Correspondent
Japan’s lower house election later this year is seen as a chance to address the gender gap in the country’s political representation. But even though a law aims to boost the number of female candidates, some parties haven’t set targets for the proportion of women they plan to support in the upcoming poll.
Japan’s poor record on gender equality was highlighted in this year’s World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report. The country is ranked 147 out of 156 for women’s political empowerment. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, just 9.9 percent of the Diet’s lower house members are female, well below the 25.5 percent global average.