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Paper short abstract:

We analyze the recent Japanese labor reform and, more specifically, the working-time reform by focusing on the judicialization process. We question the role of the judicial system in policy-making analyzing the factors, procedures and context of judicial-decision implementation.

Paper long abstract:

This paper starts from the observation that individual labor disputes have increased in recent decades. To cite just a few examples: legal recourse for karôshi and karôjisatsu cases (death or suicide due to overwork), legal recourse for unpaid overtime, litigation for psychological and sexual harassment, and more recently court decisions in favor of workers discriminated against on their basis of their status (“equal work for equal pay”). In 2018, the Japanese government implemented a major labor reform called hatarakikata kaikaku, the work-style reform. To what extent do court decisions play a role in this policy-making process? To answer this question, we analyze this recent labor reform and, more specifically, the working-time reform by focusing on the judicialization process. We use the concept of “judicialization” based on a simple definition: "increased recourse to the judicial institution to settle disputes" (Pélisse, 2018, p.1). We question the role of the judicial system in policy-making focusing on the factors, procedures and context of judicial-decision implementation through legislative and political process. Media coverage and political salience are also closely analyzed. We focus on cases of karôshi and karôjisatsu, as they crystallize a number of crucial questions related to work organization, managerial practices, and social norms, and their resolution through courts to by pass organizational and administrative barriers in the recognition of the victims rights to compensation. The purpose of the legal mobilization against karôshi/karôjisatsu is threefold: compensation for workers and recognition of work-related illness, implementation of measures aimed at preventing karôshi, and labor law reform - particularly working-time regulation reform. While the link between judicial decisions rendered in karôshi/karôjisatsu trials and the professional disease recognition reform between 1987 and 2010 is well analyzed, the precise role played by the judicial institution in the legislative and regulatory initiative is less so.