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The Asian Criminological Society 12th Annual Conference (ACS2020), hosted by Ryukoku University, was held online for four days from June 18 to 21, 2021. The purpose of the conference, the second of its kind to be held in Japan after the 2014 Osaka conference, was to promote the growth of criminology in Asia and Oceania, and to promote academic exchange with advanced regions of criminology such as the United States and Europe.
>> ACS2020 Program　https://acs2020.org/program.html
The overall theme of the conference is "Crime and Punishment under Asian Cultures: Tradition and Innovation in Criminology". The aim was to promote understanding of the social systems and culture and measures against crime and delinquency in Japan, which is said to be "the country with the least crime in the world".

The following is a summary of the Closing Plenary Session, which was held live streaming at the conference.

Presentation Summary:

[Decrease in Crime Recognition and Increase in Crimes by the Elderly]
Japan is said to be one of the safest countries among the developed countries. The number of homicide arrests per 100,000 population is much lower than in other countries, and is decreasing every year. The number of deaths due to violent crime is also decreasing. On the other hand, crimes committed by the elderly are on the rise. Even though the total number of inmates is decreasing, the number of elderly people being held in penal institutions for minor crimes such as shoplifting is increasing. It may be said that inmates in Japan are becoming welfare facilities. Many elderly inmates suffer from dementia, and the number of elderlies who die in prison is increasing. There are also inmates who reoffend and re-enter prison because they have no place in society. Prisons have become a safety net for the elderly.

[So-called "Peer Pressure"]
Japanese society is punitive towards those who disrupt order and cause trouble. Therefore, people are extremely afraid of causing trouble to others. In Japan, when someone helps you or takes care of you, many people say "I am sorry" instead of "Thank You". This is the same reason why people are hesitant to apply for welfare. It may be said that social order is maintained by mutual surveillance within a group, or fear of exclusion from a group. In a society of mutual surveillance, the fear of exclusion and isolation can discourage crime. However, once a person has become isolated from society, or has crossed the line into crime, he or she will be viewed harshly. As the number of isolated elderly people is increasing, the strict scrutiny of each other is leading them to commit crimes. For such elderly people, prison may be the only place where they do not have to bother others and do not have to worry about being subjected to new stigmas.

[Juvenile Delinquency in Japan]
Recently, the economic situation for juveniles in Japan has been worsening. The number of juveniles living in poverty has been increasing. However, the number of juvenile delinquents is decreasing, a paradoxical phenomenon. This phenomenon can be explained by Robert Merton's theory of anomie. In societies characterized by "innovation" such as the U.S., the predominant value choice and behavioral pattern is that it is okay to have some problems with how the goal is achieved. Japan, on the other hand, is a society where "ritualism" prevails, where alignment and synchronization are more important than devaluing goals. Furthermore, there is even a tendency among young people these days toward "retreatism," which is the abandonment of achieving goals and conforming to rules in the first place. So we are beginning to see juveniles who are not even motivated to delinquency. An international survey on youth attitudes conducted by the Cabinet Office also shows that Japanese youths do not have high hopes for their future. Without big dreams, there will be no tension due to dissatisfaction, which can lead to crime.

[Pandemics and Criminology]
This year's Asian Criminological Society 12th Annual Conference was held in the midst of a pandemic, the global outbreak of COVID-19. As a member of the academic division, I asked the invited speakers to mention the pandemic.

Prof. David Garland (Sociology of Law, New York University, U.S.) argued that criminology should learn from the role that public health (experts) have played in this pandemic. He also argued that it is important to take a public criminology perspective on how to communicate expert knowledge to citizens and policymakers.
In a pandemic, a person is infected with a virus, which is then transmitted by the infected person to other people. An important mission for public health is to communicate real threats to people scientifically. In other words, the key message is to accurately convey that the target to be fought (evil) is the virus, not the person carrying it.

The same goes for criminology. Penal Populism argues that it is the individual criminals who are the real threats to us so that isolating (incapacitating), intimidating, and monitoring them will be the answers to solve the problem.
The mission of criminology, like that of public health, is to inform the public, based on scientific knowledge, about the mechanisms that make people commit a crime and the mechanisms that help people recover from crime. As with infectious diseases, any person can be infected with the virus of crime. And anyone can recover from that infection. It is important to convey this fact properly to the public.


Prof. Shadd Maruna (School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work, Queen's University, UK) showed how to recover from the infection of crime. Prof. Lorraine Mazerolle (School of Criminology, University of Queensland, Australia) pointed out that reliable criminal justice is the key to solving the problem. Like Prof. Garland, Prof. John Pratt (Institute of Criminology, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand) pointed out that criminology needs to learn from public health successes and strive to communicate the right knowledge to the public, which will reduce punitive populism and pave the way for the future of criminology. He pointed out that criminology needs to learn from public health success stories and try to communicate the right knowledge to the public.

Japanese society is basically very punitive towards people who cross a certain line and cause trouble or cause trouble to others. And it is a society where mutual surveillance functions to prevent people from crossing certain lines. Even in the midst of a pandemic, the Japanese government has not taken strong measures such as lockdowns like European countries have. And trust in the government is not high. However, we have been able to maintain a relatively low infection rate, probably because of the functioning of these characteristics of our society.

[Paradigm of Criminal Policy]
Let me tell you about the case in Japan. At the request of a local government, I took on the role of an advisor for rehabilitation. I advised them, based on empirical data, that it is important to support reintegration into the community to prevent recidivism. I explained, based on evidence, that offenders are not enemies who should be excluded from society, but are born into society and return to it, just like us.　Criminal policy in Japan should shift from a punitive paradigm to a reintegration paradigm. Such efforts are beginning to be made at the municipal level, and the "Nara City Regulation on Rehabilitation Support," in which I was involved, is one example.


[Conclusion Message]
In Buddhism, there is the concept of 縁(En), which is the everything that supports us. Without 縁, we would not be able to live on our own. If criminology can convince people that those who have committed crimes are also human beings just like us, and that they can be recovered by regaining their 縁, Japan may be able to change from a society of mutual surveillance to a society of mutual trust. This may be the path for which criminology in Japan should aim.


After the plenary lecture that summarized the conference, there was a discussion on why elderly people commit crimes in Japan and why they tend to be isolated. The answer lies in the isolation of the elderly. Elderly people who live alone cannot live without the help of those around them. However, many elderly people stay indoors and isolate themselves because they feel that they should not bother others for help.

The Asian Criminological Society 12th Annual Conference (ACS2020), hosted by Ryukoku University, was held online for four days from June 18 to 21, 2021. The purpose of the conference, the second of its kind to be held in Japan after the 2014 Osaka conference, was to promote the growth of criminology in Asia and Oceania, and to promote academic exchange with advanced regions of criminology such as the United States and Europe.
>> ACS2020 Program　https://acs2020.org/program.html
The overall theme of the conference is "Crime and Punishment under Asian Cultures: Tradition and Innovation in Criminology". The aim was to promote understanding of the social systems and culture and measures against crime and delinquency in Japan, which is said to be "the country with the least crime in the world".

The following is a summary of the Plenary Session with Q&A Session, which was held live streaming at the conference.

Summary of the Q&A Session

Question 1: What is the relationship between spiritual criminology and positive criminology?
Answer 1: Spiritual criminology goes beyond the usual distinctions of positive and negative, good and evil.
Question 2: Can your report today be applied to secular situations?
Answer 2: Today, I talked about spirituality, not about religion. Both secular and religious people do good and share similar experiences.

Question 3: If being a volunteer is so important, what is the significance of being an expert?
Answer 3: When you are an expert, you are firstly a volunteer who unconditionally wants to help others, beyond which you have the added value of being an expert.

Question 4: I would like to learn more about spiritual criminology and its relationship to religion. I am interested in religion as a political issue. What forms of religion and spirituality are beneficial to society? Who decides this and how? If there are inmates in prison who follow an antisocial religion, should they be allowed to practice their beliefs?
Answer 4: Religion is the act of praying and performing rituals, while spirituality is what is in the mind of the person performing the act. The separation is a shift from self-centeredness to other-centeredness and God-centeredness. Religious groups and gangs are self-centered if they are separated from society. It is difficult to determine what is self-centered and what is not. Rather, we can only say that we hope to grow out of that self-centeredness.

Question 5: I have been doing research on ”Aum Shinrikyo". I have met many prison chaplains, but none of them belong to Aum Shinrikyo. To define a religion as good or bad is to give the government the authority to define which religions are good or bad. I think there is a common interest in this point.
Answer 5: Any power has the potential for abuse. Crime is an abuse of power, and prisons are places where power is abused. Massacres have been committed in the name of religion. This is why spiritual criminology tries to provide ideas that go beyond the distinction between good and evil and focus on the battle against self-centeredness.

Question 6: The concept of self-centeredness is central to the argument, but why is suicide, in which the self is killed, a manifestation of self-centeredness?
Answer 6: Self-centeredness refers to a situation in which one is occupied with oneself. Suicide or self-injury is a kind of proof that one can control one's life. Suicide means to end the pain, which is a sign of self-centeredness.

Question 7: Could you provide us with more information about your clinical practice?
Answer 7: I have published a book on psychotherapy called "Twelve Tools," which is similar to the Twelve Steps. I treat a wide variety of people, from rich to poor. Some are drug addicts, some are sex addicts, some are violent, some are sexually violent. Some of my patients are Orthodox Jews. They are very religious, but many of them are sex addicts. Sex is legal, so they are not sex offenders, but there is no spirituality in this case. In the initial interview, I ask about their belief systems and religion. This is a good starting point. Sexually addicted people are constantly thinking about sex and are caught up in it. This treatment is difficult but possible.
Question 8: In recent years measures of the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Health have led to reversals. Addiction has become the focus of treatment and correction. What can be done to overcome this?

Answer 8: The government has nothing inherently to do with Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) or Narcotics Anonymous (NA). I teach a 12-step program at university and send my students to AA and NA programs as part of their education. In Israel, the government has provided facilities to help NA, and NA has been established in various cities. I would like to see more cooperation from the groups.

Question 9: In Japan, the elderly are isolated from society and many of them are in prison for committing crimes. How can we solve this problem?
Answer 9: If we build halfway houses, we will end up building another prison. Instead, it is important to rent a house locally and create a community, which is cheaper for the government. AA, NA, etc. can also be used in such communities to bridge the gap between society and those on the periphery of society.

Question 10: I want to know about the philosophy behind your spiritual criminology.
Answer 10: My source is the 12 steps, and I have traveled in search of spirituality within me. I've been to Japan, I've done Zen, I've been to India. The root of their commonality is something greater than the self.

The Asian Criminological Society 12th Annual Conference (ACS2020), hosted by Ryukoku University, was held online for four days from June 18 to 21, 2021. The purpose of the conference, the second of its kind to be held in Japan after the 2014 Osaka conference, was to promote the growth of criminology in Asia and Oceania, and to promote academic exchange with advanced regions of criminology such as the United States and Europe.
>> ACS2020 Program　https://acs2020.org/program.html
The overall theme of the conference is "Crime and Punishment under Asian Cultures: Tradition and Innovation in Criminology". The aim was to promote understanding of the social systems and culture and measures against crime and delinquency in Japan, which is said to be "the country with the least crime in the world".

The following is a summary of the Plenary Session with Q&A Session, which was held live streaming at the conference.

Summary of the Q&A Session

Question 1: Your report focuses on female prisoners charged with drug-related crimes, which are so-called "victimless crimes." What kind of effects can we expect from this Strength-Based Psychology intervention for crimes with victims, not drug-related crimes? What is the relationship between making amends to the victim and correctional education that is conscious of the victim's perspective?
Answer 1: While it is true that the female prisoners in my report are "drug offenders" in both the experimental and control groups, some of them have committed other crimes in addition to drug offenses. Some of them committed other crimes as a means of obtaining illegal drugs. For those who committed fraud or violent crimes, it is true that empathy for the victims is important. However, I believe that the main aspects of Strength-Based Psychology interventions can be applied to these crimes as well.

Question 2: The importance of Strength-Based Psychology interventions in penal institutions is as you reported. On the other hand, are there any plans to apply this approach to follow-up studies after prisoners are released from prison? How about investigating the impact on the rate of reimprisoned inmates?
Answer 2: Of course, it would be nice to be able to study the effects of the Strength-Based Psychology interventions even after the prisoners are released. However, there are some barriers to this kind of study. For example, access to information on ex-prisoners after their release is quite limited. There is a strong need for confidentiality of information on ex-prisoners. It should also be pointed out that the prisoners are serving long sentences. (It takes a long time for them to return to society.)
As a further area of application of this study, the effects on male prisoners should also be considered. However, we recognize that the degree of engagement in the program is higher for women than for boys, and that the effects are also higher.
We also believe that this approach has a role to play in the training of police officers and prison guards.

Question 3: Could it be that the Strength-Based Psychology interventions could also be expected to change prison culture - especially a culture that has been far too male-oriented?
Answer 3: That's right. The implementation of such programs in penal institutions may create a more relaxed atmosphere within the penal institutions themselves. In Taiwan's female prisons, it can be said that more effective correctional education programs are being implemented in the classroom, and more women are becoming correctional officers.

Question 4: Please explain a little more about the changes in prison culture in Taiwan. In particular, have you begun to see the perspective of "open prisons"? For example, is there an external ombudsman organization like the Penal Institution Visiting Committee in Japan, or is there a movement of outreach from penal institutions to the local community?
Answer 4: Recent legal reforms have led to the establishment of oversight committees organized by those outside penal institutions. Based on the complaints and suggestions of prisoners, the committee makes recommendations for the improvement of penal institutions.

Question 5: In Taiwan, what kinds of initiatives, both government-led and by private organizations, are available to help prisoners reintegrate into society after their release?
Answer 5: Especially in recent years, the government has begun to realize the importance of social networks after release from prison. There is also an emphasis on efforts to support the bonds between prisoners and their families. I hope to see more and more interventions based on these ideas in the future.