Shogakukan Announces Findings from 3rd-Party Investigation, Measures Company Will Take to Prevent Recurrence – News

Shogakukan revealed on August 3 a summary of findings following the third-party investigation into the publisher’s Manga ONE editorial department and involvement with manga creator Shōichi Yamamoto. On August 4, the company then released a list of measures that it plans to enact in response to the findings.

Summary of Findings

Sponichi Annex reported that the external committee received reports of 44 incidents, including similar suspected incidents of sexual misconduct and other misconduct, during the investigation through its dedicated hotlines. The incidents included misconduct from senior executives, employees abusing the power of their positions, as well as misconduct from editors toward creatives. The committee found that in some of these cases, the company took the appropriate course of action, but in other cases the response was insufficient. 

According to news website Kai-You, the report also stated editorial decisions were prioritized even in cases where human rights violations were suspected, and coordination between editorial, legal, administrative, and managerial departments did not function sufficiently. 

The committee specifically criticized that regarding the victim in Yamamoto’s case, the company “encouraged and supported” the violation of her human rights.

The committee concluded that Shogakukan did not always have sufficient systems in place to: acknowledge the perspective of the victims of human rights violations, “prevent itself from encouraging and supporting human rights violations,” recognize the inherent power imbalance in relationships between editors and authors and other clients, and manage and assess significant risks (including human rights violation risks).

The company’s executive staff — including the CEO, managing directors, board members, and auditors — will cut their monthly salaries for a period of three months. The president will reduce his salary by 50% during this period, and the other members will reduce their salaries by 20-30%.

Proposed Measures

Shogakukan stated it has compiled a list of measures it will enact in order to “apply the proposals from the third-party committee as concrete policy.” These measures relate to the company’s practices in general, as well as preventative measures in response to Yamamoto’s sex crime case.

The preventative changes the company will enforce include five measures:

• Formation of the Shogakukan Human Rights Policy and Human Rights Commission

The company drafted the Shogakukan Human Rights Policy on March 19 (available in English here), which expresses its intent to respect and protect fundamental human rights in every area of the company’s activities. Shogakukan will also establish a Human Rights Committee — led by senior managing director Kumiko Hanazuka (name romanization not confirmed) as chairperson and with involvement from external experts — to prevent, mitigate, and correct human rights violations within the company.

• Expansion of human rights training and corporate culture reform

Shogakukan will regularly hold training to teach and reinforce respect for human rights, prevention of sexual violence and harassment, victim support, and whistleblowing procedures. Managers will additionally undertake a separate program regarding the correct procedure for supervision, guidance in their roles, and contact with external parties. The company will also offer human rights seminars to writers, authors, and freelancers.

• Revised system and process for working with external creators

The company will review its human rights policy with external creators and include clauses in its contracts with respect to human rights. In the event of violations or concerns raised in areas related to human rights by external creators, the company will create a clear authority structure for reporting and decision-making that will involve the editorial department, legal department, and administrative departments, who will determine whether to continue the business relationship with that creator or business partner.

• Strengthen supervisory bodies and systems

The Board of Directors will regularly report on human rights violations and implement oversight at the management level. When violations are found, the company will investigate whether similar incidents have occurred in other divisions. Decisions regarding human rights violations will be reviewed by the Risk Management Office, Human Rights Committee, and Legal Department before management verifies the results. Special response committees will also be established depending on the severity of the violation.

• Establish and reform internal whistleblowing, reporting, investigating systems

The company will establish a “grievance system” compliant with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. The system will incorporate the opinions of external human rights experts, especially in cases of serious violations, and allow victims (regardless of whether they have a direct contractual relationship to Shogakukan) to file complaints. The existing reporting system will be revamped and will account for anonymous reporting and protection measures after reporting. Sexual assault cases will have a specialized response system including psychological counseling for victims.

Shogakukan also promises to continually review and renew its preventative measures for effectiveness.

Shogakukan stated it will post the full list of proposed measures in English in the future, and ANN will update this article to link to that English document once it is available. The document is not available in English as of press time.

On February 20, the Sapporo District Court handed down a ruling in a civil case ordering a man to pay 11 million yen (about US$71,000) in damages to a woman in her 20s, who claimed that Yamamoto repeatedly sexually abused and raped her while she was in a distance-learning high school in Sapporo and while he was a teacher at her school. The woman originally filed the civil suit in July 2022.

According to the Okayama-based economic media outlet “Ashita no Keizai Shimbun” (Tomorrow’s Economic Newspaper) on February 25, the defendant, named Shōichi Yamamoto, was the same as the manga creator of the manga series Daten Sakusen.

Other news outlets reported that in February 2020, in a separate criminal case, a summary court convicted Yamamoto of violating the Child Prostitution and Pornography Prohibition Act and he was ordered to pay a penalty of 300,000 yen (about US$1,900).

The victim in the case announced in March that she and her lawyers are appealing the court’s initial ruling in the civil case, as it did not acknowledge the school’s wrongdoing in the case. The victim had initially filed the civil suit against Yamamoto, the teaching staff, and the educational corporation that operated Hokkaidō Geijutsu Kōkō Sapporo Satellite Campus, the distance-learning high school she attended at the time.

Yamamoto began serializing Daten Sakusen on Manga ONE in February 2015. The manga went on hiatus in February 2020, and was removed from Manga ONE in October 2022. 

However, in 2022, Manga ONE started serialization on writer “Hajime Ichiro” and artist Eri Tsuruyoshi‘s Jōjin Kamen manga, even though “Hajime Ichiro” and Shōichi Yamamoto were the same person. Manga ONE announced on February 27 that it has halted digital distribution of the Jōjin Kamen manga, and also halted shipments of the physical compiled volumes of the manga. Shogakukan stated it should not have hired “Hajime Ichiro” as the original writer of the manga.

Shogakukan also noted that during the civil case that ended on February 20, a manga editor participated in the settlement negotiations, advising that the parties hire a lawyer to prepare notarized documents for the settlement. Other news outlets reported the manga editor advised the notarized documents include the condition the female victim could not disclose the matter, and also proposed that Yamamoto pay 1.5 million yen (about US$9,700) as settlement.

Manga ONE and Shogakukan both apologized to readers and other creators who contribute to Manga ONE, stating at the time it would set up a third-party investigative committee that would include lawyers to clarify the facts of the situation, particularly to understand how the manga serialization began and the involvement of an editor in the settlement negotiations.

After Manga ONE and Shogakukan published their statements, many manga creators took to social media to criticize the statements and Shogakukan in general, and many stated they would pull their manga from the Manga ONE platform.

The Kyodo news agency reported on March 1 that Shogakukan had postponed the ceremony for the winners of the 71st Shogakukan Manga Awards, which was scheduled to be held on March 3.

The previous scandal prompted Shogakukan to undergo an internal investigation.

Shogakukan announced on March 2 that the Manga ONE editorial department needed to investigate the process and verification system for hiring the original creator of the Seisō no Shinri-shi manga, which had been serialized on the Manga ONE service. Miki Yatsunami, the manga’s original creator, is the pen name of act-age manga writer Tatsuya Matsuki, who was arrested and indicted on the charge of committing a coerced indecent act on a female middle school student in 2020.

The Manga ONE editorial department explained in the statement how it came to re-hire Matsuki, and that the Miki Yatsunami pen name was initially chosen out of consideration for the victims so they would not be re-victimized.

While Shogakukan insisted its decision to have Matsuki use a pen name for the new work was always intended to be at the best interest of the victims, the company admitted the Manga ONE editorial staff should have given more consideration as to whether this decision was truly in consideration of the victims.

Shogakukan temporarily suspended updates for Seisō no Shinri-shi.

Sources: Shogakukan (link 2, link 3, link 4), Sponichi  Annex, Oricon, Jiji Press, Kai-You via My Game News Flash