Who: Bill to lower voting age from 20 to 18
What: Passed in Parliament of Japan (Diet)
When: 17 June 2015
Parliament of Japan (Diet) on 17 June 2015 passed a bill to lower the voting age from 20 to 18. The bill that seeks revision of the public office election law was passed by the House of Councilors (upper house) after being approved in the House of Representatives (lower house).
The legislation will come into effect during the 2016 Upper House Election and will add about 2.4 million new potential voters to Japan’s current voting population of 104 million.

The passage of the bill follows a law passed in 2014 that sought to lower the voting age to 18 years in 2018 for national referendums on the Constitution.

Last time, Japan lowered the age of voting from 25 to 20 and gave voting rights to women in 1945 after the World War II.