The School of Law held the Law in Japan Program, a short-term summer course for foreign students to learn about Japanese law and legal systems in English. Usually the program is held only once a year but the number of people applying to participate has been on the rise so this year, the ninth year, we held the program twice: session 1 (July 3 to July 14) and session 2 (July 28 to August 9).
The people eligible to participate are overseas undergraduate students, graduate students, and working adults over the age of 18. Legal knowledge is not required. Twenty-nine students from 9 countries, including students from De La Salle University in the Philippines, an international partner institution of the School of Law’s exchange program, participated in session 1 and 21 students from 15 countries, including students from Nanjing Normal University (China) and University of Sao Paulo (Brazil), also international partner institutions of the same program, and in addition 9 students from this university’s School of Law participated in session 2.
This time a record 50 people from 21 countries participated in the two sessions combined and a majority of these, 42 people, were participants that have legal knowledge, for example people who major in law. Furthermore, in the context of a higher number of participants from Asian countries than usual, this year the program welcomed students from Argentina, Morocco, Norway, Sweden, Bangladesh, Kazakhstan, etc. for the first time.
This program comprised 26 hours of lectures and 12 hours of field trips. The lectures covered a wide range of fields including the constitution, judicial system, criminal law, civil law, family law, intellectual property law, tax law, international law, competition law, labor law, system of legal professionals, law and IT, and law and business, and the students exchanged views while comparing the legal systems of their home countries and Japan. Field trips were taken to the Tokyo Stock Exchange, a law firm, corporate legal department, the Japan Patent Office, the Intellectual Property High Court, the Bank of Japan, the Legislative Bureau of the House of Representatives, etc. The students deepened their understanding by adding substance to the knowledge gained during the lectures.
On the final day, a ceremony to award certificates of completion and a farewell party were held. Participants, program teachers, and School of Law students who supported the program enjoyed sharing their experiences and outcomes of the two-week program.
A student from Stockholm University in Sweden who participated in session 1 talked about the background to their participation, saying “I am majoring in law at university, so I searched for an overseas university where I could use my summer vacation to study law for a short time. I found the Meiji University’s program on the Internet and that is how I gained this opportunity to study.” A student from the Faculty of Law at the University of Hong Kong looked back on the program, saying “I don’t have many opportunities to go to prisons overseas. Visiting Yokohama Prison was a valuable experience.”
In academic year 2018, the 10th anniversary of the program, we plan to welcome new students in the summer and hold the program again.
