Comparison of Histories of Law of Major Civilized Societies : The Land Laws of Western Europe, China, Japan and etc.

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The following three articles are the output of the three-year research project, Comparison of Histories of Law of Major Civilized Societies : The Land Laws of Western Europe, China, Japan and etc. 1.The Transformation of the Order of Land Ownership and "Modern Law" (NIHONSHI KOZA 8, University of Tokyo Press, 2005) ; 2.The Theory of the History of "Social System and the Law": The Historical Perspective of "Modern Experience and Institutional Changes" (SHAKAI TAISEI TO HO, Vol. 6, 2005) ; 3."Hoken (Feudal) System" and "Gun-Ken (District-Prefectural) System" as Historical Concepts : An Approach to Universalization of the Concepts of "Hoken" and "Gun-Ken" (HOKEN TO GUN-KEN, International Institution of Japanese Cultural Studies, Shibunkaku, 2006).The first article examines the characteristics of the transformation of the Japanese land law under the pre-modern Baku-han system to that in the modern period (the center of which is from non-approval to official approval of land sales), by comparing the history of the land law in Japan with the history of which in China and Western Europe. The second article, which has been developed from the first, discusses the general theory of the history of social system and the law. The basic concept introduced in developing the discussion is "civilization" (the content of which is the transformation of a community to a society based on market economy). Relying on this concept of "civilization" explicated in the second article, the third article describes, as a matter of constitutional history of states, that a "personal and class-based integration order" of a community transforms into an "institutional territorial state system." The third article points out that Chinese have traditionally understood this transformation as a transformation from "hoken" to "gun-ken." It also contends that the concepts of "hoken" and "gun-ken"can be used as universal concepts to understand not only Chinese history but also human history in general.