Responses of Japanese tax law to the global economy – Theme of J.Japan.L. 47/2019
The current issue of the Journal of Japanese Law features four contributions focusing on current developments in Japanese tax law. The issue also includes articles on reforms to the Japanese Corporate Governance Code and on harmonization in competition law. Prof. Dr. Harald Baum, head of the Institute’s Centre of Excellence for Japan, is one of the executive editors of J.Japan.L.
The rise of new forms of economic activity such as the sharing economy poses novel challenges to national tax law, as does the growing problem of the transfer of profits for purposes of tax evasion. Four contributions to the new issue 47/2019 of J.Japan.L. deal with the responses of Japanese tax law to these recent developments. The articles address a legislative initiative for an anti-avoidance regime (Keiji Aoyama), the G20 countries’ BEPS project to combat profit reduction and profit shifting by multinational corporations (Takayuki Kozu), and newly emerging tax issues in the sharing economy (Tetsuya Watanabe and Yumi Nishiyama). The articles originate from the comparative law symposium “Global Economy and the Answers of Tax Law in Japan and Germany”, which Waseda University hosted in Tōkyō in 2018 in cooperation with the German-Japanese Association of Jurists (DJJV).
Another article in the current issue of J.Japan.L., written by John Buchanan, Dominic H. Chai and Simon Deakin, also tackles the reforms to its corporate governance regime that Japan implemented in 2014 and 2015. The principal measures adopted were the creation of a Corporate Governance Code, revisions to the Companies Law, and the introduction of a Stewardship Code, together with a report (the Itō Review) on corporative competitiveness and incentives for growth. The article analyses the objectives of these reforms and assesses their prospects of success, drawing on the authors’ interviews with decision-makers in Japanese government, finance and industry.
A further article reports on Asia’s experiences with legal assistance in the field of competition law. As author Shuya Hayashi demonstrates, differences in local situations mean that introducing solely Western models of competition law frameworks, which currently prioritise ensuring free competition and efficient markets, is not a promising approach. In this regard, he suggests that the Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) develop a better thought out strategy of assistance involving medium- and long-term projects.
The Journal of Japanese Law is the world’s only Western-language publication that offers regular, timely and conceptually consistent documentation and analysis of the myriad lines of development in Japanese law, making these developments broadly accessible through a methodologically and formally comprehensive approach.
Prof. Dr. Harald Baum, Head of the Japan Unit at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, founded the journal in 1996. Since 2004, J.Japan.L. has been published by the Max Planck Institute in Hamburg in cooperation with the Deutsch-Japanischen Juristenvereinigung .
Contents of Issue 47/2019:
Symposium
Global Economy and the Answers of Tax Law in Japan and Germany Keiji Aoyama: A Japanese Response to the OECD’s Base Erosion and Profit Shifting Project Takayuki Kozu: Recent Trends in Tax Management in Japan Tetsuya Watanabe: Taxation of the Sharing Economy in Japan Yumi Nishiyama: The Collaborative Economy and VAT/Consumption Tax
Articles
John Buchanan, Dominic H. Chai, Simon Deakin: Taking a Horse to Water?
James Claxton, Luke Nottage, Nobumichi Teramura: Developing Japan as a Regional Hub for International Dispute Resolution Shuya Hayashi: International Cooperation and Harmonization in Competition Law
Julian Hinz: Das Recht der Mediation im japanisch-deutschen Vergleich
Peter Kirby: Robert Beadon and the Japanese Jury System Debate of 1878–1880
Lectures
Oliver Remien: Internationale Reformen des Verjährungsrechts und die japanische Neuregelung in den Artikeln 144 ff. Minpō 2020 Kunihiro Nakata: Die Modernisierung des Rechts der Willenserklärungen in Japan
Documentation
Keiko Ishikawa, Tobias Schiebe: The Japanese Work-Style Reform 2019
Case Law
Gabriele Koziol: Überblick über wichtige zivilrechtliche Entscheidungen des japanischen Obersten Gerichtshofs aus dem Jahre 2017
Reviews
Carsten Griebeler: KEIICHI YAMANAKA: Einführung in das japanische Strafrecht. Strafrecht auf der Basis der japanischen Sozialstruktur
Harald Baum: KEIZO YAMAMOTO: Grundzüge des japanischen Schadensersatzrechts
Izumi Kurita: EIJI TAKAHASHI Nihon to doitsu ni okeru kabushiki kaisha-hō no hatten [Die Entwicklung des deutschen und des japanischen Aktienrechts]
Reports
Moritz Bälz: Die Sicherung des Rechtsstaates New Books New books on Japanese law in Western languages
