The law collection

Sets up the family register (戸籍) — the record, kept by each municipality's mayor, of each person's name, date of birth, parents, marriage and other family relationships, from which anyone who loses Japanese nationality is removed — and the notifications (届出) that keep it up to date.

Court mediation (調停) of civil disputes: the parties, helped by a judge and civil mediation commissioners, look for a settlement by mutual concession that is reasonable and fits the facts of their case.

How a building split into separately owned units — homes, shops, offices, storerooms and the like — is owned and run: what each owner owns alone and what the owners share, how they decide together, and how they can rebuild, renew, sell or demolish the building.

Sets up the Basic Resident Register (住民基本台帳) that each municipality keeps of the people living in it, the notifications residents must make when they move, and who may see the records or get copies of them.

Special rules for rights to use land in order to own a building on it — by superficies (地上権) or by lease — and for leases of buildings: how long they last, how they are renewed and what effect they have, with the court procedure for changing the conditions of a land lease.

How land and buildings, and rights over them such as ownership and mortgages, are recorded in a public register (登記), to protect people's rights and keep property dealings safe and smooth.

The rules for forming, organising, running and managing companies: the four kinds of company, their shareholders or members, their directors and other officers, their accounts, and how they merge, split and dissolve.