1. Gender Inequality in Legislative Speeches at Japanese Diet
Kayo Onishi, Indiana University
Daisuke Yoneoka, The University of Tokyo

2. Background and Motivation
Japan ranks 164th out of 190 in the proportion of female legislators in parliament (IPU as of 2017 May 1st)
44 out of 475 (9.3%) in the Lower House ( )
59 out of 242 (20.7%) in the Upper House ( )
Lower than 19 % average in Asian countries
Japan has been under international pressure to address under-representation of women in decision making
The idea of gender quotas has been controversial but Japanese Diet is ready to adopt one soon in 2017

3. Background and Motivation -Sexist taunts and gestures and Interruptions in Japanese Diets-
Sexist taunts and gestures are prevalent
A female legislator in Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly faced sexiest jeers from her male colleagues, blamed for being single and having no children (August 2014)
A female legislator in Upper House got heckled by male counterparts, told to “be in a hurry to get married and have children” (July 2015 )

4. Background and Motivation -Sexist taunts and gestures and Interruptions in Japanese Diets-
Interruptions by male legislators as well as Prime Minister are prevalent
Prime Minister Abe did not try to listen but yelled and interrupted female M.P.’s questions, saying “come on, just ask a question” (August 2016)

5. Literature Review —Gender Inequality in Oral Argument--
Jacobi and Schweers(2017) In US Supreme Court, female judges are more interrupted by male counterparts
Shaw (2000) In Parliamentary debates in the British Houses of Commons gender inequality between participants exits; rule violations are common

6. Research Questions & Hypothesis
Research Question1 : Are female MPs more likely to be interrupted by legislators in their oral argument?
Research Question 2: By whom are female legislators more likely to get interrupted, by men or women, or both?
Research Question 3: Under what circumstances are female MPs more likely to be interrupted?
H1: female MPs more likely to be interrupted by legislators in their oral argument?

7. Research Method
Analyze Ministerial speeches, retrieved from National Diet Library
National Diet Library provides online Parliamentary minutes (full-text)
Application Programming Interfaces (API)
： search words}
Search Key Words :
“there is someone interrupted the speaker” (hatsugen suru mono ari) “difficult to hear”(choshu funo)
Interruption: The Number of Interruption/ The Number of Sentences

8. Research Methods Time span: 2011 April-2017 May
Committee sessions and general hearings in Lower and Upper Houses
18 major ministerial posts, 24 female ministers out of 157 ( )
Created Original Dataset: arguments by 157 ministers retrieved from NDL

9. Preliminary Result 157 ministers (24 female ministers) # of sentence
#of interruption
ratio of interruption
(source) Created by authors

10. Preliminary Result (Hypothesis 1)

11. Preliminary Result (Hypothesis 1)

12. Supplementary Result
(source) Created by authors

13. Next Steps 1) By whom do female legislators get interrupted?
→Currently analyzing Ministers’ arguments
(search words “ (----said) ”) : MP X interrupted MP Y and said “ “
2) Under what conditions are female MPs more likely to be interrupted?
→ Will find verbal patterns
3) Are female MPs forced to be verbally more masculine (hawkish/hardliner) to be promoted?

14. Thank you very much