Kashiko Kodate is Professor Emeritus at Japan Women's University in the Department of Mathematical and Physical Science, currently a specially-appointed Professor at the University of Electro-Communications, Tokyo, and CEO of Photonic System Solutions Inc. (PSS). She was a former Director of Gender Equality Bureau at the Japan Science and Technology Agency.

Naonori Kodate is a Lecturer in Social Policy in University College Dublin, Ireland. His main research area is comparative social policy, particularly in health care. He has co-edited a book entitled Maternity Services and Policy in an International Context: Risk, Citizenship and Welfare Regimes (Routledge, 2015).

Introduction 1. History of women's education in pre-WWII Japan 2. Policy changes from the post-WWII period up to the mid-1980's 3. From equal opportunities to equal participation: women's careers in science and engineering in the 1990s 4. Policy breakthrough by promoting equal participation of men and women in the late 1990s and 2000s 5. Policy impacts and voices of women in science and engineering: evaluation and survey results. Conclusion

This book sheds light on historical developments and the current gender equality situation in Japan, through the lens of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. It shows how a policy of gender equality in science and engineering has been introduced through the coordinated efforts of academia, scientific societies and the government, and how this has led to a slow but steady increase in female representation. It draws on data including extensive interviews with government officials, scientists and educators in Japan to provide a revealing case study on how the underrepresentation of women in STEM has been approached and dealt with by a national government.