2022 US-Japan Women Leaders Dialogue
Executive Summary

MOVING THE NEEDLE ON GENDER EQUITY
THROUGH US-JAPAN COLLABORATION

From January to March 2022, JCIE gathered more than 40 women leaders from Japan and the United States to participate in aseries of three online sessions to share insights into the challenges and opportunities for women’s leadership in various fields.
Co-chaired by Rep. Diana DeGette and Rep. Seiko Noda, the 2022 US-Japan Women Leaders Dialogue featured lively discussions
on social and economic equity and how policymakers and other leaders are working to promote greater gender equity. Participants
examined best practices in promoting women in politics in the United States and Japan. These discussions were informed bysurveys prepared by JCIE to compare existing processes and support systems in both countries that are designed to foster women’s
political participation. The dialogue also took a deeper look at the state of women in STEM fields, which are so critical to the future
economic growth of our countries.

Summary of Findings
1. Improve Economic Equity and Security for All Women• Treat women’s economic security as a critical component of domestic and global economic recovery in the aftermath ofthe pandemic and take this opportunity to rethink fundamental structural inequities that disproportionately impacted
women’s economic security during this crisis.
• In particular, the overrepresentation of women in non-regular and informal employment is a serious concern that pushes
women into vulnerable positions and lessens their lifetime earning potential.
• Ensure that workers—both men and women—across all sectors and types of businesses have equitable access to paid family
and medical leave and are able to utilize that leave without fear of reprisal or negative impact on their careers.
• Accessible and affordable caregiving is a critical element in closing gender gaps, but it poses a difficult conundrum: usersof care services require affordability, but providers of care—who are predominantly women—must be adequatelycompensated.
• Women worldwide spend much more time than men on unpaid household chores and care work—cleaning, cooking, grocery
shopping, and providing child/elder care. We must recognize, quantify, reduce, and redistribute unpaid work.
• Government and corporate leaders should maintain and expand access to workstyles that promote flexibility and work-lifebalance, such as telework and telehealth. This creates new opportunities for men and women to rethink their work-lifebalance and their contributions to housework and childcare.

2. Create and Strengthen Empowering Frameworks for Women in Politics and Business• Engaging greater numbers and diversity of women in politics and corporate leadership is crucial for more informed
decision making, whether that entails understanding the real-life impact of policies or identifying new or overlooked business
opportunities.

• We must start early to change perceptions. More work is needed at younger ages to inform girls and young women, as wellas their male counterparts, that politics and business are not just a “man’s world,” but places where all people can andshould participate and make their voices heard. This requires efforts by parents, as well as schools, media, and others.

• Don’t assume laws are enough—concrete actions are needed to promote political engagement. Active interventions areneeded to successfully recruit, train, and fund women candidates, create caucuses, and establish support mechanisms.

• Increase access to political leadership training programs in both countries. Greater engagement of the academic sector indeveloping new and existing political training programs in Japan would be beneficial. Civic leadership education, particularly
for girls and young women, is an important means of promoting political participation.

3. Promote Women in STEM
• Both governments should continue and expand their initiatives to improve diversity and inclusion in STEM education at
the K-12 level. In addition, girls (and boys) need to see more female role models in STEM and be exposed to more
information about the reality and variety of work in STEM fields.

• Greater diversity and inclusion in STEM in universities is needed. The presence of and mentoring by female professors

can play a decisive role in encouraging young women to pursue a career in STEM. Universities need to have a full-scale, databased articulation of their institutions’ vision for recruitment, retention, and advancement of women in STEM.

• Ongoing education and reskilling programs can provide valuable assistance to women who want to reenter the STEM

field after pausing their careers to care for children or other family members, as well as to women who may not have started
in technology-related fields but see that as a potential path forward.

• Venture capital (VC) is essential for entrepreneurship in STEM-related business, yet the field in both countries is dominatedby men. A number initiatives have been launched to assist businesswomen and it would be helpful to compare notes on what has
been effective to date and consider ways to ensure that more women’s voices are represented in the VC sector.

RECOMMENDATIONS: An Agenda for Collaboration on Gender Equity
In their May 2022 Joint Statement, President Biden and Prime Minister Kishida “concurred that ensuring thatall people, regardless of gender identity, can achieve their full potential is both a moral and strategic imperative,
critical to every aspect of society and the economy.” The next step must be to clearly elucidate and integrate gender
equity in the bilateral US-Japan collaborative agenda. The following are potential action items for that agenda.
Explicitly incorporate gender in existing agreements
Steps should be taken to clarify and monitor how existing initiatives under the rubric of the CoRe
Partnership, as well as the US-Japan Climate Partnership and other bilateral agreements, will work toensure equity and inclusion.
Promote research and dialogues on government and corporate policies
to improve womens’ wellbeing
The United States and Japan should provide funding for joint analyses and dialogues that examine
policies and practices both in the public and private sector that can improve the status of women.
Expand or create bilateral programs to promote womenin STEM in education and business
Increase bilateral academic exchanges and fellowship opportunities. Build networks among womenleaders in STEM and encourage interaction with younger generations of women to show them potential
career paths in STEM.
Encourage investment in Japanese and American women entrepreneurs
Create opportunities to increase US-Japan networks of entrepreneurs and of venture capitalists whoare interested in supporting women-led companies. Consider incorporating grants to women-led
businesses in critical fields related to shared objectives of the bilateral partnership, such as green
energy, cybersecurity, supply chain resilience, and femtech.
Increase the availability of funding to civil society organizations
for people-to-people exchanges
Cross-sectoral US-Japan dialogues that draw on the experiences of women in politics, business,academia, policy research, and media have proven to provide unique perspectives and insights, but theavailability of funding for such exchanges has been shrinking over the past decade. Both governments
should examine ways to expand their support of such programs.

Japan Center for International Exchange (JCIE/Japan)
Meisan Tameike Bldg. 7F, 1-1-12 Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan 107-0052

Japan Center for International Exchange, Inc. (JCIE/USA)
475 Riverside Drive, Suite 731, New York, NY 10115

We thank the Toshiba International Foundation for their support of this report.
Support for the dialogue was provided by the MRA Foundation, with additional funding from ITOCHU International.

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