump is anticipated to satisfy Takaichi on a go to to Japan later this month. Corridor predicts she is going to comply with the identical playbook as her predecessors:

“You be as nice as possible to the president, you show him the maximum respect, you do not have public disagreements with him,” he says. “And when you do disagree over policy, you do it in a very subtle way that doesn’t seem like you’re telling the president he’s wrong.”