This seminar has three main goals: to help you to understand the functioning of the Japanese legal system; to acquaint you with Japanese written legal materials; and to develop your reading and discussion ability on topics of Japanese Law. This seminar is not designed to provide you with the skills necessary to deal with business law practice in Japan, but rather offers you an opportunity to think about and discuss the similarities and differences in how different legal system resolve legal disputes. For that purpose I would like to allocate sufficient time in the seminar for discussion of specific issues now facing Japan.
Japanese language ability is not pre-requisite for this seminar, but since you all speak Japanese, we should use Japanese as the language for discussion of the reading materials. I will try to use English only if necessary to avoid major misunderstandings. Of course, outside of class you can use English to ask me questions either in person or by e-mail. We should take the Japanese-only in class policy seriously since it is a great opportunity for you to use your Japanese, to develop your knowledge of Japanese legal terms and to become comfortable with legal discourse in Japanese.
The topics I will offer in the reading materials are collection of Japanese written legal materials such as fundamental legal treatises (kihonteki kyokasho), leading cases ( yumeina hanrei), statutes (Code provision), case reviews ( hanrei hyoshaku), articles form magazines and news paper and other materials. The legal areas I will cover are constitutional issues, the legal profession, legal reforms, the function of corporate legal advisors, contract law, tort law, administrative rules and interpretive guidelines, the administrative legal dispute system and criminal and civil procedures. You can expect to gain a deeper knowledge on the Japanese law and the difficult issues that Japanese legal system faces.