By Takayuki Tanaka

8:00 JST, January 24, 2026

About two months ago, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi wrote on social media that she had broken a glass ceiling when she was elected president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and then took office as the first female head of Japan’s government. Now, the House of Representatives has been dissolved at her direction and a lower house election will be held in February. No one knows whether the ruling coalition will make a good showing that enhances her power base or a poor showing that forces her to step down.

In either case, I hope this election sets the stage for breaking another rigid traditional “ceiling,” one that is based on lawmakers’ seniority or number of terms. In Japanese politics, a Diet member is usually evaluated more on how many times he or she has been elected than on ability or leadership.

Veteran leaders have assumed the reins of successive LDP-led governments. Takaichi and her most recent predecessors — Shigeru Ishiba, Fumio Kishida and Yoshihide Suga — each spent more than two decades as Diet members before becoming prime minister. Shinzo Abe, Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, was first elected to the lower house in 1993 and formed his first Cabinet a “short” 13 years later. But his grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, was a prime minister, and Abe had been a secretary for his father, Shintaro Abe, a leading LDP politician. Shinzo Abe was regarded as having had a long political career considering his age.

In the LDP leadership........

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