The scandal surrounding top prosecutor Hiromu Kurokawa has kicked off a debate on retirement ages and interference in Japan's civil service.

Identity-based discrimination is a part of Japanese law, but could our own experiences with the new coronavirus become part of our identity?

With data privacy being a huge issue, you may feel uneasy about hotels photocopying your passport. However, Colin P.A. Jones says the rule is more about bureaucratic culture than privacy.

If I had to identify one event in the Carlos Ghosn case indicitave of concern for foreign perceptions of Japan's criminal justice system, it would be the decision to grant him bail.

The separation of church and state in Japan comes under scrutiny in the new era. However, we've been down this road before.

Three Tepco executives are acquitted of criminal negligence in the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant disaster. Did the court recognize the unfairness of holding only three people responsible for a crisis that had much broader causes?

The textbooks students in Japan use to learn wrong from right are filled with stories of invoices, citizen committees, petitions and other cool stuff kids like.

One convenient thing about Japanese law for those of us who are professors of it is that it is quite modern. Virtually all Japanese laws and institutions antedate the Meiji Restoration of 1868 and, of those, most have a 20th-century provenance. Compared to Anglo-American ...

It is odd to stand at an iconic place few can ever visit. There on Mount Suribachi where the American flag was raised over Iwo Jima, I am embarrassed to report my first thought on looking out across at the military airport we landed ...

With Emperor Akihito abdicating on April 30, the Heisei Era that began Jan. 8, 1989, after his father's death will also come to an end. With this column I'd like to look back at some of the noteworthy changes that occurred to Japan's laws ...