Gender and Political Behavior in Japan

8/11/2019 Gender and Political Behavior in Japan

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224 Gill STEEL

that male and female political behaviour might be different, the differences are small and often

declining or are inconsistent. To the extent that there are some significant differences, they stem not

from deep differences in individual consciousness imposed by biology or overall life course, but from

modest and partly declining differences in the types of social networks in which men and women

participate. These social networks have slightly different implications for voting rates and partisanship.

I proceed as follows: first, I explain the data I use; then, before turning to the empirical evidence,I begin each section with a brief outline of the previous research in the four areas.

1.1 Data

I use data from the surveys conducted after each election by the Society for the Promotion of Clean

Elections Lower House Election Surveys (Akarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai Shugiin Giin Sosenkyo or

ASSK). The ASSK are the longest running series of academic surveys in Japan; they have taken place

after every election since the early 1970s. The samples are stratified random samples, drawn from

the adult population. The surveys are administered in face-to-face interviews. I describe the coding

I use in more detail in Appendix A.

I also use qualitative data gathered in focus groups that I conducted in Nagoya and Tokyo in Marchand April 2000 as part of my dissertation field research. I divided the focus groups by gender

and age: middle-aged and older women, middle-aged and older men, younger women, and younger

men.

2. Womens Interest in Politics

Many commentators assert that women are not interested in politics, and at least one commentator

asserts that women are not only disinterested, but actually repulsed by politics (Iwao 1993: 215).

Other studies suggest that women do not feel close to politics (LeBlanc 1999). Watanuki, in his

widely cited article, argues that women are less interested than men in politics because they are, on

average, less educated than men: women and men who have attained the same level of schooling areequally interested in politics (Watanuki 1991: 3435).2

Starting in 1986, the ASSK surveys ask respondents: What level of interest did you personally

have in the last House of Representatives Election? The respondents are given a show card and

asked to choose one of the following options: extremely interested, somewhat interested, not very

interested or not at all interested.

Women and men are not polarized in their interest in elections, but women are a little less

interested, on average, in elections than men are. Women tend to report some interest in politics,

whereas men tend to report a great deal of interest. Slightly more women than men say they have

hardly any interest in elections (see Figure 1). Note that mens levels of interest have come to resemble

womens, with men being decreasingly likely to report a great deal of interest as the 1990s progressed.

These small differences do not support the idea that women are completely uninterested in politics,but compared with men, women areon averageslightly less interested in elections. To interpret

2. Watanuki analyses interest in politics, whereas I analyse interest in elections. The ASSK surveys do not ask respondentsabout their interest in politics, but about their levels of interest in elections. The two questions are not identical, but Iexpect similar, though not identical responses. Interest in elections is probably more volatile and election specific thaninterest in politicsfor women and menbut it is reasonable to expect a high general correlation between the twomeasures.


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this narrowing gap as womens repugnance towards politics exaggerates the magnitude and importance

of this gap.

More people expressed higher levels of interest in 1990 than at any time since. The LDPs defeat

in the 1989 House of Councillors Election, and opposition to the recently introduced consumption

tax probably contributed to unusually high interest in 1990. Citizens interest in elections waned asthey got used to paying the consumption tax, and the promise of political reform seemed unfulfilled

as politics returned to business as usual.

To examine womens and mens interest in elections further, I regressed gender on interest in

elections (see Model 1, Table 1).3 In 1986, if we consider each levelfrom not at all interested,

ranging to extremely interestedat each level of interest, women were 0.23 times less likely than

men to express interest. By 1996, this had fallen to 0.19 points. The time span is narrow, but the

difference between women and men seems to be narrowing, although it is still significant.

What accounts for womens slightly lower levels of interest in elections? In contrast to

Watanukis (1991) findings on interest in politics, I found that womens lower levels of education

do not explain their lower levels of interest in elections.4 Education is a function of age. Because

levels of education have risen over time, older women are less educated than younger women.We should expect education to be an intervening variable: more important is how old women

Gender and Political Behaviour in Japan 225

3. The analysis is limited to the elections during the years 19901996.

4. In earlier models that I do not report here, I regressed gender and education on interest in elections. Gender was stillsignificant, but the coefficients were smaller than in the bivariate models in which I regressed gender only on interest inpolitics.

Figure 1. Womens and Mens Interest in Elections, 19861996.

Source: Akarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai, 19861996.


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are since their age determines their educational level. Age, in turn, influences their political

outlook.

I studied the effects of age and whether older women are less interested than younger people are

in elections (I included age and an interaction term which multiplied age with gender in the

analysis). I also included an age-squared term to test whether citizens interest in elections declines

when they enter old age. Womens greater longevity does indeed account for womens lower levelsof interest in elections: when the effect of womens and mens ages are taken into account, gender

becomes insignificant (Model 2, Table 1).5 Although older women and men are slightly less

interested than younger people, older women are no less interested than are older men. The signs

of the coefficients of the interaction terms are negative; the coefficient was significant only in 1986

and 1990 (see Table 1). Older women may once have been less interested in elections, but as the

1990s progressed, this was no longer the case. Older women and men are equally interested in

elections, but because women live longer, there are more elderly women than men in the popu-

lation, and this accounts for womens average lower levels of interest in elections.

Analysts debate the relationship between age, or cohort, and political decision-making. Proponents

of the life-cycle model (age/senescence effects) argue that people become more conservative as they

age. On the other hand, proponents of the cohort model (generation model), argue that opinionsare acquired fairly early in life and are relatively stable (Butler and Stokes 1974). Other analysts have

226 Gill STEEL

5. In earlier analyses that I do not report here, I also investigated whether housewives are less interested than other citizensin elections. Housewives do not have workplace socialization, nor are they members of trade unions or professionalassociations, characteristics that we could expect to increase interest in politics. I found, however, that housewivesinterest in elections was not significantly different from that of other voters. Housewives are not a group apart from or

with different interests than the rest of society. In fact, in 1996, housewives were more interested than other citizens inthe election.

Table 1. Japanese Womens Interest in Elections, 19901996.

Parameter estimates 1990 1990 1993 1993 1996 1996

Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2

Intercept 3.498* 3.164* 3.287* 2.937* 2.950* 2.458*

(0.022) (0.078) (0.023) (0.085) (0.025) (0.088)

Female 0.78* 0.965 0.11* 0.43 0.86* 0.43

(0.030) (0.103) (0.032) (0.114) (0.035) (0.111)

Age 0.006* 0.007* 0.009*

(0.001) (0.002) (0.002)

Age*female 0.003 0.003 0.002

(0.021) (0.002) (0.002)

Standard error of regression 0.7010 0.6974 0.7635 0.7600 0.7964 0.7865

R2 0.04 0.05 0.02 0.03 0.02 0.04

Sample size 2269 2269 2301 2301 2114 2114

*p0.05. Cell entries are ordinary least squares coefficients with standard errors in parentheses.

Source:Akarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai, 19721996


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found a combination of these two effects (Jennings and Niemi 1981). It is beyond the scope of this

paper to reach firm conclusions on whether the life-cycle or cohort model more accurately describes

the process of political decision-making, andmore importantlythese data sets do not contain the

definitive type of data necessary to reach firm conclusions (see Jennings and Niemi 1981: 190).

Both effects are probably in operation, but the life-cycle model seems to describe citizens interest

in politics more appropriately: older citizens are less likely than others to vote. As people ageparticularly people who are not part of networksthey become less likely than younger people,

and less likely than they themselves were when they were young, to vote and to be interested in

politics.6

The finding that older women are no less interested than others in politics is surprising, given

some of the claims in the literature. Ecological replacement may explain this change since, before

1993, older women were less interested in politics than older men. Alternatively, since politically

the 1990s were an unusual decade, my findings may be atypical. Older women during this period,

for example, may have been more interested in elections than they usually are because of their

opposition to the newly introduced consumption tax. This seems unlikely: the consumption tax as

a politicizing issue was of dramatic but transient significance, fitting well Carmines and Stimsons(1989) hypothetical impulse-decay model.7 In this case, as women became used to paying the tax,

their anger at the LDP waned, and their political interest returned to previous levels. Impulse-decay

effects on the consumption tax issue may explain the general volatility in interest levels in these data,

but do not explain older womens levels of interest.

In the focus groups that I conducted, some women did report a lack of interest in politics, but

the more common response was I dont understand politics at all. It seems socially acceptable,

particularly for women, to express ignorance of politics and to feel that politics is far or distant from

them.8 Yet in answer to my question about problems and difficulties in their neighbourhoods or

cities, the same respondents eagerly discussed problems, many of which are political, and often

suggested solutions for these problems.

Environmental pollution was one of the main topics of discussion in the focus group. Themedia had publicized a few high-profile pollution cases just before I conducted the focus groups, so

the participants were primed to discuss pollution in response to my general question about issues or

problems in the participants neighbourhoods and cities. Pollution and many of the other problems

the participants discussed are issues on which the government could legislate (i.e. political issues).

But the respondents did not seem to consider them to be political issues. When I asked about

solutions, the participants generally did not expect the government to solve these problems, nor did

they blame the government. I have argued elsewhere that citizens consider issues such as the environ-

ment and education to be public issues, rather than political ones (Steel 2003). Women do not

consistently vote on these policy issues, nor do they organize and petition politicians about them.

The disconnection between these public issues and politics also explains why female informants


6. In preliminary models, I studied the effect before 1947, that is, before women gained the right to vote. I did not findstrong consistent evidence that a distinct cohort of women, who aged through the course of these elections, behaveddifferently than other women (or men). I tested various plausible ages for these cohorts, for example, women who were20 in 1947, I then tried women who were 30 in 1947. Although some differences emerged, they were not convincingas evidence of cohort differences (I do not report the results of these findings here).

7. Carmines and Stimson, in their study of race as an issue in US politics, suggest that it is possible for issues to have a short,but powerful influence. As soon as the temporary stimulus is removed, the system rapidly returns to its pre-existing levelof stability (Carmines and Stimson 1989: 139).

8. Similar responses have been noted in previous studies (LeBlanc 1999).


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professed ignorance of politics and felt that politics was distant from them, yet were knowledgeable

about problems in their neighbourhoods and towns.

Norms for Japanese women still emphasize, to some extent, their primary role within the household

as wife and mother. Women are concerned with public policy issues that affect their households, but

they do not see them as political, which may contribute to older womens lack of interest in elections.

The interests of these women underscore the limitations of the political/private dichotomy. In thiscase, the boundaries blur: the private informs the public, but many women do not consider household-

related policy issues to be political.

3. Womens Political Independence

More women than men claim to be politically independent. Decades ago, commentators assumed

that independentscitizens who did not support any partywere apolitical. Curtis (1998) argues

that citizens who supported no party in the 1950s were typically older, male farmers, uneducated

people or women. With the large and well-documented rise in independence among voters that

occurred in recent decades, analysts are now less likely to stigmatize independents. By the 1970s,many men and women in their 20s, white-collar workers and managers, and people with many years

of education reported no party affiliation or loyalty (Curtis 1988: 201, 273274, fn. 11). The image of

the typical independent as a woman, uneducated and non-urban has been replaced by the image of

the typical independent as an urban yuppie.

More recently, Patterson and Nishikawa (2002) argue that gender gaps in policy preferences

mainly account for gender-based patterns of support and rejection of parties. They argue that women

who focus on womens issues such as social welfare, the home and the environment are more likely

to support leftwing parties, whereas men, who focus on economic recovery, the budget deficit and

tax reform are more likely either to be non-aligned or to support one of the opposition parties.9

More research needs to be done on womens policy preferences, especially since disparities exist

between the surveys. According to data from the ASSK surveys, which ask respondents whether theyconsider policy issues in their vote choice, no consistent gender gap exists between the policy

preferences of women and men (see Steel 2001).10 Nevertheless, we need to consider policy prefer-

ences as intervening variables between socioeconomic characteristicsincluding genderand party

identification. If a gender gap exists in policy preferences, we need to know why. Rather than the

gap in policy preference being an explanation in itself, the underlying cause of this gap probably, in

turn, explains the gap in independence rates. Martin (2004) argues persuasively that profound

differences exist between different types of independents. According to Martin, we need to under-

stand the differences between alienated independent women and strategic independent women,

rather than thinking that all independents are non-aligned for the same reason. This makes sense,

but to be sure that analyses of small subgroups are representative of the subgroups in the broader

population, we need to analyse data from larger samples or to oversample the subgroups that wewish to study.

Research on Japan stresses that networks and mobilization in networks are crucial to citizens

party alignment. Deciding which party to support can take a great deal of time and effort: gathering

228 Gill STEEL

9. The relationship between the vote and party identification is necessarily unidirectional. Some evidence suggests that thereis reciprocal causation: that voting and issue preferences influence, and are influenced by party identification. To itsdetriment, research on gender differences that includes party identification typically fails to present non-recursive models.

10. The disparity may be due to differences in question wording across the surveys.


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and understanding information about parties, their policies, and candidates takes time and resources.

Networks can underwrite the cost of this process in important ways; candidates, parties, or activists

can either personally contact citizens or can contact people through mutual associates, thereby

encouraging them to support a specific party or candidate, and providing them with information

and reasons for so doing.11 Mobilization occurs more easily and effectively when citizens are integrated

into pre-existing networks. Not only are citizens in networks more easily available than citizens whodo not participate in networks, they may be more amenable to mobilization attempts. As Rosenstone

and Hansen (1993: 23), in their discussion of the social nature of political life in the US, put it,

people in networks reward those who comply with expectations, and they sanction those who do

not. They praise, esteem, and owe favors to those who do act, and reprove, shun, and take note of

those who do not.

For some commentators, mobilization is not a cost-cutting heuristic, but a straightforward exercise

in vote-delivery. Commentators claim that koenkaiplay a leading role in the so-called vote delivery

system when they lobby organizations such as neighbourhood groups, business associations, and

farmers collectives (Cox, Rosenbluth, and Thies 1998: 456). In turn, the members of these groups

not only turn out to vote, but turn out to vote for the LDP.12

Political scientists have paid little attention to gender-segregation in networks. Women and men

are largely part of different networks, and thus experience different kinds of mobilization, which

may affect womens higher rates of independence. There are more female than male members of

PTAs, womens groups and old peoples groups, whereas men outnumber women in trade unions

and professional associations (Steel 2003).13 Members of ostensibly non-political groups report vote

solicitation through their membership in various community and occupation-based groups.

Before analysing some of the causes of independence, we need to know how different are the rates

of independence between women and men. The percentages of women and men who responded

that they did not support any party are presented in Figure 2. Most remarkable is that male non-

alignment increasingly resembles female non-alignment. The rates of non-alignment rose for both

women and men during the last 30 years, but the change was most rapid among men. In 1972,almost 23% of women and 12% of men responded that they did not support a party. By 1996, these

percentages had risen to 35% of women and 28% of men.

To understand female non-alignment better, I estimated a set of models regressing structural

gender differences, network and social integration on non-alignment. I report the results of my

analyses of party support in Table 2. In these models, I analyse whether the structural gender

differences such as womens longer life spans, lower levels of education, greater likelihood to be

housewives, membership in different community and professional networks explain womens rates

of independence. I also include other measures of social integration in my analysis. I use community

size and the length of time that citizens have resided in their communities as indications of social

integration. People who live in smaller communities typically have more opportunities to develop

networks, use these networks as resource-saving cues, and may feel the weight of social expectationsmore strongly than those who live in cities. People who live in one community year after year have

more opportunities to develop networks of friends, neighbours, colleagues, and acquaintances.


11. Rosenstone and Hansen (1993: 26), in their study of political behaviour in the US, refer to these processes as directandindirect mobilization.

12. Some recent research has begun to question this received wisdom and argues that a more complex pattern of mobilizationexists (see, for example, Flanagan et al. 1991: 143197).

13. The Neighbourhood Associations, in which equal numbers of women and men are affiliated, are an exception.


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For ease of interpretation, I converted the estimates from my analyses of independence that Ipresented in Table 2 into predicted probabilities. I report these probabilities as first differences in

Table 3 (the model is non-linear, and the effect of estimated coefficients depends on the values taken

by the other variables and coefficients) (see King 1989). I construct a hypothetical scenario to deter-

mine the probability that an average citizen does not align with a party. I set gender to one (female),

and all the other variables to their sample median values. In 1976, for example, this hypothetical

median female was 42. She graduated from high school, and she lived in a town with a population

greater than 100,000 for more than 20 years. She is a member in a neighbourhood association,

but she is not a member in any other community group, nor is she a member in a trade union or

professional association.

I then determine the probability that this voter will not be aligned with a party. Since 1976,

this hypothetical woman has a probability of being non-aligned which ranges from 0.20 to 0.38(I give baseline probabilities for median voter at the top of the table). Next, altering one independent

variable at a time, I calculate the change in predicted probabilities of this hypothetical female being

non-aligned, that is, I calculate the partial effects of each independent variable on the probability of

non-alignment with other variables held at their median values. In essence, this is asking what difference

would it make if this hypothetical citizen were older, more educated or a member of a community

group, and so forth (see Table 3).14 Womens greater likelihood of non-alignment, which was

230 Gill STEEL

14. I used CLARIFY to perform these calculations (Tomz et al. 2000).

Figure 2. Percentages of Female and Male Independents, 19721996.



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apparent in correlations, was an artefact of their longer life-spans, lower levels of education and

participation in female-dominated networks.

Taking other causes of non-alignment into account, members in professional associations and farmers

co-operativesin which there are more men than womenare more likely than non-members to

support parties. Whereas membership in community networksin which women and men participate


Table 2. Logistic Regression Results Explaining the Causes of Non-alignment, 19761996.

1976 1979 1983 1990 1993 1996

Constant 0.369 0.587 0.700 2.348* 0.459 1.931*(0.418) (0.398) (0.417) (0.462) (0.415) (0.412)

Female 0.359 0.499 0.382 0.045 0.013 0.052

(0.358) (0.338) (0.332) (0.363) (0.339) (0.346)

Age 0.029* 0.028* 0.030* 0.034* 0.026* 0.036*

(0.007) (0.006) (0.006) (0.006) (0.006) (0.005)

Age*female 0.016* 0.016* 0.015* 0.002 0.005 0.005

(0.008) (0.007) (0.007) (0.007) (0.007) (0.007)

Education 0.002 0.010 0.024 0.318* 0.024 0.018

(0.091) (0.081) (0.088) (0.091) (0.059) (0.060)

Housewife 0.123 0.126 0.032 0.086 0.016 0.019

(0.148) (0.133) (0.134) (0.143) (0.134) (0.137)Membership in:

Womens Assn. 0.697* 0.392* 0.396* 0.302 0.273 0.292

(0.198) (0.168) (0.177) (0.192) (0.186) (0.200)

Religious group 1.064* 1.160* 0.870* 1.235* 1.046* 0.920*

(0.379) (0.379) (0.336) (0.440) (0.367) (0.342)

Koenkai 1.258* 1.201* 1.524* 0.959* 1.160* 0.921*

(0.248) (0.170) (0.225) (0.177) (0.175) (0.168)

Neighbourhood Assn. 0.250* 0.066 0.113 0.072 0.168 0.019

(0.113) (0.103) (0.107) (0.116) (0.104) (0.109)

Professional or Farmers Assn. 0.209 0.416* 0.627* 0.363* 0.639* 0.745*

(0.214) (0.174) (0.178) (0.175) (0.184) (0.224)

Trade Union 0.098 0.237 0.491* 0.175 0.099 0.330

(0.192) (0.168) (0.175) (0.180) (0.154) (0.175)

City size 0.147* 0.045 0.124* 0.110* 0.039 0.184*

(0.047) (0.026) (0.043) (0.046) (0.044) (0.044)

Length of 0.030 0.003 0.065 0.213* 0.073 0.034

residence (0.057) (0.054) (0.056) (0.058) (0.059) (0.059)

Sample size 2371 2416 2361 2269 2301 2269

Log likelihood 1073.855 1247.775 1208.895 1249.223 1384.426 1173.668

Degrees of freedom 13 13 13 13 13 13

*p0.05. Cell entries are logistic regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses.

Source:Akarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai, 19761996.


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equally or women dominatehas no effect on party support. This makes sense because members in

occupation-related groups have a clear sense of shared economic interest that influences their levels

of party support. The incentives for participating in occupational networks and supporting the partythat the network supports may be more immediately obvious in occupational networks because

discussion and mobilization may focus on issues related to livelihood and working conditions. The

incentives may includeto borrow Wilsons (1973) typology of incentives for US citizens organ-

izational participationmaterial incentives, specific or collective solidary incentives or purposive

incentives (Wilson 1973: 3051). In occupation-based networks, the incentives for participation and

party support are probably material incentives, that is, tangible rewards that can be priced, such as

a job or tax-reductions.15 Taking other causes of non-alignment into account, womens association

members were more likely than non-members to support parties until 1990, but this is no longer

the case. No one factor accounts for this loss of support, and it happened gradually. In 1976, the

probability of non-support for members in womens associations was 0.08% less than that of non-

members, by 1983, it was 0.06%, and by 1990, membership gave no added bonus. In analyses thatI do not report here, I tested whether this was due to opposition to policy issues such as taxation

232 Gill STEEL

15. Wilson also includes improvements in property values, personal services and gifts (for which one would otherwise haveto pay), and so forth as material incentives. Solidary incentives are less concrete than material rewards, and include offices,honours and deference. Collective solidary incentives develop from the social interaction that comes with participation, butmust be enjoyed by the group as a whole. These benefits include the fun and friendliness of participating in groups, andthe sense of exclusiveness and esteem that the group as a whole enjoys. Purposive benefits are the intrinsic rewards thatcome from the sense of satisfaction of having contributed to something worthwhile (Wilson 1973: 3051).

Table 3. The Probability of Non-alignment, 19761996.

Variable 1976 1979 1983 1990 1993 1996

Baseline probabilities at sample median values 0.20 0.28 0.30 0.25 0.34 0.38Female 0.05 0.09 0.07 0.01 0.00 0.01

Age 0.23 0.28 0.31 0.37 0.33 0.47

Age*female 0.23 0.28 0.26 0.03 0.09 0.10

Education 0.00 0.00 0.01 0.10 0.01 0.01

Housewife 0.02 0.02 0.01 0.01 0.00 0.00

Membership in:

Womens Assn. 0.08 0.06 0.06 0.05 0.05 0.06

Koenkai 0.13 0.17 0.19 0.13 0.19 0.16

Religious group 0.11 0.14 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.15

Neighbourhood Assn. 0.04 0.01 0.02 0.01 0.03 0.00

Trade Union 0.01 0.04 0.07 0.03 0.02 0.06Professional or Farmers Assn. 0.03 0.07 0.09 0.06 0.11 0.13

Length of Residence 0.01 0.00 0.03 0.12 0.04 0.02

City size 0.09 0.05 0.09 0.08 0.03 0.16

Source: Analysis from Table 2. The data are from theAkarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai, 19761996.


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more conformist than men.19 Before looking at the results, it is worth briefly discussing the question

and the closed-ended responses that the surveys use. Asking respondents why they vote is problematic

for at least two reasons. The question assumes that citizens have considered the issue and are fully

aware of their own cognitive processes. This is asking a lot, especially as the rationality behind voting

has been a source of debate among political scientists for decades. Furthermore, we should be cautious

about considering top of the head responses (to use Taylor and Fiskes [1978] terminology), andthen concluding that women are more conformist than men. Zaller (1992), drawing on Taylor and

Fiske, argues that citizens attention to politics varies across time. People can react critically to

arguments they encounter only to the extent that they are knowledgeable about political affairs.

This leads to a situation in which citizens do not have fixed attitudes on every issue, but they

construct opinion statements as they confront new issues. People construct these statements from

the ideas that are most immediately salient to themthose that are at the top of the head. The

top of the head construction of opinion statements accounts for the variance in public opinion; it

also suggests that we need to be aware of the contexts that produce immediate salience. Womens

and mens work experiences, life experiences and participation in networks are different, which may

give them access to different ideas, thus producing different responses to public opinion surveys.Whether this difference in responses indicates deeper differences in political consciousness is

questionable.

I suggest that Japanese voters are similar to American voters:

the connection between belief in a duty to participate and participation itself is distressingly close.

Undoubtedly, many people vote because they believe it is the right thing to do. Still, many people might

identify their duty as a reason for their participation because they cannot identify any other reason for it

(Rosenstone and Hansen 1993: 20, fn. 23).

It is debatable whether carrying out a civic duty is the same as conformity for either the women or

the men who selected this response. There are many reasons why citizens carry out civic duties, and

conformity may or may not be one of them. Informants in the focus groups that I conducted indiscussing voting did not voice any conformist reasons for voting. Participants in the focus groups

that I conducted generally, but not unanimously, felt that voting was important. Many conflated

the importance of voting with voting for the LDP. For them, it was important to vote to ensure that the

LDP remained in power, maintaining a competent, stable government, since no viable alternative

party capable of ruling exists.

Because of the margin of error inherent in sampling, analysing the influence of gender on the

decision to vote is problematic. The differences in the population are too small to register accurately

in the ASSK surveys, falling within the margin of error of the samples, which are drawn from repre-

sentative samples of the population. A further problem is that older men are over-sampled in many

of the ASSK surveys, which may bias the results of analyses of voting rates. The age distribution in

the 1993 survey most closely reflects the age distribution in the population, and may thus be a moreaccurate guide to understanding the causes of voting than surveys from the other years. I use a

weighting variable in the analyses, which weights the proportion of women and men in the sample

to reflect accurately the proportions who vote in the population. In this section, to understand

19. Watanuki uses the ASSK data from surveys on the House of Councillors Elections until 1989. For 1990, he uses ASSKHouse of Representatives Election data. There seems to be some discrepancy between his results and mine. AlthoughI do not have access to his data, it appears that even in Watanukis table, women are significantly different from men infour of the eight elections (Watanuki 1991: 35).


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women are more likely to vote than men. If the opposite were true, since a large proportion ofwomen were socialised prior to gaining the vote, we would expect womens overall voting rates to

be low, but this is not the case. Japan seems to conform to the classic pattern, noted cross-nationally,

that turnout is lowest at the beginning of adult life, as younger people are not yet socialised into

voting. Turnout rises to a plateau in middle-age, and then declines as the middle-aged become

elderly. Some of the decline is probably due to physical infirmity, withdrawal from some types of

networks, and other socio-economic variables related to age.

5. KoenkaiMembership

Men significantly outnumber women in koenkaibut, as more women join, the gender gap in mem-

bership has narrowed considerably. In 1993, women were equally as likely as men to join koenkai,although in 1996 a gap re-emerged since slightly more men than women claimed to be members

(see Figure 4). Womens lower membership levels may reflect womens lack of interest in politics

but, importantly, women are considerably less likely than men to be mobilized to join koenkai(see

Figure 4). Although the correlation between invitations to join and joining is not perfect, it certainly

seems that, as more women are invited to join, they do so. As with many associational groups,

people participate when they are asked to do so. As Rosenstone and Hansen conclude, in their study

of political participation in the US, The bottom line is very simple. People participate because

someone encourages or inspires them to take part (1993: 161). In Japan, parties, candidates, their


Table 6. The Probability of Voting in Selected Lower House Elections, 19761996.

1976 1979 1983 1990 1993 1996

Baseline probability at 0.94 0.90 0.91 0.92 0.92 0.81sample median values

Female 0.037 0.055 0.065 0.012 0.093 0.005

Age 0.012 0.010 0.012 0.011 0.012 0.022

Age*female 0.001 0.002 0.002 0.001 0.002 0.002

Age2 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000

Education 0.017 0.017 0.039 0.021 0.023 0.070

Housewife 0.004 0.002 0.024 0.013 0.024 0.051

Membership in:

Womens Assn. 0.032 0.057 0.050 0.022 0.103 0.129

Koenkai 0.061 0.071 0.056 0.030 0.060 0.048

Neighbourhood Assn. 0.019 0.021 0.035 0.013 0.006 0.011Professional or Farmers Assn. 0.009 0.051 0.071 0.023 0.019 0.059

Religious 0.043 0.091 0.049 0.122 0.046 0.081

Trade Union 0.018 0.018 0.042 0.010 0.024 0.021

Social Integration

Community size 0.016 0.013 0.016 0.015 0.007 0.015

Length of residence 0.011 0.028 0.018 0.012 0.014 0.014

Source: Analysis from Table 5. The data are from theAkarui Senkyo Suishin Kyokai, 19761996.


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campaigners and supportersthose responsible for mobilizing othersno longer automatically

dismiss women as apolitical. There is a growing perception that womens votes are important, so

candidates and their supporters are making a deliberate effort to contact and mobilize women to

join koenkai, and to participate more generally in political activities. As they do so, womens partici-pation increases.

Although the gender gap in koenkaimembership has narrowed, womens and mens participation

is not qualitatively identical. In addition to the political functions of koenkai, they have a strong

social or community component which is organized along gender lines. Entertainment aimed

at appealing to women includes cookery classes, womens volleyball, flower-arranging, kimono

classes, and so on (Abe et al. 1990: 157).23As a result, the political and politicising role of koenkai

may be different for women and men. Furthermore, we should not expect all koenkai to be the

same; some groups may involve women and men equally in politics, regardless of the type of

participation. We should also bear in mind that joining koenkai may indicate political interest.

Although a unique mix of material, solidary or purposive incentives probably motivates individuals

to join, we should be cautious about interpreting koenkaimembership as interest or involvementin politics.24

240 Gill STEEL

23. For brief summaries of the history and function of the koenkai, see Abe et al. (1990: 152160), Ishikawa and Hirose(1989: 129), and Curtis (1971: 157232).

24. Numerous female-dominated activist groups exist, particularly in local level politics. The data I analyse here areaggregated across nation-wide communities, so I am unable to study the extent of womens participation in localmovements.

Figure 4. KoenkaiMembership and Invitations to Join, by Gender, 19761996.



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6. Concluding Remarks

Basing their insights on sociological models that use socio-demographic variables to explain behaviour,

some commentators assume that women participate less than men do in politics, and are indifferent

or hostile to politics. These models, however, explain only a small proportion of political behaviour

and decision-making. Other quantitative research highlights very small behavioural and attitudinal

differences between women and men. Still other perceptions of womens behaviour appear to be

influenced by research conducted in the 1950s that characterised women as politically parochial and

passive. Some more recent research focuses on the atypical behaviour of activists, whose behaviour

may not be generalisable to the broader population of women.

My findings suggest that we need to be cautious about assuming that large differences exist in

the political behaviour and attitudes of women and men. I demonstrated that some of the overall

political differences between men and women are slighter than previously believed. Some differences

have disappeared over time, and others can be explained by womens and mens participation in

different types of networks. But some puzzles still remained. Women, for example, are slightly less

interested and less likely to align with parties than men, but vote at higher rates. Network analysis

partly explains this puzzle: womens associations are better at getting out the vote than are thenetworks to which men tend to belong. My findings lead to further important questions: how are

womens associations able to get out the vote without raising overall levels of political interest or

party support among women? Why do occupation-related groups fail to get out the vote among

men as effectively as womens organizations do? Taking other causes of voting and party support

into account, why are trade union members generally not more likely than non-members to support

parties or vote? Although members of professional associations and farmers co-operatives are

more likely to support parties than non-members, why are they notmore likely than non-members

to vote?

I suggest that the influence of occupation-related groups may have been exaggerated. Certainly,

in some situations and at some points in time, these groups may be very influential. In tight-knit

farming communities, for example, or in times of economic difficulty, we would expect political mobil-ization and activity to be high. But averaged over all communities and viewed over time, membership

in many networks does not significantly influence the behaviour of members.

Clearly, networks in Japan are not vote delivery systems, as some commentators suggest.

The reality is more complex: we need to study the kinds of mobilisation that occur in the different

networks, the differences between the kind of mobilisation that results in votes and the kind that

results in other types of political integration. We cannot assume that the types of mobilisation across

groups are the same or that citizens in different groups respond similarly to mobilisation. Are

women simply more conformist than men, or do womens associations provide their members with

a heuristic, a common contextual identity, which has implicit voting cues attached? If professional asso-

ciations and farmers co-operatives provide their members with such a common contextual identity,

why does this not extend to the act of voting?More research needs to be conducted on mobilisation, how it works, when, and among which

groups it is successful. As one anonymous reviewer of a previous draft of this survey astutely pointed

out this finding teaches us that gender-conscious investigations of political life have as much to

teach us about the basic nature of political behaviour as they do about the more specific case of

women. It is impossible to answer these questions conclusively by analysing the limited range

of closed-ended questions that are included in these surveys, which themselves are not specifically

designed to study these topics. To understand these phenomena better, we need to utilize either

surveys designed to study this topic with a larger sample size or certain subgroups oversampled so


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that we can be more confident in our statistical analyses. Perhaps utilising qualitative methods, such

as in-depth interviews or participant observation of networks, may be more illuminating.

References

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Carmines, Edward G. and James A. Stimson. 1989. Issue Evolution. Race and the Transformation of American Politics.

Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Cox, Gary W., Frances M. Rosenbluth, and Michael F. Thies. 1998. Mobilization, Social Networks, and Turnout:

Evidence from Japan. World Politics50(3): 447474.

Curtis, Gerald L. 1988. The Japanese Way of Politics. New York: Columbia University Press.

Flanagan, Scott C., et al. 1991. The Japanese Voter. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Iwao, Sumiko. 1993. The Japanese Woman: Traditional Image and Changing Reality. New York: Free Press.

Jennings, Kent M. and Richard G. Niemi. 1981. Generations and Politics: A Panel Study of Young Adults and

Their Parents. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Kubo, Kimiko and Joyce Gelb. 1994. Obstacles and Opportunities: Women and Political Participation in Japan.In Women of Japan and Korea. Continuity and Change, ed. Joyce Gelb and Marian Lief Palley. Philadelphia:

Temple University Press.

LeBlanc, Robin. 1999. Bicycle Citizens: The Political World of the Japanese Housewife. Berkeley: University of California

Press.

Martin, Sherry. 2004. Alienated, Independent and Female: Lessons from the Japanese Electorate. Social Science Japan

Journal7: 119.

Ogai, Takuko. 1998. Japanese Housewives Political Participation Political Styles: Old and New. Unpublished paper.

Patterson, Denis and Misa Nishikawa. 2002. Political Interest or Interest in Politics? Gender and Party Support in

Postwar Japan. Women & Politics24(2): 134.

Pharr, Susan J. 1998. Moralism and the Gender Gap: Judgments of Political Ethics in Japan. Political Psychology

19(1): 211236.

Rosenstone, Steven and Mark Hansen. 1993. Mobilization, Participation, and Democracy in America. London:Macmillan.

Steel, Gill. 2001. Gender and Issue Voting in Japanese House of Representatives Elections, 19721996. Paper presented

at the Association of Asian Studies Annual Meeting, Chicago.

. 2002. Gender and Voting Preferences in Britain, Japan, and the United States. Ph.D. Dissertation,

University of Chicago.

. 2003. Mobilization and the Vote Choice in Japanese Lower House Elections.Japanese Journal of Political

Science4(1): 139.

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242 Gill STEEL


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Length of Residence. About how many years have you lived in this City (Prefecture, Town, Village)?

[19721979]: 1. Three years or less. 2. More than three years. 3. More than 10 years. 4. More than

20 years. [19831996]: 4. More than 20 years (ever since birth). Unclear and dont know

responses: system missing.

Group Membership. Are you a member of any of these kinds of groups? List includes: NeighbourhoodGroups (Chonaikai, Burakukai, Jijikai); [19721990] Womens Association and Young Peoples

Association. [19931996] Womens Association; Koenkai; PTA; Religious group.

Trade Union Member. 1 if member; 0 if otherwise.

Professional Association Member. Member in a business, commerce, farming or fishing association;

1 if member; 0 if otherwise.

Recommendations/Vote Solicitation from Networks. Whether it was useful or not, in the Election for

the House of Representatives, did you hear or see any [voting] recommendations? From this list,please choose all.

Social Network Recommendation. Reported recommendation from one or more of the following

community-based networks: family, neighbours, friends; 0 if otherwise.

Workplace Recommendation. Reported recommendation from one or more of the following:

superior, colleague, professional association; 1 if member; 0 if otherwise.

Direct Mobilization. Reported recommendation from one or more of the following: a party member,

campaigner (in person) or campaigner (via telephone) (1993 and 1996) koenkai; 1 if member;

0 if otherwise.

244 Gill STEEL

Documents

Gender and Political Behavior in Japan