Dear Peter,



Thank you for raising this important question. I don't have one clear answer, but a few observations to share that highlight interesting differences between Japan and Germany.



Green politics does exist in Japan, but it is young and lacks visibility. So far the 'Greens Japan' are only active on the local level, most notably in urban centers like Tokyo. Here is a link to their website http://greens.gr.jp/world/english/ and a list of seats they have won in local elections http://greens.gr.jp/english/14998/ Born out of a social movement and starting out as a local level party, their beginnings share common characteristics with the Green Party in Germany. Does 'Greens Japan' have the chance to become as big as the German Greens? That depends on voters. Generally, polls about the salience of different issues with voters in Japan show that climate/ environment always comes after the economy and security. Judging from that, green politics in Japan has a long way to go.



I am not surprised about the small size and lack of media coverage of #Fridays for Future. Maybe my image of Japanese media is overly negative, but comparing it with the German media coverage, I can only conclude that Japanese media coverage of climate topics is so tame, it almost seems they are under the government's spell. Why is that? Similarly, after the Fukushima nuclear accident, it took big newspapers a long time to really report about anti-nuclear protests, pretty much until 200.000 people flooded the streets around the Diet building. Since 2013, Japan has moved down on the freedom press index of reporters without borders https://rsf.org/en/japan. Also, as far as I know, well-staffed environmental desks at big newspapers are rare and there are no powerful environmental and climate NGOs that could put the topic on the agenda. Without Japanese media outlets that translate rather complex climate science for the public, it is not surprising to me that few pupils and students actually skip school. Another reason for the reluctance to skip school that I can think of is simply shying away from civil disobedience as a tool to voice dissatisfaction with politics.



I also have a question to everybody in this forum: Does #Scientists for Future exist anywhere outside the German speaking academia (Germany, Switzerland and Austria)?



Best regards,

Florentine Koppenborg



Technical University Munich

Germany