© Vincent Lesch
18 and Exposed: Regulating Youth Vulnerability and Risk in Japan’s Amusement and Adult Video Industry
Dr. Vincent B. Lesch (Universität Heidelberg)
In April 2022, Japan lowered the legal age of adulthood from 20 to 18, expanding young people’s contractual capacity while leaving certain age-restricted activities unchanged. This reform heightened concerns about vulnerability, particularly beyond financial risks, in sectors such as the amusement and adult video (AV) industries.
In response, the Adult Video Appearance Damage Prevention and Relief Act (2022) was enacted to prevent harm, provide victim relief, and protect performers’ dignity and privacy. Evidence points to coercive recruitment practices and structural links between host club businesses and forced AV participation, often involving debt-based pressure. Complementing this, the 2025 amendments to the Act on Control and Improvement of Amusement Business strengthened regulatory oversight and adapted legal controls to contemporary practices.
This research project adopts a doctrinal legal research approach to examine the regulatory design and protective scope of these legal instruments. It analyzes the harms that prompted legislative intervention, the structure of the protection mechanisms, and their capacity to address exploitative practices at the intersection of amusement businesses and the AV industry. The analysis draws on legal texts, policy documents, administrative materials, statistical data, and case-based reporting, and evaluates these laws as instruments of youth and consumer protection in contexts marked by power asymmetries and information imbalances.
Vincent B. Lesch has been a research associate at the Department of Japanese Studies at Heidelberg University since April 2022. Prior to that, he worked at the Department of Global Studies at Aarhus University in Denmark. In 2019, he received his Ph.D. from the Asia-Africa Institute at the University of Hamburg with a dissertation on NPO-led career guidance at urban high schools in Tokyo.
his research currently focusses on consumer education and consumer protection as part of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the Japanese education system and society. He focuses on educational policies and frameworks as well as the implementation of consumer education and consumer protection on the micro-level.
Since completing his degree, he has also served as head of the “Education” section of the German Association for Social Science Research on Japan (VSJF), promoting exchange between early-career researchers (especially students), established scholars, and the interested public.
Der Vortrag findet in Präsenz statt. Ort: Japan-Zentrum der LMU, Seminargebäude am Englischen Garten, Oettingenstr. 67, 80538 München, Raum 151.