Japan's Power Harassment Prevention Law — Mandatory Anti-Harassment Policy for Every Employer

Japan's 2020 amendment to the Act on Comprehensive Promotion of Labor Measures gave the country its first legal definition of 'power harassment' (pawahara): conduct that exploits a position of workplace superiority, exceeds what is necessary for business purposes, and harms the working environment. It took effect for large employers in June 2020 and became mandatory for small and medium enterprises in April 2022. Covered employers, administered by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), must adopt a written anti-harassment policy, operate a consultation and complaints desk, respond to reported incidents, and are barred from disadvantaging any employee who reports harassment. The law creates no criminal penalties or direct fines for non-compliance — MHLW's strongest enforcement tool is administrative guidance and public disclosure ('naming and shaming') of non-compliant employers.
MHLW's own commissioned national survey found the share of employees reporting power harassment in the previous three years eased slightly from 32.5% in 2016 to 31.4% in 2020, and prefectural Labour Bureau consultations in the 'bullying/harassment' category fell from about 87,570 in FY2019 to 54,987 in FY2024. In the same 2020 survey, 48.2% of companies said they had received power-harassment-related consultations in the previous three years, the highest share of any harassment category measured.
Despite the decline in raw consultation numbers, 'bullying/harassment' has remained Japan's single most common individual labour-dispute category for 13 consecutive years through FY2024, out of more than a quarter of a million disputes filed nationally that year. A 2024 peer-reviewed study in Women's Studies International Forum went further, arguing that the law's narrow legal framing has had an ironic side-effect of legitimising certain forms of harassment against women in management roles.

Read the full analysis: https://rousaigojyokai.or.jp/