‘Having choice’ is the point: Randstad exec on same-sex marriage, surname system in Japan

TOKYO — Jos Schut, Chief Human Resources Officer of the Japanese arm of world-leading employment services company Randstad, is an avid supporter of sexual minorities’ human rights, for both professional and personal reasons. As a global company executive and an openly gay man, he believes that excluding any minority group only harms business as well as society.

Originally from the socially liberal Netherlands, Schut came to Japan in March 2022 after assuming his current position the year before on the urgent business visa, which was applied due to COVID-19 border controls at the time. However, under Japanese law, which does not recognize same-sex married couples, his husband was not granted a visa to come to Japan with him. Schut was told that the only way for his partner of 28 years to receive a visa was to enter the country as a tourist and apply for one locally, but because the border was shut down due to the pandemic, no tourists were allowed entry to Japan at the time.

“So, I got on this catch-22. I had a visa, my ‘wife’ could come, but (since) he’s a man … he should come as a tourist. … He couldn’t because tourists were not allowed. So, we were stuck,” Schut recalled. While he believes that it wasn’t intentionally done to discriminate, the fact that the system did not anticipate couples like him and his partner caught him off guard.

With help from the Japanese Embassy in the Hague and the Dutch Embassy in Tokyo, Schut managed to convince the Japanese immigration bureau that he and his husband were in “a stable relationship,” and finally the couple were able to enter Japan together three months later, with the “special designated activities” visa for his husband.

Schut told the Mainichi Shimbun that the whole experience was “frustrating” and that he was “disappointed.” He added that though he’s confident about who he is now, it would have been harder if he was younger and still struggled with his identity, and that he didn’t want anyone to experience what he went through.

Asked whether Japan could legalize same-sex marriage under the current conservative government, Schut said, without hesitation, “I think the Japan government can do it,” but he believes the changes will be made “under the pressure of the G7 (Group of Seven)” as the Japanese government “is a bit of a traditional old man community” and has “a disconnect with young generations.”

While the Netherlands was the first in the world to legalize same-sex marriage in 2001, and Schut had been active back home in promoting the change, he and his partner did not tie the knot right away. “That was not the point,” he said, but emphasized, “The fact that you had the choice. It’s not about every same-sex couple wants to get married or even has to. It’s (about) simply having the opportunity.”

As a strong believer in choice, Schut also questions Japan’s surname system in which a married couple must share a single last name and over 90% of couples adopt the husband’s surname, saying that people “should be free to choose.” He believes that when people are not given the opportunity to choose and forced to act a certain way, it “creates a hurdle” that they have to overcome, meaning that they must put the energy there instead of working to reach their full potential, and this, he argues, not only harms society as a whole, but also business.

His company also places major emphasis on “equity” rather than “equality,” and Schut says women’s empowerment is a “very important topic.” Since assuming the current position, Schut has made sure that an equal number of men and women became candidates when a leadership position opened and that employees return to their original posts after taking maternity or paternity leave.

While he stressed that “women can absolutely be successful,” Schut also admits that Japanese society creates extra hurdles for women because of expectations to look after children and elderly members of the family, and he points out that the representation in the country is not helping the situation.

“It is important in society that women see that you can be a leader as a female (and) that you can have a career,” he said. At the same time, Schut emphasized that this is not just a women’s issue, as “opportunities for women depend also on men in society.” While he praised the Japanese government’s initiatives to encourage men to take paternity leave, he also recognizes the social pressure on men not to take it. On this, Schut again emphasized the importance of having role models, and “educating society” to raise awareness so that everyone, whether women, men or members of minority groups, can realize their full potential.

(Interview by Haruka Takaba, The Mainichi staff writer)

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Schut was born in 1968. He assumed his post as Randstad K.K.’s chief human resources officer in January 2021, and has been living in Japan with his husband since May 2022.