According to public broadcaster NHK, Takaichi, 64, secured 185 of 341 votes cast from the party’s sitting parliamentarians and current members. The race, much like last year’s party leadership contest that Takaichi initially led but ultimately lost to Shigeru Ishiba, went to a run-off vote between Takaichi and the would-be youngest-ever Prime Minister, 44-year-old Shinjiro Koizumi.But the elevation of Takaichi, a staunch conservative and fiscal dove who “behaves like men,” experts previously told TIME, and has embraced comparisons to former U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, does not necessarily portend a brighter future for Japanese women.
“She doesn’t have a very positive track record on gender issues, on family-friendly policies, women’s empowerment,” Jeff Kingston, a professor of Asian studies and history at Temple University’s Tokyo campus, tells TIME. “Coming from the right wing of the party, there is a strong, conservative family-and-social-values emphasis.”
