Attempts to introduce the jury system in Japan’s colonial possessions

This chapter discusses the attempts to introduce the institution of jury service in the colonial possessions of the Japanese Empire. Its primary focus is on two of Japan’s colonies – Taiwan (where Japan’s pre-war Jury Act was never enforced) and Karafuto, the Japanese name for Sakhalin, where the Jury Act functioned without any modifications until it was suspended in mainland Japan in 1943. This chapter shows that at a time when in mainland Japan the defects of the system provided for by the Jury Act started being discussed, the nationals of the colonial possessions of the empire saw the notion of trial by laypersons as a source of hope for achieving justice and greater equality with the colonizers.