Power to Japan's 'Princesses'

Two doors down from former Prime Minister Taro Aso's office in the House of Representatives Building No. 1 in Tokyo, freshman Japanese lawmaker Eriko Fukuda, her hair characteristically tucked behind her right ear, sighs that her male secretaries don't know how to care for flowers. Fukuda is settling in as the upcoming session of the Diet, Japan's parliament, approaches. Her office is filled with bouquets and orchids sent by well-wishers, adding a splash of color to the building's dreary halls — as does Fukuda herself. At age 29, she is the country's youngest member of the Diet; her pink cell phone with a tiny plush Chihuahua dangling from it, her pink blouse and black flats with bows until recently would have seemed grossly out of place in the locker room of Japanese politics.

But Fukuda is not so out of place anymore. The petite, soft-spoken activist from Nagasaki prefecture is one of more than two dozen rookie female politicians who three months ago swept into the legislature on a groundswell of antiestablishment public sentiment. During watershed national elections on Aug. 30, voters not only handed control of the government to the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) after more than five decades of rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), they also elected a record number of women to high office. The Diet now includes 96 women among its 722 members in the upper and lower houses. More than one-fourth of them are serving for the first time. (See the new activism of Japan's youth.)

This miniature women's movement is a small step toward equality in a society still steeped in conservative, patriarchal values. Japan's government for decades has been dominated by older men, most hailing from the right schools and the right families, who staked out politics as their exclusive domain. In 1997, a former Health Minister offered a glimpse of prevailing attitudes in Tokyo's men's club when he referred to women as "babymaking machines." Still relatively few in number and junior in status, women are unlikely to have much of an immediate impact on the Diet. But their influx has unquestionably added a dash of diversity — and perhaps will instill some social conscience and sensitivity to the concerns of working-class Japan. "Many came from local legislatures and some have experience in civil movements, which will bring about a new perspective in legislation," says Mari Miura, associate professor of political science at Sophia University in Tokyo. Japan's female lawmakers are generally seen by voters as kokumin no mesen — ordinary citizens — who have a better understanding of grass-roots issues. "There have been many male-centered policies in Japanese politics," says Eiko Okamoto, a former Yokohama city assembly member who won a seat in the Diet's lower house after serving 14 years in local politics. "I have high expectations that the increase in female legislators will help measures on issues that are more closely related to people's lives" such as education and child care.

In a country with a low-hanging glass ceiling, the appearance of so many junior female politicians on the national stage has inevitably generated controversy. Besides Fukuda and Okamoto, members of a freshman class of 26 female DPJ lawmakers include Kayoko Isogai, a temp worker who was unemployed when she stood for election, and Mieko Tanaka, a former secretary and actress who had a small role in an erotic horror film, Blind Beast vs. Killer Dwarf. The group has been criticized for being little more than pretty faces unqualified to hold public office. During campaigning, some newspapers dubbed them "Ozawa's princesses" because most were recruited to run for parliament by Ichiro Ozawa, the DPJ's 67-year-old secretary general and chief election strategist. By running a slate of female neophytes — many of them unknowns and outsiders — Ozawa drew fire from some pundits who accused him of offering up unfit candidates to capitalize on voters' increasing concern over Japan's worsening economic plight and their frustration with an ineffective political establishment. (See pictures of young Japanese women.)

Regardless of the accusations, the tactics worked. Fukuda, for example, handily defeated LDP incumbent Fumio Kyuma, a former Defense Minister and nine-term parliamentarian. Yet, despite her lack of on-the-job experience, she and other Ozawa princesses are not political novices. A former psychology student who holds a black belt in karate, Fukuda at age 23 became a health care activist after discovering she was infected with the hepatitis virus by a contaminated blood transfusion she received as a newborn. She was just one of thousands of Japanese who received contaminated clotting agents in blood in the 1970s, '80s and '90s, which became a major health care scandal. Fukuda's lobbying against Japan's Ministry of Health and private companies that had sold the tainted blood-clotting agents established her public profile — she wrote two books about her experiences — and ultimately brought her to Ozawa's attention.

Now in the early stages of the new Diet's first session, Fukuda says her focus as a lawmaker includes increasing access to Japan's health care system, including streamlining the drug-approval process so that life-saving medications can become available more quickly. "We need good social systems so people don't lose hope," she says. "There's so much uncertainty in society right now, so many suicides, so much worry and despair." This emphasis on issues of social justice leads some observers to hope that Ozawa's princesses can make a difference. By running for office, "These women weren't just looking for jobs," says Machiko Osawa, an economics professor at Japan Women's University. "They want to do something and change society. That's why they ran." But because of their lack of experience and connections, they will in all likelihood spend their first terms as apprentices, working from the sidelines. Says Miura, the Sophia University political-science professor: "Their impact on legislation will be minimal. Legislators need to be re-elected to have influence."

It's really a question of staying power. "There are more women learning about politics and networking and so [Fukuda] is not alone," Miura says. "We have to start from somewhere." During the election campaign, Fukuda says she was asked by several voters, "What can a young woman like you do?" Her response: "I understand the young part of what they were saying, but the woman part? That is irrelevant."

— with reporting by Yuki Oda / Tokyo

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