The U.S.-Asia Law Institute and Japanese Federation of Bar Associations celebrate 25 years of bringing Japanese public interest lawyers to NYU as visiting scholars. The program has “deepened our international sophistication beyond transactional law to include comparative perspectives on public interest lawyering,” says NYU Law Professor Emeritus Frank Upham.
Institute News: Japanese politician speaks to law students about women’s empowerment
Event Recording: The Future of U.S.-Japan Trade Relations
East Asia Forum: Towards marriage equality in Japan
Event Recording: Reforming the Global Public Health Regime: Asian Perspectives
Kyoto Congress 2020: Japan’s Criminal Justice System: from a Comparative Law Perspective.
This panel, as part of Kyoto Congress 2020 and organized by Japan’s Ministry of Justice presents a range of views and the discussion considers some fundamental issues concerning Japan's criminal justice system that underlie currently debates in Japan, such as balancing the (1) civil law inquisitorial tradition with a focus on "finding the truth" and the rehabilitation and reintegration of offenders into society with (2) increasing demands for greater emphasis on, and practical implementation of, rights of criminal defendants provided in the constitution. Notably, USALI Affiliated Scholar Bruce Aronson participated as a panelist in this event.
Watch here: http://www.un-congress.org/Session/View/ef0678bc-7b8e-437b-af96-10dffcafc810
The Asia Pacific Journal: Comparative Reflections on the Carlos Ghosn Case and Japanese Criminal Justice
The arrest and prosecution of Nissan executive Carlos Ghosn, together with his dramatic flight from Japan, have focused unprecedented attention on Japan’s criminal justice system. This article employs comparison with the United States to examine issues in Japanese criminal justice highlighted by the Ghosn case.
Event Recording: How Japan Justifies the Death Penalty
Event Recording: COVID's Challenge to Japan and Korea
Event Recording: World War II Reparations in Contemporary East Asia
Tim Webster, a professor of law, has dedicated many years to exploring the law, sociology, and politics of East Asia's World War II reparations movements -- which are still ongoing 75 years after the war’s end. Why are the last surviving war victims in Asia and their families still pursuing claims for reparations? Professor Webster will give an overview of the major legal cases, settlement agreements, international treaties, efforts by civil society organizations, and political negotiations to allocate liability for World War II.
Carlos Ghosn and Japan’s ‘99% Conviction Rate’
USALI Affiliated Scholar Bruce Aronson’s article on Japan’s criminal justice system was featured in The Diplomat. This article examines Japan’s criminal justice system from a comparative perspective and reveals the nuance behind an often-cited statistic.
Affiliated Scholar Bruce Aronson analyzes the Ghosn case in The Diplomat.
Affiliated Scholar Bruce Aronson talks about Carlos Ghosn's attack against Japan's criminal justice system on Bloomberg TV
Bruce Aronson, affiliated scholar at the U.S.-Asia Law Institute of New York University School of Law, talks about Carlos Ghosn's attack against Japan’s criminal justice system. “I was brutally taken from my world as I knew it,” the former head of Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA said in Beirut. Aronson, who is an outside director of Japanese Japanese pharmaceutical company Eisai Co. and has been tenured professor of law at universities in the U.S. and Japan, speaks on "Bloomberg Daybreak: Australia."
Further reading: The Diplomat: Is Nissan a Japanese Company? by Affiliated Scholar Bruce Aronson.
Original interview on Bloomberg.
Event Recap: Exonerated! From Central Park to East Asia
Wrongful convictions occur in every jurisdiction, and legal professionals around the world should collaborate to redress and prevent them. That was the message of ‘Exonerated! From Central Park to East Asia,’ a speaker event held at the law school on Tuesday, October 8, 2019 by the U.S.-Asia Law Institute (USALI) and co-sponsored by the Center on the Administration of Criminal Law and Asia Law Society.
China Law & Policy Podcast: Frank Upham - Our Man in Wuhan
On May 29, 2019 Elizabeth Lynch interviewed NYU Law Professor Frank Upham in observance of the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre. The interview details how in 1989 Professor Upham was a researcher at Wuhan University faculty of law and as a result witnessed the pro-democracy protests that were also occurring in Wuhan, the capital of China’s Hubei Province. Listen / Read Transcript of the Podcast here.
"An American Perspective on Capital Punishment in Japan"
In May 2019 “An American Perspective on Capital Punishment in Japan” written by David T. Johnson, Professor of University of Hawaii at Mano’a was published. This volume was edited by Kana Sasakura Professor of Law at Konan University and Wrongful Convictions Program participant.
About the publication:
The death penalty of Aum Shinrinkyo’s Shoko Asahara is one of the most notable instances of capital punishment in Japan. Among modernized countries, Japan and the United States are exceptions for exception amoungst developed countries. This publication provides detailed analysis of the secret execution, the culture of denial in Japanese criminal justice, and the Japanese political society surrounding the death penalty system.
Introduction
Japanese-language reviews and articles:
The Diplomat: "Is Nissan a Japanese Company?"
At this stage the basic facts surrounding the case against former Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn remain unclear. It is too early to decide between the two diametrically opposed narratives that have been offered to date: (1) Ghosn is a greedy autocrat who violated laws and company rules to enrich himself at the expense of the company and its stakeholders or (2) Nissan management, aided by inadequate protections for the accused under Japanese law and by the Japanese government, undertook a coup d’etat to rid Nissan of Renault’s control. We may ultimately discover that this case contains elements of both narratives.