Why Japan’s Supreme Court ordered compensation for victims of forced sterilisation

Why was a law on eugenics brought in?

Coined in 1883 by British explorer and natural scientist Francis Galton, the term “eugenics” refers to selective breeding in races to produce offspring with “desirable” characteristics.

According to the US government’s National Human Genome Research Institute, “Eugenics is the scientifically inaccurate theory that humans can be improved through selective breeding of populations. Eugenicists believed… abstract human qualities (e.g., intelligence and social behaviors) were inherited in a simple fashion. Similarly, they believed complex diseases and disorders were solely the outcome of genetic inheritance.”

It adds, “The implementation of eugenics practices has caused widespread harm, particularly to populations that are being marginalized”. This includes non-white races, people with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ individuals.

Japan enacted the eugenics law in 1948 “to address the rapidly growing postwar population, allowing the government to sterilize individuals with hereditary, mental or physical disabilities in order to ‘prevent the birth of inferior offspring,’” according to The Japan Times.

What was Japan’s Eugenics Law?

Enacted in 1948 to prevent the increase of “inferior descendants”, the Eugenic Protection Law was in effect for nearly 48 years, until it was scrapped altogether in 1996. The law also stated that it aimed to protect the life and health of the mother.

The law defined “eugenic operation” as a surgical operation “which shall incapacitate a person for reproduction without removing their reproductive glands”.

Article 3 mentioned a physician operating with the consent of the person in question and their spouse, although it carved out significant exceptions.

For voluntary sterilisation, there were requirements. For instance, people with “hereditary psychopathy, bodily diseases, or hereditary malformations” could apply. Notably, the provision went a step further and allowed one’s spouse to act on their behalf in seeking a “eugenic operation.” If one’s partner was suffering from leprosy and was “liable to carry infection to their descendants”, they could also qualify.

The law was scrapped in 1996.

Who qualified for involuntary sterilisation?

Under Article 3, there were exceptions for the physician seeking consent for the procedure for minors and persons with “mental weaknesses”.

The mental illnesses and disorders mentioned on the list of “diseases” were then considered to be hereditary in nature, such as schizophrenia, epilepsy, deafness, ruptured hand or foot, albinism, haemophilia, and even “abnormal” sexual desires or criminal inclination.

The physicians could also apply for a patient’s eugenics operation, even in cases where they had a “psychosis or mental deficiency” that wasn’t hereditary or on the list, provided their guardian or parent consented to it.

According to a parliamentary report accessed by the BBC, victims as young as nine years old were forcibly sterilised under the law. “It’s believed that at least 25,000 people were sterilised in the 48 years the law was in place and, while few records remain of the time, it’s thought that at least 16,500 of those did not give consent,” BBC also reported.

What was the case before the court?

The court was acting on a batch of petitions filed by people forced to undergo sterilisation surgeries without their consent or awareness. Seeking compensation, they argued that the statute discriminated against persons with disabilities and denied them dignity.

The victims had been seeking justice for decades and had filed petitions in multiple cities, The Japan Times reported. It said 39 people had filed similar lawsuits before 12 district courts and their branches. Six people have passed away since the cases were filed.

However, courts were divided over a 20-year statute of limitation or time limit for the case to be brought to court. In 2019, the Sendai district court ruled that the eugenics law was unconstitutional but turned down the demand for compensation owing to the statute of limitations on seeking damages.

In 2019, the Japanese government also offered to compensate each victim with 3.2 million yen, but the victims contended it wasn’t sufficient.

Subsequently, in 2022, the Osaka High Court directed a 55 million yen compensation to be paid, adding that applying the statute of limitations would be unjust in this case.

What did the SC rule?

On July 3, Japan’s top court gave a unified ruling on five lawsuits filed by some of the 39 plaintiffs. It directed the government to pay 16.5 million yen to the victims and 2.2 million yen to their spouses.

It also overturned the 2019 Sendai court decision that dismissed the demand for compensation due to the statute of limitations, calling it “unacceptable” and “extremely contrary to the principles of justice and fairness”, CNN reported. The Japanese SC, presided over by Judge Saburo Tokura, also said the law “was significantly against the idea of respect for individual dignity and personality”.

Besides Japan, other countries that had involuntary sterilisation programmes include Germany, Sweden, the United States, and even India during the 1975 Emergency declared by then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.