Time will tell. Given the disastrous historical performances by female leaders like Margaret Thatcher and Angela Merkel, it’s hard to have any confidence in Japan’s next prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, despite her ideological superiority to her LDP rivals:
Japan’s ruling party picked hardline conservative Sanae Takaichi as its head on Saturday, putting her on course to become the country’s first female prime minister in a move set to jolt investors and neighbors.
The Liberal Democratic Party, which has ruled Japan for almost all of the postwar era, elected Takaichi, 64, to regain trust from a public angered by rising prices and drawn to opposition groups promising stimulus and clampdowns on migrants.
A vote in parliament to choose a replacement for outgoing Shigeru Ishiba is expected on October 15. Takaichi is favored as the ruling coalition has the largest number of seats.
Takaichi, the only woman among the five LDP candidates, beat a challenge from the more moderate Shinjiro Koizumi, 44, who was bidding to become the youngest modern leader.
Being more influenced by their social surroundings than men, women in positions of political leadership also tend to “grow” more in office because the influences on them once they become a broad spectrum leader, they are suddenly subject to pressure from a much broader range of interests and ideologies.
Margaret Thatcher violated her most precious principles when she sold out British sovereignty and permitted Great Britain to join the precursor to the European Union. Angela Merkel was the most conservative major party leader when she invited the invasion of Germany by the mass of third-world migrants in 2015.
So, I would not expect too much from either Takaichi or Alice Weidel of Germany’s AfD party. Because no matter hardline or conservative they are now, they are still women and they are still subject to the same social pressures that so easily manipulate their more liberal sisters.