"Litigation in Japan and the Modernisation Thesis" [2010] ELECD 158; in Tanase, Takao; Nottage, Luke; Wolff, Leon (eds), "Community and the Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2010)

Book Title: Community and the Law

Editor(s): Tanase, Takao; Nottage, Luke; Wolff, Leon

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781848447851

Section: Chapter 8

Section Title: Litigation in Japan and the Modernisation Thesis

Number of pages: 24

Extract:

8. Litigation in Japan and the
modernisation thesis

1. JUDICIAL REFORM AND THE REMODELING OF
JAPANESE SOCIETY
In June 2001, the Judicial Reform Council (JRC) handed down its Final
Report.1 The reforms it proposed were sweeping. It recommended tripling the
number of lawyers admitted to practice each year, improved access to justice,
and popular participation in civil and criminal trials. The impetus for the JRC
recommendations was an acknowledgement by the ruling Liberal Democratic
Party (LDP) and the business sector that Japan needed to build greater capac-
ity into the Japanese legal system to enhance Japan's ability to compete in an
increasingly globalised economy.
The judicial reform process coincided with changing attitudes to law and
litigation. The general antipathy to litigation has broken down, as Japanese
turn to the courts in greater numbers, filing mass claims against firms for envi-
ronmental damage and defective blood products as well as individual disputes
for medical malpractice and workplace bullying. A spate of legislative initia-
tives has tackled new and emerging social problems, such as domestic
violence and stalking. Never before has law played a more visible role in
Japanese society.
This represents a major transformation in Japan, especially considering that
Japan effectively industrialised without the benefit of law. Such an expanded
place for law may also reflect the growing impact of globalisation in an era when,
according to a report from the LDP, `the world is being united through market
principles, freedom and democracy' (LDP Legal System Investigatory Council,
1997). ...