This article explores the politics surrounding the recent data transfer agree-ment between Japan and the European Union, with a focus on the linkage between Japanese domestic politics and foreign pressure on Japan’s personalinformation protection policy. The agreement may be seen as one of mutualrecognition, in that Japan and the EU mutually recognized the other as pro-viding an “adequate level of protection” for personal data. However, a close examination of the case suggests that Japan made substantial efforts to meetthe EU’s standards for adequacy in order to enhance the interests of transna-tionalized Japanese firms that rely on the flow of personal information acrossborders. In sum, the latest changes in Japanese personal information protec-tion regulation paved the way for the Japan-EU data transfer agreement; these changes were precipitated by the extraterritorial effect of the EU’s data pro-tection laws, which had resonated within Japan’s domestic politics.

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