earticle

영어

This study has been conducted with the purposes of introducing the contents and the status of the Labor Adjudication System in Japan, which has been in effect for more than 10 years, and of evaluating the possible lessons from the Japanese system for Korea, by analyzing several issues currently debated under the Japanese system. The Japanese Labor Adjudication System refers to the system implemented under the Labor Adjudication Act, enacted April 1, 2006, with the purpose of speedy and fair adjudication of individual labor disputes by the court. This system has been implemented and put into use very fast, and been praised by Japanese practitioners and parties to labor issues as one of the most successful systems created by the legal system reform efforts. However, despite theses extremely positive reviews in Japan, it is still true that this system has its fair share of problems. Specifically, although this is a system introduced as an adjudication system by the court, there has been a tendency to resolve the disputes through monetary awards, rather than through declaration of rights and obligations based on the law, while emphasizing that this is a system designed to provide flexible solutions on a case by case basis. These so-called flexible solutions that are not based on legal concepts, the author believes, are somewhat contrary to the notion of law as justice, especially in cases of wrongful termination where there is a close connection to the worker’s life. In Korea, there have been some efforts to introduce the European style labor court as a vehicle to resolve individual disputes. As such, Korea should pay a close attention to these problems identified in this paper.