Japanese Family Law and laws

See also our section on the Freedom of Information Act for more information on the related laws.

Information on this page is based on research and actual experiences of people in and out of Japan.  But none of this was written by a lawyer and none of it should substitute for real legal advice.  We do not guarantee its accuracy.  Please confirm all information with your own lawyer.

Essays

• KNOW THIS: Overview of the Family Registration (koseki) system in Japan
• KNOW THIS: Overview of the Residency Registration (jyuminhyou) system in Japan
• FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions about Japanese Law.  (Please send your questions to webmaster28493 <AT crnjapan.com)
• Possible Japanese Criminal Penalties for Child Abduction To Japan
• How to Get a Foreign Divorce Recognized in Japan
• List of Interesting Japanese Court Cases Related to Children's Rights
• Overview of the Japanese Family Court
  • Words of advice and precedents for Japanese Family Court
  • Filing a lawsuit in Japan to enforce a judgment overseas
  • Possible Alternative Legal Approaches
  • Applying Foreign Laws In Japan
• Common Japanese Legal Forms
• Forged Signatures on Divorce and Child Custody Agreements
• Child Birth and Child Support
• Extradition Treaties between Japan and Other Countries
• Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments on Child Custody Cases In Japan by Judge Sumiko Ikemoto. Footnotes by William M Hilton
• Serving Process in Japan for Foreign Court Proceedings
• Contents Registered Mail: 内容証明郵便 (Naiyou Shoumei Yuubin)
• Visas and Permanent Residency
  • When You Are Afraid Your Japanese Spouse Will Not Sign Your Spouse Visa Guarantor Form
  • Petition Campaign to Amend Immigration Rules Concerning Granting of Residency/Permanent Visa for Foreign Parents of Japanese Children
• Inheritance and Wills for a Japanese child when one parent is non-Japanese
• Good Japanese Court Rulings and the Judges Who Make Them
• Bad Japanese Court Rulings and the Judges Who Make Them

External Essays

• In the Best Interests of the Court: What American Lawyers Need to Know about Child Custody and Visitation in Japan; Colin P.A. Jones; Asian Pacific Law and Policy Journal, University of Hawaii; Volume 8, Issue 2, Spring 2007.  The first sentence is "Japan is a haven for parental child abduction."  This may finally be what you need to convince your lawyer or a judge of  the fact that you and your child's rights could be violated simply by allowing a parent to take your child to Japan to visit, much less to relocate. (cached copy)

• Marbury v. Madison and The Matrix: What Child Custody and Visitation in Japan Show us about the Japanese Court System; Colin P.A. Jones;  - Written by a western lawyer who is fluent in Japanese, this is the best overview available of the problems with Japanese family law.  Published on the website of the Australian Network for Japanese Law. (cached copy)

• Comparative Dispute Management: Court-connected Mediation in Japan and Germany; Funken, Katja; German Law Journal Vol. 3 No. 2 (01 February 2002) - Private Law (cached copy)

• Resolution of Disputes over Parental Rights and Duties in a Marital Dissolution Case in Japan: A Nonlitigious Approach in Chotei (Family Court Mediation); Minamikata, Satoshi; Family Law Quarterly, Vol 39, No 2; p. 489; Summer 2005.  (local copy)

• International Commercial Litigation in Japan - A MUST READ article that goes over many aspects of commercial law, such as how to gather evidence, that are likely applicable to civil trials also.

Online Versions of Laws

The modern Japanese legal system is based largely on the Anglo-American tradition, with some influence from the 19th century when French and German legal systems.  Japan operates under the so-called Six Codes (Roppo):

• the Constitution
• the Civil Code (Minpou 民法)
• the Code of Civil Procedure
• the Penal Code (keihou 刑法)
• the Code of Criminal Procedure
• the Commercial Code

Japan does not yet have official English translations of her laws.  As there are often several translations of a law available, if you know of a better one, please let us know and we will consider using that instead.  Where you see Composite, it means that we have combined the best aspects of various versions to make our own version.  Any version labeled with a star (*) has unique features that may be worth looking at.

We keep a local copy just in case the original link goes away, or it may be the original combined into a single page for easier printing.  But laws do change, so we strongly suggest that you use the original if possible, and confirm anything critical in an up to date version of the original Japanese on an official government site (See note *0) or better yet with a Japanese lawyer.

(*0) If you read Japanese, the Ministry of General Affairs maintains an authoritative version of all laws in Japanese.  [Ed: I will be replacing all "source" references in the table below, with links into this system as soon as I get time.]

(*1) According to Japan 's 2nd Periodic Report to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, " There are no nationality requirements in the provisions of the Child Welfare Law, the Child Allowance Law, the Child-Rearing Allowance Law or the Special Child-Rearing Allowance Law. These laws do not lead to any difference in the treatment of children according to nationality."

(*2) Also according to the same source as in (*1) Articles 2 and 3 of the Child Welfare Law and Article 3 of the Maternal and Child Health Law "assume that a child’s best interest is to be considered in each individual case."

(*3) According to Japan's original Report to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.

(*4) Only French is available.

Resources

• Australian Network for Japanese Law - Might be a good place to get an article about these problems published. See guidelines. People there might also be helpful if you asked.
• List of Law Libraries in Japan, and much other information.
• More Japanese law links in English
• Japanese LawLinks page
• http://www.senrei.com/
• Addresses of local Bar Associations in Japan
• Hourei Date Teikyo System (Current Law Database)   Japanese versions of what appears to be all laws, maintained by the Ministry of General Affairs.  It is the first case in Japan to produce consolidated code on the web for the public without a fee.  The data comes to the web two or three months after enacting a new law or amending a code on the diet.  The database includes over six thousand laws, regulations, directions and orders from the ministry.
• Japan Law Online (in Japanese)  - Cant tell if its got everything, but there is A LOT!!
• This company publishes English versions of most Japanese laws, and seems to be just about as official a source as you can get. Here is a list of available titles,  which if you cant find them anywhere else, have been known to be available at a government bookstore near the Otemachi branch of Tokyo Immigration office.
• Update to Japanese Law via the Internet by Dr. Makoto Ibusuki, Professor of Law, Department of Law and Policy, Kagoshima University, Japan.- A very good overview of Japanese legal resources on the internet, many referenced here, although some links are inoperative.
• English Translations of Japanese Laws in Japanese but with an introduction in English.
• Links to more sites with information on Japanese laws in English
• Japanese Legal Research at University of Washington - some good links for English and Japanese law information
• In 2001, the Japanese Supreme Court (English version home page) started their service to produce full-text data of official case reports which have been published since 1947. It also has a full-text search capability on the site. Some famous and old Supreme Court cases have been translated into English and are available on this site. A private site, Kihon-page (meaning basic cases - site seems to have disappeared), also provides Supreme Court cases, which have been published in the Official Court Report (Saibansho-jihou) since 1995. The resources on their web for Supreme Court cases before 1995 are limited.  (Also see the "Cases" section on our site which has links to specific Supreme Court cases that are related to Children's Rights in Japan.)
• In May 1999, the Japanese Diet passed the Freedom of Information Act. Before the legislation was enacted, many governmental sites had started to provide their information via the Internet. On the web, there are numerous resources for government information. The best way to search for the information is to locate and check on the Clearing System (link seems to be gone). This site is a meta-search engine designed for searching the information contained in the central government sites and local government sites. Some useful web resources are introduced here. Japanese Crime Statistics is provided at http://web-japan.org/stat/category_14.html. The Japanese Census is available at http://web-japan.org/stat/category_01.html.
• Japanese Law (Finance related laws in English) - An English language resource from Mizuho Securities
• Meiji University Collection of pointers to English laws. - good but few family laws
• Home Page:Seeman's Japan Law - English translation of mostly commercial law
• Also easier to use list of several Japanese laws here.
• Japan Information Access Project - a variety of information on Japanese laws and politics

Articles

• Japanese Justice: Confess and be done with it; The Economist; February 8, 2007. This articles shows that not just family law in Japan is pretty messed up.  One common theme seems to be that judges are evaluated on how quickly they clear their case loads, which in family law, leads to judges not spending much time in proceedings they will eventually rule on.  In criminal law, a 99.9% conviction rate of defendants brought before judges, 95% of whom have already confessed and a suspiciously high number of suspects dying during up to 23 days of detention without contact with the outside world.

Other Information

Notes From Japan's 1996 report to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child

The Constitution protects the fundamental rights of children as well. Especially in the interests of children, the Child Welfare Law was established in 1947 in recognition of the need to promote child welfare both in mind and body. Article 1 of the Child Welfare Law provides that "all people shall strive to ensure the sound birth and growth of children, both in mind and body. The livelihood of each and every child shall equally be guaranteed and protected". This provision not only elucidates that all people as members of society, including parents, guardians and teachers, have responsibility for sound child rearing, considering the best interests of the child in each individual case, but also upholds that each child must be respected as a human being so as to enjoy the fundamental human rights equally without any discrimination in that respect. Article 2 of the said Law prescribes that "the State and local public entities bear responsibility for the sound mental and physical growth of children", explicitly defining the duty of the State and local public entities for child welfare. In addition, article 3 of the said Law stipulates that "the principles stipulated in the preceding two articles guarantee the welfare of children and shall be observed at all times in the enforcement of all laws and ordinances concerning children", clarifying that the principles of child welfare as provided for in articles 1 and 2 must be respected in the execution of any law or ordinance relating to children, not only the Child Welfare Law. The Japanese Government, under such basic principles which conform to the spirit of the Convention, has been developing various measures relating to welfare and education, etc.

The protection of fundamental human rights is the important pillar of the Constitution of Japan, of which article 97 stipulates that fundamental human rights are "conferred upon this and future generations in trust, to be held for all time inviolate". These fundamental human rights include: (i) civil liberties such as the right to liberty and the rights to freedom of expression, thought, conscience and religion; (ii) social rights such as the right to receive education and the right to maintain the minimum standards of wholesome and cultured living.

Notes From Japan's 2001 report to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child

There was a law partially amending the Child Welfare Law and other relevant laws enacted in June 1997

In February 2001, Japan’s Action Plan against Commercial and Sexual Exploitation of Children was developed. The plan is a compilation of measures for the prevention of commercial sexual exploitation of children such as child prostitution or child pornography, law enforcement in this area, and rehabilitation of child victims of such acts

At the time of Japan’s ratification of the Convention, the Supreme Court sent a notification entitled “Promulgation and Effectuation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child” to high courts, district courts and family courts, with the aim of acquainting judges and other officers concerned with the contents of the Convention. Furthermore, judges are supposed to deepen their understanding of children’s rights through curricula dedicated to various training programmes, including joint research on juvenile delinquency cases, problems concerning child custody, etc. and lectures on media reports on juvenile cases and human rights. In principle, anyone preparing to become a judge, prosecutor or lawyer needs to attend judicial training at the Judicial Research and Training Institute in order to obtain a licence to exercise a legal profession. During this legal training, lectures are given on children’s rights, references are made to the objectives, contents and implementation of the Convention, including the 1994 report issued by the Japanese Government, the NGO report issued in 1994, and the concluding observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child on the initial report of Japan made in 1998. There is also a curriculum on precedents of juvenile delinquency cases or cases of disputes over child custody. Thus trainees are given the chance to learn about children’s rights, protection and welfare of children. In these training programmes for judges and curricula for legal training, judges and trainees learn the significance of fully considering the interests of children, encouraging children to express their own intentions in cases, as well as taking these into consideration.

TO ADD

住居表示に関する法律（昭和三十七年五月十日法律第百十九号）

住居表示に関する法律施行令（昭和四十二年八月十日政令第二百四十六号）