The town voters handed fresh-faced political newcomer Haruka Kuwahara a stunning victory in Sunday’s local election. Ms. Kuwahara, who just qualified to run for office a few months before campaign season began, blew away the rest of the competition. The independent candidate garnered over 15% of the nearly 7,500 total votes cast, more than twice the number of votes compared to the second-place winner. In all, 17 candidates ran for a council seat. Her victory means Ms. Kuwahara earns one of the 16 spots on the town assembly and will be one of the four rookies on the council.

That Tsunan, a pastoral town where more than one-third of the population is over the age of 65, elected a young woman and conversely, that a young woman wanted to run, is an unusual event in Japan. Despite the slate of new generation lawmakers elected when the Democratic Party of Japan swung to power in 2009, Japanese politics is still dominated by old men. Meanwhile, the younger population is often chided for its disinterest.

Japan, according to the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union, citing a November 2009 survey, ranks 106th among 189 countries in terms of the proportion of female parliamentarians in the House of Representatives.
Japan just has 45 women parliamentarians in the powerful lower chamber, occupying just 9.4 percent of the total 480 seats. The corresponding proportion in the 242-member Upper House is 18.2 percent.
Still, as analysts point out, the overall level of women’s representation in local politics is not as dismal as it may seem. Overall, women represent 20 percent of local assembly seats across Japan.
In the city council of Isehara, where Hamada resides, women comprise seven, or 40 percent, of the total 24 assembly members.

There was only one problem. Her Democratic Party had never been in power. In fact, only one party has really been in charge of Japan since the end of World War II. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) helped build the world's No. 2 economy, but it has also imposed a stifling consensus that discouraged public debate and suppressed civil society initiatives. As a result, Japanese elections have been about as exciting as watching grass grow.
But politics in Japan became a whole lot more interesting when Tanioka's party captured more than 300 seats in the 480-seat lower house of Japanese parliament. Most pundits have dismissed the vote as simply a protest against the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's ineptitude, the rising unemployment figures, and the indignity of living in a one-party state.