Japan's conservative values collide with plan to mobilize women

Days after Kaoru Shimada and other Japanese mothers rallied in Tokyo to press for more public daycare, she was shocked to read a local politician's blog blasting their "shameless" demands and asserting that children should be raised at home.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has vowed to take steps, including expanding daycare, to help mobilize women as part of his "Abenomics" plan to end economic stagnation and engineer growth in a country beset by an aging, shrinking population.

But that economic imperative is colliding with a conservative worldview, shared by many ruling party politicians as well as top business executives, that sees women's proper place as in the home, not in offices, factories or boardrooms.

"My first impression was that he was mocking us," said Shimada, a 29-year-old systems engineer with a toddler son, referring to the blogged comments by Yutaro Tanaka, a local assembly member from Abe's Liberal Democratic Party.

"He has no idea of the reality," said Shimada, who found a daycare spot about a week before she had to resume work in April.

Opposition lawmakers, experts and even some from Abe's own party say such conservative views are common inside the LDP.

"Their view of women is basically as tools to boost the birth rate, reduce social security spending and increase growth. Women have a role because they are key to solving these three problems," said Mari Miura, a political science professor at Sophia University in Tokyo.

Experts and working women laud Abe's goal of mobilizing women even as they note the moves are long overdue in a country where female board members account for only about 1 percent of the total, and women's employment rate of 60 percent is among the lowest in developed nations.

Hidden message?

Abe has pledged to eliminate daycare waiting lists in five years - which official data put at 25,000 nationwide and private experts much higher. He also has set a target of having women in 30 percent of leadership posts in all sectors of society by 2020 and also urged Japanese companies to put more women on their boards. His initial goal is one female director per company.

"At the end of the day, it's the first administration that I can think of that even mentioned women's participation. So that's a step forward," said Kathy Matsui, chief Japan strategist at Goldman Sachs.

She estimates that raising female labor participation rates to the same 80 percent as males could boost Japan's GDP by as much as 14 percent.

But critics are questioning some moves, including Abe's request for companies to increase childcare leave from a maximum of one-and-a-half years to three and an LDP proposal to make private nursery schools, which only hold morning sessions - free for preschoolers.

"They are saying: 'Stay home until the child is three, then put the child in nursery school and take care of him or her yourself in the afternoon'," said opposition Democratic Party lawmaker Renho, a former TV announcer and mother of teenage twins, who goes by one name.

"The message is: 'Don't think about working full-time'."

While some women might welcome the prospect of three years' childcare leave, many say the notion is unrealistic given the need for double incomes and the likely damage to careers from a three-year gap. Currently, those taking childcare leave get a government allowance equal to half their salary.

"Practically speaking, three years would be tough," systems engineer Shimada said. "I took off 18 months and there was a gap that made me feel like a rookie employee when I returned."

Reuters

(China Daily 06/21/2013 page11)