Japan’s Iron Lady

Sanae Takaichi’s rise as Japan’s first female Prime Minister shatters a glass ceiling but cements the conservative foundations beneath it.

In a country where patriarchal tradition has long dictated the boundaries of public life, Sanae Takaichi’s ascent to Japan’s premiership is a moment of striking symbolism. For young Japanese women, the image of a woman leading the nation evokes the tantalising promise of change. Yet for all its historic resonance, her victory also underscores a paradox: Japan’s first female Prime Minister may be among its most conservative leaders in decades.

Born in Nara and known for her no-nonsense demeanour, Takaichi, 64, has long modelled herself after Margaret Thatcher. Like her British idol, she relishes toughness, discipline and ideological clarity. Her campaign speeches bristled with language about “duty” and “hard work,” culminating in her declaration to parliament: “I will work, work, work.” To her admirers, she embodies the resilience Japan needs in an era of sluggish growth and demographic decline. To her critics, she personifies a leader who, whilst breaking the ultimate glass ceiling, has only reinforced the walls beneath it.

Her rise comes at a time when the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has governed Japan almost uninterrupted since 1955, faces internal disarray and public distrust. The party’s old guard, steeped in factionalism and money politics, was battered by the recent slush-fund scandal that forced Shigeru Ishiba to resign. The departure of Komeito, the LDP’s centrist coalition partner, further weakened the government. Takaichi’s election, backed by the right-wing base and bolstered by an alliance with the populist Japan Innovation Party (JIP), was thus both a necessity and a gamble. It was meant to consolidate the conservative bloc and prevent further drift toward Japan’s nationalist fringe.

Fierce Nationalist

The parallels with Thatcherism extend beyond tone. Like Thatcher, Takaichi champions small government, fiscal discipline and a muscular nationalism. She has argued for revising Japan’s pacifist constitution, originally drafted under American occupation, to grant the Self-Defence Forces the explicit right to act militarily abroad. In this, she reflects the LDP’s long-standing ambition to ‘normalise’ Japan’s defence posture amid an increasingly assertive China and an unpredictable North Korea.

Since the Meiji era, the Japanese state has fused nationalism with patriarchal family norms, encapsulated in the ideal of ‘ryōsai kenbo’— the ‘good wife, wise mother.’ Post-war reforms under American occupation formally granted women the right to vote and work, but corporate culture and social expectations kept most women tethered to the domestic sphere. Even today, women make up less than 15 percent of managerial positions and only around 10 percent of parliamentarians. The LDP, dominated by elderly male politicians, has done little to change this. Takaichi’s rise, paradoxically, was enabled not by a feminist wave but by the party’s internal arithmetic and the vacuum of credible conservative leadership.

Her premiership also speaks to broader geopolitical anxieties. Japan faces an increasingly hostile neighbourhood: Chinese naval incursions around the Senkaku Islands have become routine; North Korea continues to fire missiles over the Sea of Japan; and America’s security commitment, though reaffirmed under Joe Biden, remains shadowed by uncertainty. At home, an ageing electorate and stagnant wages fuel discontent. Takaichi’s call to “rebuild Japan through hard work” taps into nostalgia for the post-war decades when Japan’s industriousness powered its rise as an economic superpower. But such rhetoric may fall flat in a society where overwork has already taken a toll.

Internationally, Takaichi’s ascent could mark a rightward shift in Japan’s diplomacy. She is likely to maintain close ties with Washington but take a firmer line on Taiwan, aligning Japan more closely with the United States and Australia in their Indo-Pacific security agenda. Her scepticism toward China’s economic influence may lead to a cooling of relations that are already strained by territorial disputes and trade frictions. Domestically, however, her minority government will have to navigate a fractious Diet, where the LDP-JIP alliance remains two seats short of a majority.

In many ways, Takaichi’s leadership reflects Japan’s uneasy relationship with modernity: a society eager for renewal but wary of altering its foundations. Like Thatcher, she may prove transformative, but whether she transforms her country’s gender order or merely reinforces it remains to be seen. 

In the end, Japan’s first “Iron Lady” offers both inspiration and caution. She shatters a barrier but embodies the conservatism that built it. Her tenure will test not just her stamina but Japan’s ability to reconcile its reverence for tradition with the imperatives of change.

(The author is a researcher and expert in foreign affairs. Views personal.)