[bokonist]

If you believe the autobiography of Yukichi Fukuzawa, it is the police that are responsible. Fukuzawa lived in Japan during the mid to late 1800's, before and after the time of the Meiji restoration. At that time Japan had quite a lot of crime, the roads were not safe, and if you passed another person along the roads you would both clutch your sword and maintain a wary eye. His description sounds a lot like walking in certain neighborhoods of Philadelphia. But later in his life, that was no longer the case, and he credits the creation of a professional police force.

Read this article about the police and law enforcement in Japan: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2011/0... Notice how very, very different it is than the policing of say, Baltimore.