Colin P. Jones
Hideyuki Matsumi will lead a discussion of Colin P. Jones‘s Using The Robot Koseki – Using Japanese Family Law as a Model for Regulating Robots on Saturday, April 13, at 1:00 p.m. at #werobot 2019.
This paper seeks to address the definitional problem of robot law – “what is a robot.” It posits that a fundamental goal of practical robot law should be to provide such a definition, even if it is an arbitrary one. It further proposes a registration system as the means of doing so. The criteria to be required for registration would offer a useful means of establishing the technical, informational and other parameters for a “desirable” robot. The creation of a “robot/not-robot” dichotomy, together with the defined attributes required for registration would facilitate the establishment of further public and private regulatory systems based on registration status. The registration system would likely be a combination of hard and soft law, as well as technical specifications.
In proposing such a system, the looks to family law as a useful metaphor for addressing some of the problems commonly discussed in connection with robot law, such as who is responsible for harms caused by autonomous robots.
Hideyuki Matsumi
The author, however, looks not to Western family law, which is based primarily on the assertion of rights between family members, but a feature of Japanese family law: the koseki system of family registration. The kosei system confirms both Japanese nationality and the creation and existence of legally-recognized familial relationships that are potentially of legalrelevance to third parties. Historically the koseki has functioned as a foundation for other public and private regulation based on the registratered attributes of the family and its members. An overview of the koseki system is given to offer examples of how a Robot Koseki could be a powerful tool for developing practical rules for the regulation of autonomous robots.
