{"id":10762,"date":"2012-11-17T06:20:32","date_gmt":"2012-11-16T21:20:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=10762"},"modified":"2012-11-17T07:44:35","modified_gmt":"2012-11-16T22:44:35","slug":"archiving-tottoris-2005-jinken-ordinance-the-first-and-only-one-ever-passed-then-unpassed-penalizing-racial-discrimination-in-japan-to-keep-it-in-historical-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=10762","title":{"rendered":"Archiving Tottori’s 2005 Jinken Ordinance (the first and only one ever passed, then UNpassed, penalizing racial discrimination in Japan) to keep it in the historical record"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Hi Blog. Archiving something important today: The text of the first law explicitly against (inter alia<\/em>) racial discrimination in Japan that was passed (and then subsequently UNpassed by a panicky public). Although I have already written about this subject before<\/a>, let me give you the story in more detail, then finish with the text of the j\u014drei<\/em> so it does not disappear from the historical record.<\/p>\n

On October 12, 2005, after nearly a year of deliberations and amendments, the Tottori Prefectural Assembly approved a human rights ordinance (tottori-ken jinken shingai ky\u016bsai suishin oyobi tetsuzuki ni kansuru j\u014drei<\/em>) that would not only financially penalize eight types of human rights violations (including physical abuse, sexual harassment, slander, and discrimination by \u201crace\u201d \u2013 including \u201cblood race, ethnicity, creed, gender, social standing, family status, disability, illness, and sexual orientation\u201d), but also set up an investigative panel for deliberations and provide for public exposure of offenders<\/a>. \u00a0Going farther than the already-existing Ministry of Justice, Bureau of Human Rights (jinken y\u014dgobu<\/em>, which has no policing or punitive powers), it could launch investigations, require hearings and written explanations, issue private warnings (making them public if they went ignored), demand compensation for victims, remand cases to the courts, and even recommend cases to prosecutors if they thought there was a crime involved. It also had punitive powers, including fines up to 50,000 yen. Sponsored by Tottori Governor Katayama Yoshihiro, it was to be a trial measure — taking effect on June 1, 2006 and expiring on March 31, 2010. \u00a0It was a carefully-planned ordinance, created by a committee of 26 people over the course of two years, with input from a lawyer, several academics and human rights activists, and three non-citizen residents. It passed the Tottori Prefectural Assembly by a wide margin: 35-3.<\/p>\n

However, the counterattack was immediate. \u00a0The major local newspaper in the neighboring prefecture, the Ch\u016bgoku Shimbun (Hiroshima), claimed in its October 14 editorial entitled, “We must monitor this ordinance in practice,” that the ordinance would “in fact shackle (sokubaku<\/em>) human rights.” \u00a0Accusations flew that assemblypersons had not read the bill properly, or had supported abstract ideals without thinking them through. Others said the governor had not explained to the people properly what he was binding them to. \u00a0Internet petitions blossomed to kill the bill. \u00a0Some sample complaints (with my counterarguments in parenthesis, for brevity): \u00a0a) The ordinance had only been deliberated upon in the Assembly for a week (though it was first brought up in 2003 and discussed in committees throughout 2005); b) The ordinance\u2019s definitions of human rights violations were too vague, and could hinder the media in, for example, investigating politicians for corruption (even though the ordinance\u2019s Clause 31 clearly states that freedom of the press must be respected); c) Since the investigative committee was not an independent body, reporting only to the Governor, this could encourage arbitrary decisions and cover-ups (similar to the Bureau of Human Rights, which reports only to the secretive Ministry of Justice); d) This invests judicial and policing powers in an administrative organ, a violation of the separation of powers (which means that no oversight committee in Japan is allowed to have enforcement power — but this calls into question the many other ordinances in Japan, such as those governing garbage disposal, mandating fines and incarceration).<\/p>\n

The Japan Federation of Bar Associations (Nichibenren<\/em>) sounded the ordinance\u2019s death knell in its official statement of November 2, 2005: Too much power had been given the governor, constricting the people and media under arbitrary guidelines, under a committee chief who could investigate by diktat, overseeing a bureaucracy that could refuse to be investigated. \u00a0This called into question the policymaking discretion of the committees that had originally drafted it, and the common sense of the 35 Assemblymembers who overwhelmingly passed it. \u00a0The government issued an official Q&A to allay public concern, and the Governor said problems would be dealt with as they arose, but the original supporters of the ordinance, feeling the media-sponsored and internet-fomented pressure, did not stand up to defend it. \u00a0In December and January 2006, the prefecture convoked informal discussion groups containing the Vice-Governor, two court counselors, four academics, and five lawyers (but no human rights activists), where arguments to rescind the bill included how appointed untrained public administrators ostensibly cannot act as judges. \u00a0On March 24, 2006, less than six months after passing the ordiance, the Tottori Prefectural Assembly voted unanimously to suspend it indefinitely. \u00a0“We should have brought up cases to illustrate specific human rights violations. \u00a0The public did not seem to understand what we were trying to prevent,” said Mr. Ishiba, a representative of the Tottori Governor’s office. \u00a0“They should have held town meetings to raise awareness about what discrimination is, and created separate ordinances for each type of discrimination,” said Assemblywoman Ozaki Kaoru, who voted against the bill both times. \u00a0Governor Katayama resigned his governorship in April 2007, saying that ten years in office was enough. \u00a0The ordinance was later resubmitted to committees in 2007, where it was voted down for the last time. As of this writing, the text of the ordinance, Japan\u2019s first legislation explicitly penalizing racial discrimination, has been removed entirely from the Tottori Prefectural website.<\/p>\n

The fact that this former law has been removed entirely from the legislative record is a crime against history, and an unbefitting end to a template of human-rights legislation so needed in Japan. \u00a0So let me, for the purposes of keeping a record of the casualty of this catastrophic event, blog the entire text of the Ordinance on Debito.org to keep it web searchable:<\/p>\n

Courtesy http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20080329214102\/http:\/\/www.pref.tottori.jp\/jinken\/jorei-kyusai.html<\/a><\/p>\n

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