ABSTRACT
Japan as a country is today internationally known for its high degree of gender inequality, despite a series of national/local policies and governmental measures to realize a ‘gender equal society’ implemented for the last 30 years. This chapter aims to establish the basic groundwork for future research to understand the persistence of such gender inequality in Japan. To this end, the chapter tries to identify the ways in which the term ‘gender’ has been understood and used and seeks to consider how gender-related issues have been discussed and handled in contemporary Japan by following the national political process since the 1990s.
