Japan: Responsibility and Liability of Digital Platforms; Corporate Law Reform and Profitability

Abstract

On 25 March 2019 the Hamburg Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law hosted a further installment of its annual lecture program “Current Developments in Japanese Law”, in cooperation with the German-Japanese Association of Jurists. The half-day symposium under the moderation of Harald Baum and Moritz Bälz featured (among other elements) the following two lectures: Professor Souichirou Kozuka (Gakushūin University, Tōkyō) started the conference with a comprehensive analysis of the Japanese government’s introduction of business rules concerning digital platforms in its Growth Strategy 2018. This initiative was a response to the ever-greater role these platforms play in the digital economy. Japan has decided to employ primarily the Antimonopoly Act for the purpose of regulating the relationship between platform operators and retailers (business users), and also to monitor how well the voluntary arrangements work in protecting consumers' interests vis-à-vis platforms. Thereafter, the lecture presented by Professor Akira Tokutsu (Tōhoku University, Sendai) surveyed the fundamental goals behind the Japanese Companies Act Reform as well as two new soft laws, the Corporate Governance Code and the Stewardship Code. Japan’s present government has set efficiency – particularly increasing corporate income and fostering innovation – as the goal of corporate governance reforms, which raises the question whether the recent corporate governance reforms actually did increase profitability. The lectures are presented here in slightly revised versions.