{"id":2500935,"date":"2026-07-14T00:56:04","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T00:56:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2500935"},"modified":"2026-07-14T00:56:04","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T00:56:04","slug":"japan-is-running-out-of-royals-so-why-wont-it-let-women-become-emperor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/japan-is-running-out-of-royals-so-why-wont-it-let-women-become-emperor\/","title":{"rendered":"Japan is running out of royals. So why won\u2019t it let women become emperor?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n Tokyo<\/span>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/span>
\n <\/cite><\/p>\n

\n Japan<\/a> may have its first ever female prime minister, but her government\u2019s attempts to avoid a royal succession crisis are making the chances of a woman taking the imperial throne ever slimmer.\n <\/p>\n

\n With just three eligible heirs to the Chrysanthemum throne \u2013 and two of them 60 or over \u2013 the imperial family is facing a succession crisis.\n <\/p>\n

\n Japan\u2019s monarchy has for centuries maintained male-only succession, which is on-brand for a deeply patriarchal society where men dominate other spheres of life such as business and politics.\n <\/p>\n

\n Now, that rule has come to threaten the very survival of the world\u2019s oldest monarchy which, in recent decades, has spawned more daughters than sons.\n <\/p>\n

\n To solve the dearth of heirs, government ministers have proposed reinstating former branches of the royal family, thereby expanding the pool of male successors. The changes are awaiting parliamentary approval.\n <\/p>\n

\n But it has left scholars, opposition politicians and some citizens wondering: why not just let women take the throne?\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIt is difficult to find any rational basis for refusing to allow a woman to become emperor,\u201d said Professor Makoto Okawa, who studies imperial lineage at Chuo University in Tokyo.\n <\/p>\n

\n Japan previously had eight empresses, mostly when the male heirs were too young to rule, until the Imperial House Law was enacted in 1889 during the Meiji era, officially banning female emperors.\n <\/p>\n

\n Despite the law, the country\u2019s overarching constitution does not bar women from taking the throne, Okawa said, nor can it be regarded as a \u201cJapanese tradition\u201d to exclude them.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe idea of excluding women in advance as persons incapable of becoming emperor should be understood plainly as misogyny,\u201d said Okawa.\n <\/p>\n

\n Various polls have shown most people are open-minded about female emperors.\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n <\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n Another resident, Kana Sakakura, noted that countries in Europe, such as the UK, have long histories of female monarchs.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cI suppose when you really compare it to other countries, it does feel like Japan still has an atmosphere where women taking on leadership roles in society is avoided,\u201d she said.\n <\/p>\n

\n But the cause of female succession has gained little traction. And Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and her ruling Liberal Democratic Party are among the sternest voices of opposition to such a change.\n <\/p>\n

\n During a parliamentary discussion earlier this year, Takaichi said it was still \u201cappropriate to limit eligibility to male descendants of the imperial lineage.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Her government\u2019s proposed amendments, expected to pass into law this month, do not contain a single scenario where a princess can ascend to the throne. Neither can their children, if they marry a commoner \u2013 an almost certain occurrence, given the royal family\u2019s shrinkage.\n <\/p>\n

\n Though its role is largely ceremonial, the imperial family \u2013 believed in Japanese myth to be descendants of the Sun Goddess \u2013 is a powerful symbol of unity in the country of 123 million.\n <\/p>\n

\n The family\u2019s centrality to the nation is such that US army general Douglas MacArthur, overseeing Japan\u2019s development immediately after World War II, described the emperor in a telegram as \u201ca symbol which unites all Japanese,\u201d according to the US State Department\u2019s Office of the Historian. \u201cDestroy him and the nation will disintegrate.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n In pre-war Japan, identifying a successor was less of a conundrum.\n <\/p>\n

\n Back then, the imperial family was bigger and incorporated other collateral branches, known as Oke, which offered a pool of candidates if the main bloodline failed to produce an heir.\n <\/p>\n

\n But that all changed in 1947. As Japan grappled with a war-ravaged economy, the Imperial House Law was amended to downsize the imperial family and trim royal spending.\n <\/p>\n

\n That effectively restricted membership of the imperial family to immediate relatives of then Emperor Hirohito, pruning 11 collateral branches, and setting the scene for the current shortage.\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"With<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n The original 67-member royal household shrank to 16, a contraction exacerbated by the requirement that female members must leave the imperial family after marrying a commoner.\n <\/p>\n

\n The latest government proposal seeks to allow the imperial family to \u201cadopt\u201d members of these former collateral branches who are 15 years old or above, unmarried and childless. Their children would be eligible to the throne.\n <\/p>\n

\n Currently, Emperor Naruhito, 66, has a daughter, the widely popular Princess Aiko, who is legally barred by gender from inheriting the throne. At age 24, she doesn\u2019t have any children, and even if she did have a son, he wouldn\u2019t be eligible to take the throne.\n <\/p>\n

\n Two of the emperor\u2019s\ufeff eligible successors are Hitachi, Naruhito\u2019s 90-year-old uncle, and his younger brother Akishino, 60.\n <\/p>\n

\n The third eligible \u2013 and most likely \u2013 successor is Akishino\u2019s 19-year-old son Hisahito, the first male royal to reach adulthood in 40 years<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Japan's<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n Over the years, the imperial family has shrunk and aged so much that performing royal duties has become a struggle. The new bill will also enable princesses to stay in the imperial family and share the workload after they marry a commoner, although their sons remain ineligible for the throne.\n <\/p>\n

\n Okawa, from Chuo University, said these are only short-term fixes as they depend heavily on limited male heirs and their sons.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cAs long as women remain excluded as subjects of imperial succession, it will be difficult to secure the fundamental stability of the imperial succession,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n

\n But for some, the question of female succession strikes at the heart of a tradition that, they say, has provided the country the stability on which it thrives.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cPeople who favor that outcome might not see it as an issue, but for someone like me who believes we should sustain the traditional patrilineal line, this is seen as a distinct risk,\u201d Tsuneyasu Takeda, a descendant of a former collateral imperial branch, told celebrity.land.\n <\/p>\n

\n He will not be eligible for \u201cadoption\u201d under the proposed bill because he\u2019s already married. His son could be eligible when he reaches 15 years old, though Takeda wants him to take over his company.\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Tsuneyasu<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n His father was born just months after the 1947 amendments came into force, and so narrowly missed out on a hereditary title. He\u2019s been vocal about protecting male-only lineage and restoring former royal branches by writing books, running a social media channel and giving university lectures.\n <\/p>\n

\n Takeda said tradition should not be overturned by \u201ca popularity contest.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cEven if a decision is reached by a slim majority in a democratic vote, if a segment of the population refuses to recognize the emperor, the monarch will not be respected,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis would fundamentally shake the foundations of Japan.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n But resident Akio Kubota disagreed, pointing out that there had been female emperors in the past.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn today\u2019s world, we have gender equality and things like that,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cI guess it just feels a bit strange that only the role of the emperor would be strictly passed down through men.\u201d\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.celebrity.land.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tokyo\u00a0\u2014\u00a0 Japan may have its first ever female prime minister, but her government\u2019s attempts to avoid a royal succession crisis are making the chances of a woman taking the imperial throne ever slimmer. With just three eligible heirs to the Chrysanthemum throne \u2013 and two of them 60 or over \u2013 the imperial family is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2500936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2500935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Japan-is-running-out-of-royals-So-why-wont-it.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2500935"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2500937,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500935\/revisions\/2500937"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2500936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2500935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2500935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2500935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}