Part II focuses on cases related to tobacco control. Law, rights talk, and litigation have become regular features of tobacco control movements and public health campaigns aimed at reducing tobacco consumption worldwide, including in Japan and Korea. But are they enough to overcome the resource and information disadvantages tobacco control activists face when taking on the industry? Chapter 6 provides historical background on the tobacco epidemic, the multifaceted reasons the tobacco industry remains politically influential in both countries, the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, and recent tobacco control measures—including taxation and pricing, limits on advertising, and new responses to electronic nicotine delivery systems.

Chapter 4 focuses on a central demand of disability rights activism—accessibility. In both Korea and Japan, the built environment has grown markedly more accessible, in part through non binding measures. But by combining contentious and institutional tactics, disability rights advocates have pushed to make standards and regulations mandatory and to give disabled persons (the users of barrier-free features) a seat at the table in policy design, implementation, and evaluation. National governments and localities in both Korea and Japan have gradually responded by making accessibility policy more formal and participatory, though gaps remain.

The book’s conclusion assesses the extent of legalism in Korea and Japan, including other issue areas. It underscores the importance of studying the role of activists and lawyers in catalyzing sociolegal and institutional change. Legalism may take diverse forms, as demonstrated in the comparisons of Korea and Japan. The tobacco liability cases show that legalism is not emerging everywhere. The cases suggest legalistic governance is more likely when support structures for advocacy and legal mobilization exist, opposition is diffuse or weak, and activists sustain all five mechanisms. The conclusion considers what the expanding role of law and courts means for democracy in both countries. It ends on a cautiously optimistic note: the potential for rights realization and participatory channels has grown, especially in Korea. Although challenges in legal mobilization persist, and reform implementation faces human, resource, and attitudinal barriers, activists and lawyers are creatively engaging with legal frameworks in ways that strengthen legalistic regulatory styles.

Chapter 8 turns to a paired comparison of secondhand smoke prevention policies, which offer a more optimistic picture of sociolegal change. In addition to more nonsmoking rules, changing social norms and declining smoking rates were conducive to realizing reforms—and benefited from them. This chapter details the contributions of tobacco control advocates through lobbying, educational activities, and lawsuits related to secondhand smoke, especially in workplaces and at subnational levels. Their multi sited activism is a necessary part of understanding why one is now much less likely to be exposed to secondhand smoke in Korea and Japan.

A brief overview of the themes of the study shows that the quest for land upon which to erect defensible settlements and from which to raise necessary revenue determined much of the course of Company endeavour. Without land there was nowhere to erect Company factories and accommodation, without land there was no security from the predations of indigenous and rival European forces, without land there was no settlement of indigenous artisans and traders generating revenue, without land there was no revenue from tenant peasants and without land there was no empire. This legitimacy of this quest and the sovereign authority the Company sought depended in part on the administration of justice. Following haphazard attempts to impose English law, the unification of jurisdiction after 1726 provided a degree of coherence across the three presidencies. Accompanied by all the trappings and pageantry of court proceedings, and the assimilation into its ranks of leading figures from the various communities, the mayor’s courts commanded legitimacy and thus a broad acceptance; this despite the persistence of corruption and a failure to render the courts wholly independent from Company influence.

This chapter introduces the main argument, situates it in a broader literature, and offers a glimpse into the evidence that will be consulted in the ensuing chapters.