2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
Balancing Security, Order and Human Rights in Japanese Prisons
| Project/Area Number |
26780084
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
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| Allocation Type | Multi-year Fund |
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| Research Field |
Politics
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| Research Institution | Kyoto University |
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Principal Investigator |
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| Project Period (FY) |
2014-04-01 – 2016-03-31
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| Keywords | 日本の刑務所 / 人権 / 被拘禁者取扱いのための標準最低規則 / 国連 / 社会安全・秩序 / 名古屋刑務所事件 / 監獄法 |
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| Outline of Final Research Achievements |
Focusing on the political events triggered by a sequence of inmate injuries and fatalities in Nagoya Prison which culminated in the 2005/6 reform of the 1908 Prison Law, I showed that while many of the successes of Japanese prison management are the result of the high degree of discretion given to individual guards, this kind of discretion can easily become systematically abused. Furthermore, I showed the capability of the Japanese legislature to hold the bureaucracy to account when called to do so. Specifically, I demonstrated how the Nagoya Prison abuses were noticed and responded to by the legislature following a tenacious campaign by prisoners' rights activists and their allies in the opposition parties. The politicians both responded to external inputs and realised their dominance in the political decision-making. This observation is important given the ongoing debates about who governs Japan, in which the bureaucracy was long seen as the predominant force.
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| Free Research Field |
日本政治
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