History Education and International Relations

00 Prelims:Hirano 22/12/08 14:46 Page i HISTORY EDUCATION AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS A CASE STUDY OF DIPLOMATIC DI...

Author: London School of Economics & Political Science Mutsumi Hirano

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HISTORY EDUCATION AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS A CASE STUDY OF DIPLOMATIC DISPUTES OVER JAPANESE TEXTBOOKS

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HISTORY EDUCATION AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS A CASE STUDY OF DIPLOMATIC DISPUTES OVER JAPANESE TEXTBOOKS

by

MUTSUMI HIRANO Visiting Research Fellow Asia Research Centre London School of Economics & Political Science

GLOBAL ORIENTAL

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HISTORY EDUCATION AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS A CASE STUDY OF DIPLOMATIC DISPUTES OVER JAPANESE TEXTBOOKS First published 2009 by GLOBAL ORIENTAL LTD PO Box 219 Folkestone Kent CT20 2WP UK www.globaloriental.co.uk © Mutsumi Hirano 2009 ISBN 978-1-905246-68-7 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A CIP catalogue entry for this book is available from the British Library

Set in Stone Serif 9.5/11 pt Printed and bound in England by Athenaeum Press, Gateshead, Tyne & Wear

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Contents

Preface and Acknowledgements List of Tables List of Figures List of Summaries List of Abbreviations 1. Introduction 2. Government Influence and the Domestic Educational Environment 2.1 Shaping Public Opinion 2.2 Writing History 2.3 Education 2.4 History Education 3. The Domestic Environment and its Interaction with the External Environment 3.1 Forming Views about Home and Foreign States 3.2 Learning Lessons from the Past 3.3 The Interplay between the Domestic and External Environments 3.4 From Shaping Public Opinion to Learning Lessons from History

vii x xi xii xiii 1 20 21 24 31 38

55 56 61 67 75

4. History Education in Japan 4.1 The Historical Background of Contemporary History Education 4.2 History Curriculum Guidelines and the Writing of History Textbooks in the 1980s 4.3 The Authorization and Selection of Textbooks in the 1980s

88 88 96 106

5. The Japanese History Textbook Disputes in the 1980s (Part I) 5.1 The Textbook Dispute in 1982 5.2 The Textbook Dispute in 1986 5.3 The Analysis of the Textbook Issue (Part I)

117 118 131 138

6. The Japanese History Textbook Disputes in the 1980s (Part II) 6.1 Public Reactions to the Textbook Disputes 6.2 Repercussions in Other Countries (except China and South Korea) 6.3 The Analysis of the Textbook Issue (Part II)

159 160 166 171

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7. Twenty-five Years On — Cross-border Interactions in Historical Knowledge 7.1 The Task of Coming to Terms with the Past 7.2 Transnational Cooperation with South Korea and China 7.3 Intergovernmental Cooperation on the Move 7.4 The Analysis of Recent Developments

202 203 210 216 225

8. Conclusion

240

Appendices Select Bibliography

260 276

Index

301

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Preface and Acknowledgements his book aims to explore the implications of history education for international relations — both interstate and transnational. Despite a widespread recognition that our grasp of history has relevance to the development of our worldviews, there has been little systematic discussion in the field of International Relations (IR) which incorporates the practical aspect of teaching history. Yet issues such as historical consciousness and perceptions, identities and understandings of the real world have been attracting growing interest in IR and across disciplines. Therefore, by questioning whether it is possible to indicate a theoretical link between history education and international relations, this study attempts to further discussions on this subject. This work is not about education per se but rather is concerned with politics. Generally, education is in this study regarded as an institution which transmits knowledge but is at the same time closely related to state formation and nationalism. Just as any student of International Relations/Politics refers to historical precedents at some point, this study casts light on the actual 'content' of history courses at the pre-university level and its meaning for both domestic and external environments. As regards empirical data, there has been enormous news coverage on 'the issue of history' over the years, not only in Japan and other Asian countries but also in other regions. In fact, the issue of history — generated, consumed and regenerated — never seems to disappear from the news agenda. Particular historical details thus examined and counter-examined and the debates revived have been presented by many commentators, although this is not the focus of this book. The empirical materials presented in the case study are limited to Japanese textbook disputes in the 1980s, and most of them are probably familiar to Japan/Asia specialists. The case study is mainly aimed at extracting parameters and logical threads useful for constructing a framework of analysis. The book is based largely on my doctoral thesis which was completed in the autumn of 2001 and retains the same framework of analysis and basic arguments. Yet recent developments on joint history research between Japan and its neighbours have provided this study with a final extra reference point, and Chapter 7 has been

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History Education and International Relations

revised accordingly. In this way, this work attempts to address general problems underlying history education in the context of international relations. Most of this work was originally written in the Department of International Relations at London School of Economics and Political Science. My sincere gratitude goes first to my supervisors, Professor Christopher Hill and Professor Ian Nish. They offered insightful guidance as well as opportunities to think about the theme of this research from different perspectives. They were very supportive throughout the period of my writing the thesis, which challenged uncharted territories and evolved a number of times. Professor Reinhard Drifte and Professor Janet Hunter also offered invaluable suggestions for the organization of the work. I would very much like to thank them as well. Without their support, this book would never have been possible. My colleagues in the foreign policy workshop and the conflict and peace studies seminar at the IR Department gave me numerous critical comments at earlier stages of this research. Their individual studies dealing with different regions and issue-areas helped to sharpen some arguments; thus, I am also indebted to them intellectually. My special thanks go to Rhonda Semple, Julius and Shashi Sen and David Styan who read either part or most of the draft manuscript and to Daewon Ohn and Chad Peterson who gave me crucial advice on the sections concerning China and South Korea, and Germany respectively. I would also like to thank all interviewees for generously taking the time to talk with me, including the people who preferred to remain anonymous. All the interviews I had were very stimulating as well as informative. Gisela Teistler and the staff at Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research (Braunschweig, Germany) extended warm assistance during my visit there. The British Library Newspapers in London, the Textbook Research Centre and the National Diet Library in Tokyo were also very useful. My thanks also go to Paul Norbury and David Blakeley of Global Oriental for their editorial assistance and to authors and organisations for permission to quote, use and reproduce their work and materials in this book: Professor Robert W. Cox, Professor Kimijima Kazuhiko and Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation (Tokyo). Friends and colleagues near and far have in many ways encouraged me to complete this work and always been an indispensable source of mental support. With all intellectual credit to these people, any errors and misinterpretations are mine.

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Throughout this book, Oriental names are given in original order, with the surname first and the personal name second. With names of Westerners of Asian descent, Western order is preserved. The titles and associations of academics and journalists that are annotated are those at the time of their comments being made. All the dates in notes and appendices are indicated numerically in the following order: the day, the month and the year (e.g. 1.5.08 means 1 May 2008.) Quotes and excerpts from Japanese sources are translated by the author, unless otherwise indicated. When English translations are available in public sources, they are used. As to committees of the Japanese Diet (parliament), details are presented as follows: ‘D-96-HR, FA, …’. This means the 96th Diet Session, the House of Representatives, the Foreign Affairs Committee, followed by the date, the page(s) of minutes and the speaker's official title or party membership. For abbreviations of committees, see 'List of Abbreviations'.

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List of Tables Table 2.1 Table 2.2 Table 2.3 Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table 4.3 Table 5.1 Table 5.2 Table 6.1 Table 7.1 Table 7.2 Table 7.3 Table 7.4 Table 7.5

Important Determinants of Educational Influence Problems Concerning Geographical and Temporal Coverage The Potential of History Education Education Policies during the Initial Stage of the US Occupation Samples of History Textbooks (1/2) Samples of History Textbooks (2/2) Government Responses during the 1982 Dispute Government Responses during the 1986 Dispute A Comparison of Government, Public and News Media Reactions to the 1982 Dispute Japanese High School History Textbooks at a Glance Research Areas of the Japan-Korea Joint Studies Forum Books Related to History and Historical Perceptions (Japan-South Korea Joint Research Book Series) The Sub-themes and Topics at the Sixth Meeting (October 2006) An Outline of the Report of the First Phase of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee (the Main Themes and Topics by Panel)

36 40 43 92 105 106 120 133 167 204 214 214 215

219

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List of Figures Figure 1.1 Figure 1.2 Figure 1.3 Figure 2.1 Figure 3.1

The Authoritarian-democratic Continuum The Framework of Analysis Relations between Multiple Frameworks The Framework of Analysis (for Phases I and II) The Framework of Analysis (for Phase III and the 'Wider Context') Figure 8.1 The Framework of Analysis (the same as Figure 1.2) Figure 8.2 The Modified Framework

3 4 5 20 55 240 251

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List of Summaries Summary 5.1 The Miyazawa Statement Summary 5.2 The Main Points of the South Korean Government's Statement Summary 5.3 The Main Points of the Chinese Government's Reply to the Miyazawa Statement (excerpts)

127 127 128

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List of Abbreviations AAB AFP AP AS ASEAN AUD BP BT BUD CAB CCS CD CIE COS D DB DPRK DSP DY E ED EM EU FA FM FRG FT GDN GHQ HC HER HR IND IT JCP JH

Asian Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan Agence France-Presse The Associated Press Asahi Shimbun (Japan) Association of Southeast Asian Nations Audit Committee* Bangkok Post Bulletin Today (Philippines) Budget Committee* Cabinet Committee* Chief Cabinet Secretary (Japan) China Daily Civil Information and Education Section of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers Course of Study (curriculum guidelines) (Japan) the Diet (the Japanese parliament) Gaiko Seisho (Diplomatic Bluebook) (Japan) Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) Democratic Socialist Party (Japan) The Daily Yomiuri (Japan) the evening edition of Japanese newspapers Education Committee* Education Minister European Union Foreign Affairs Committee* Foreign Minister Federal Republic of Germany Financial Times The Guardian General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers the House of Councillors (the Upper House) (Japan) The Herald the House of Representatives (the Lower House) (Japan) The Independent The Indonesia Times Japan Communist Party Junior high schools (Japan)

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History Education and International Relations Japan Socialist Party (Social Democratic Party of Japan (SDPJ) since 1991) Judicial Affairs Committee* Korean Broadcasting System (South Korea) The Korea Herald (South Korea) Korean National History Compilation Committee (South Korea) Kantorberita Nasional Indonesia The Korea Times (South Korea) Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) the morning edition of Japanese newspapers Manila Bulletin Malaysian Digest Mainichi Daily News (Japan) Ministry of International Trade and Industry (Japan, until December 2000) Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Japan, since January 2001) Ministry of Education (Japan, until December 2000) Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Japan) North Atlantic Treaty Organization New Liberal Club (Japan) New Straits Times (Malaysia) New York Times The Observer Official Development Assistance (Japan) Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Prime Minister People's Republic of China Republic of Korea (South Korea) Reuters News Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers Science and Technology Committee* Self-Defense Forces (Japan) Security Committee* Senior high schools (Japan) The Straits Times (Singapore) BBC Summary of World Broadcast Textbook Authorisation Research Council (Japan) The Times The Washington Post United Press International United Nations United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization World Confederation of Organizations of the Teaching Profession Xinhua News Agency (China) Yonhap News Agency (South Korea)

01 Introduction:Hirano

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Introduction Theory is always for someone and for some purpose. All theories have a perspective. Perspectives derive from a position in time and space, specifically social and political time and space. Robert W. Cox1

he thought that Cox’s statement is also true of history might come to mind. History as written and represented may always be for someone and for some purpose. Yet one soon realizes that it depends on how history is defined. Is history a narration of the past or what actually happened in the past (including what went on in the minds of people)?2 If one takes the former definition, there are many histories, depending on observers’ vantage points; if one takes the latter, as this study does, there is only one history or a body of facts, irrespective of the existence of observers. However, the problem is that it is often difficult to find a fact. This is sometimes due to factors genuinely beyond human capability, but sometimes due to very human factors. If it is possible for manipulation to creep into scientific experiments aimed at verifying hypotheses, it seems more than probable that this may occur in the social sciences.3 It even seems part of ubiquitous practice to present carefully but arbitrarily chosen chains of events.4 It follows that it is important to consider how one comes to conceive certain views. We are bound by the accident of birth and its consequent circumstances. From autobiography to official chronicles, the use and abuse of history may be inescapable.

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THE AIM OF THE BOOK

The principal aim of this study is to explore the implications of history education for international relations — both interstate and transnational. It is anchored in the assumption that, if outcomes of intergovernmental dialogue and transnational contacts depend not only on such interactions but also on the preexisting perceptions and attitudes of actors involved — ‘prearrival characteristics’, then attention must be directed to the process in which these characteristics are formulated.5 In other words, it is essential to search for the roots of patterned ways in which the public and policy-makers of a particular state perceive, observe and react to the outside world,6 and


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to analyse the factors which may determine such prearrival characteristics. It also must be emphasized here that a subtheme which runs throughout this book involves the voices of ordinary people — those of lay citizens. As one of such roots of patterned perceptions and attitudes, this study looks to history education at pre-university levels, focusing on the content of teaching. Starting from this premise, a question which is unavoidable is what is taught at school — what historical facts and interpretations are presented to students in practice. However, it is difficult to trace the origins of prearrival characteristics in a linear manner. It is also unrealistic to assume that they are determinate or constant over time. In fact, the exploration of this assumption inevitably creates a methodological problem. It mainly concerns the assessment of influence, more specifically, the establishment of a causal link between inputs and outputs. It involves a long-term evaluation of the influence of any particular instruction on developing views held by students, and they are of course situated in many other social variables. It is practically impossible to trace such influence and to establish definitive causality between a certain type of history education in a particular country and its external relations and ultimate international relations. Nevertheless, this methodological impasse does not seem to disprove the proposition entirely.7 There seems to be a widely accepted recognition that one’s grasp of historical knowledge will affect or have some relevance to the development of a worldview. For example, F.S. Northedge said in the 1970s that ‘one must remember that this education [the kind of education in Politics to which young Americans are now being exposed] will shape the thinking, and control the view of the outside world, of the most enlightened section of the public of the world’s greatest, or at least of one of the world’s two greatest, military powers’.8 Although such a recognition does not allow us to draw any conclusions about the causal connection in focus, if historical knowledge is considered to be constitutive of history,9 it is worth speculating on the connection. Therefore, the central question of this study is then: is it possible to indicate a theoretical link between history education and international relations? The question will be tackled by building a framework of analysis which sustains a proposition that the various factors pertaining to history education in a given state can be put in perspective in the formation of public dispositions, which will in turn have a bearing on international relations in the long term, and empirical data will be presented to support this framework.


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Introduction

3

A caveat must be entered before addressing the general issue. Like any general proposition or model, the framework to be constructed in this study is not readily applicable to any society without conditions. The framework which is based on one case study (i.e. Japanese history education) is susceptible to biases specific to the case. For example, the link being supposed would have more direct relevance to authoritarian states, which retain direct powers over the control of education and mass media, and thus influence public opinion, than to democracies. Japan is certainly not an authoritarian state and is regarded as one of the ‘democracies’. But an overwhelming majority of the world population do not live in those ‘democracies’. Those who enjoy freedom of speech, expression and education are still a minority in the world. Moreover, the crucial question is how educational institutions work in practice. Are there no loopholes in the legal system? Is every process and procedure in the education system politically accountable? The argument is also relevant to democracies since they too depend on administrative measures similar to those which are at work in authoritarian states, if not strict control. Common practices such as the provision of the teaching guidelines designed to raise educational standards and to narrow regional gaps in teaching quality can influence public education extensively.

Figure 1.1 The Authoritarian-democratic Continuum

Given the input of various forces operating in each society and the permutation of this make-up over a long period of time, the framework has to be adjustable to variant situations. Therefore, the framework is not rigidly mechanistic or static but is meant to be flexible enough to incorporate diverse and changeable conditions of each society. Only with such complex combinations of variables in mind, will this study consider the general issue. THE FRAMEWORK OF ANALYSIS

This work concentrates on the minimum common denominators and actors sufficient to explore the link in focus. Other background and derivative factors are therefore excluded from the conceptual framework. (See Figure 1.2.) Here, the key words used in the framework need to be defined before its outline can be explained. The term ‘history education’ is used in a very narrow sense to mean the teaching of history in primary and secondary schools. This study puts stress on the content of teaching — what is taught or at least


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Figure 1.2 The Framework of Analysis Phase I: Phase II: Phase III: The Wider Context:

The initial stage of government influence The activities under government influence The formation of public dispositions The interplay between the domestic and external environments

what students are supposed to study in history courses at the preuniversity levels. Similarly, unless specified otherwise, ‘education’ means teaching at the same levels and excludes individual learning outside schools from literature and through the mass media or any other methods. The term ‘international relations’ can be defined in different ways. But it is defined in this study, in order to make the conceptual framework better understood, as interactions across state borders in their entirety, involving governments, organizations, firms, groups or peoples.10 The framework, based on a model of the state, considers two major actors: the government and the public.11 Yet these actors are not separate in a strict sense. The dotted lines (C) which connect the public and the government indicate that prospective government officials are members of the public. Since the writing of history and schooling must be taken into account alongside any consideration of history education, other actors like bureaucrats, historians and teachers must also be identified. In the framework, they are included in the boxes of ‘The government’, ‘Writing history’ and ‘Education’, respectively, although they are not entirely independent of each other. In this way, the framework deconstructs the perceived link between history education and international relations into three


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Introduction

5

phases in the domestic environment. It then proceeds to consider the ‘Wider Context’ (the interplay between the domestic and external environments). Figure 1.3 shows more complex relations between states in the Wider Context. In the framework, the first two phases analyse history education from the aspect of ‘process’, i.e. the dissemination of historical knowledge, along with the activities of historians and educators. The third phase then deals with history education from the aspect of ‘consequences’, in other words, what is happening on the receiving end of historical knowledge, i.e. in the minds of students. While a general chronological direction is presupposed in the framework, from Phases I and II through Phase III to the ‘Wider Context’, these phases purport to be schematic. It must be emphasized here that this is not to argue educational influence in a mechanistic manner but to consider in a general context that what is taught can be ‘sources’ of developing views of the young generation. In authoritarian states, power relations which exist between political leaders and members of a society would take a more obvious hierarchical, one-way form; hence the three phases in the framework could work in a more chronological order. By contrast, power relations in democracies are multilayered, with actors in a society mutually and simultaneously influencing one another; thus the phases indicated are likely to relate to each other in a more diffuse manner. Now let us look at each phase. Phase I denotes an initial stage at which the government exerts influence over intermediary actors and institutions such as historians and schools, which act in the end to influence the formation of public opinion. At this stage, the government may have a clear intention to lead public opinion on a particular issue in a certain direction; or government preferences and expectations may come into play, regardless of its will. But this phase itself does not involve the public yet. Phase I is concerned only with government measures which can be taken towards the intermediaries situated between the government and the public.

State A

State B

State C

State D

Figure 1.3 Relations between Multiple Frameworks


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For example, it is assumed in the framework that specific policies rarely exist with regard to individual historians’ work, whereas the government needs education policy, at least minimum administrative policy, to provide some form of public education. Accordingly, ‘The government’ and ‘Writing history’ are connected in the dotted line (A) meaning indirect influence and ‘The government’ and ‘Education’ in the real line (B) meaning more direct influence. In addition to these policy dimensions, it is presupposed that the government is unlikely to intervene in historians’ practice, whereas it is more likely to do so in educational activities. The box of ‘Shaping public opinion’ indicates action taken by the government. The corresponding lines denoting the government’s inclination to intervene are shown in the dotted (A’) and real (B’) lines respectively. Phase II covers activities through which the government could actually exert some influence on the public — ‘Writing history’, ‘Education’ and ‘History education’. The internal square overlapping with these activities roughly designates the educational environment where socialization and other pedagogical effects are considered to take place. This educational environment contains various factors such as communication methods and institutional settings which determine the influence of schooling. With regard to ‘History education’, the primary focus is on its contents such as important national and international landmarks to be presented to children and young people. Phase II as a whole indicates that these activities, separately or in a combined form, influence the future public to some degree. The ‘consequences’ of the first and second phases are summarized in Phase III — ‘Forming views about home and foreign states’ and ‘Learning lessons from the past’. These consequences which are presumed to take place in the minds of students are treated separately for the purpose of analysis, although they are indistinguishable. ‘Forming views’ will be analysed in terms of the psychological and cognitive dimensions. ‘Learning lessons’ will be scrutinized with reference to factors which are likely to define a range of lessons the future public draw from historical precedents. This study will also discuss what factors are likely to block the learning of historical lessons. Finally, after the three phases in the domestic environment have been outlined, the interactions between the domestic and external environments must be considered. Although the external environment embraces innumerable actors and variables, it is presented as one outside world for the sake of simplification, with an outward arrow symbolizing the implications of history education for international relations (on the right-hand side of the framework). It represents only one of a myriad of cross-border interactions through which complex relations develop between states.


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Introduction

7

THE ISSUE OF HISTORY EDUCATION IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

How does International Relations (IR) approach the theme of this book or the area of education in general? Outside the discipline, some educationalists have admitted that traditional educational theory fails to tackle important questions concerning the relational aspects of knowledge, power and domination, while an increasing number of teachers have emphasized the need for international education.12 Psychology, sociology and economics have made inroads into the area of education, but political science has only addressed it more recently, and ‘not convincingly’.13 As a political scientist, Melvin Richter has propounded a kind of political education for citizens, combining political theory with a particular kind of history. Concerned with the scarcity of works in this area, he has argued that moral philosophers either work on the level of metatheory, a level of generality that passes over actual moral decisions in politics, or they take examples from non-political matters, and that historians generally fail to engage in such analysis.14 But the problem also seems to be compounded by the following: ‘Those political scientists who have focused on education have confined their studies very much to education politics rather than the politics of education … political questions are bracketed out and replaced by questions about processes of decision-making; politics are reduced to administration.’15 In fact, this indicates that the problem is not only about disciplinary parochialism but also about the level of analysis. A.N. Oppenheim, a social psychologist, has maintained that the subarea of political socialization has expanded into social psychology, political science and political sociology in relation to the support for parties and regimes, the perception of national leaders and the development of democracy, but there remains room for exploration in International Relations in a broader sense. In making this statement, he has referred to children’s attitudes towards war, the United Nations, various modes of conflict resolution and their national and supranational loyalties as examples of areas where further research is needed.16 Among IR specialists, E.H. Carr, in his seminal book The Twenty Years’ Crisis, mentioned universal popular education as ‘the oldest and perhaps still the most powerful’ instrument in the formation of mass opinion.17 Doubtless, historical and contemporary examples show that states influence educational institutions for national (and sometimes explicitly nationalist) goals. Doubtless, many governments are interested in the achievement of public education with a view to strengthening their national economies in the world market. In fact, the study of political economy has searched the potential of public education for improving economic performance.18 However, this area of education seems to have been largely ignored in the


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mainstream of IR. Insightful comments on the subject in passing are plentiful in the discipline; yet it does not seem that IR has ever systematically taken the theme of this research on board. From historical and normative perspectives, Michael Walzer has argued: ‘What is needed is a combination of political theory (the study of those principles that underlie the state and that shape or should shape the conduct of its leaders) and political and social history (the study of decision-making in complex and difficult conditions).’19 From the perspective of transnationalism and interdependence, Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye have said that ‘no one has developed a coherent theory of learning in international politics’. But what they meant by leaning seems to be confined to the governmental level and not education as argued in this study.20 Foreign Policy Analysis offers some avenues of research into the theme of this work. Leadership and psychological factors, intelligence activities and the making of foreign policy each shed light on factors such as information, perceptions and worldviews. Domestic sources of foreign policy and constraints of the external environment highlight interactions across state borders from opposite directions. More importantly, pulling all these threads together, the reflective and comparative approach to ‘learning lessons from the past’ provides this study with a useful base for discourse. However, educational issues in general have not been on the intergovernmental agenda, with some regional exceptions. Traditional thinking places education in the sphere of domestic business, and few think that educational problems immediately create any crisis in foreign relations under normal circumstances. Consequently, little coherent discussion which incorporates practical aspects of history education has been generated in foreign policy analysis. The well-researched areas of transnationalism and interdependence also provide this study with some important clues. Many writings in these areas deal with the mobility of people, goods, service, money and information. The basic tenet is that either people move across state borders or non-human resources are exchanged or transferred between states. Developing this view, a useful analogy may be drawn from trade issues in approaching the area of education. States engaged in trade wars have long been negotiating about, if not establishing, various criteria on which talks can be based.21 These criteria concern quality standards, safety regulations of products and distributing practices. There also exist other standards by which the local content (or the country of origin) and the actual volume of imports and exports are measured. In fact, it is not that trade friction emerges only when products cross state borders. What is at stake is new materials, product designs, manufacturing methods and skills as well as domestic procedures and practices; all these impact on the commercial or industrial products


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Introduction

9

being manufactured. Industrial espionage and patent wars are not recent phenomena.22 Seen in this light, the mobility of products itself is not the main point. The deeper sources of trade friction lie in the generation of information or knowledge and in all the structures and processes contributing to manufacturing, irrespective of physical mobility of human or non-human resources. In this regard, earlier proponents of transnationalism like Donald Warwick have addressed the aspects of public knowledge, motives and attitudes.23 James Field is another who has drawn attention to the indigenous nature of a history curriculum.24 James Rosenau mentions evolution at the ‘ideational level’,25 Peter M. Haas, ‘epistemic communities’26 and Thomas Risse-Kappen, ‘transnationally transmitted ideas’.27 These studies provide insights into considering what kind of information, ideas, values, ethos and perceptions move or do not move on the highway of innumerable interstate and transnational interactions. Of course, these arguments are not new. Discussions of cultural and/or ideological tension and conflict have long been ingredients of IR, whether highlighted or not.28 Constructivists have also addressed connections between the ideational level and the real world, being either cooperative or conflictual. In fact, there seem to be considerable overlaps between some of their wide-ranging works and this study in terms of the logic employed for main points of argument, be they ‘unobservables’, objectivity-subjectivity-intersubjectivity, identities, socialization, culture, worldviews, possible sources of change, interactions or transnational forces, as argued by Friedrich Kratochwill, Nicholas Onuf, John Ruggie and, in particular, Alexander Wendt,29 although focusing on different levels of analysis and coming up with distinct inquiries.30 If all the arguments and approaches mentioned above, although they are not meant to be comprehensive, are applied specifically to the area of education, there remain many subjects yet to be explored, such as the nature of education systems, academic practices and curricular matters along with the incipient processes of generating and transmitting knowledge within domestic societies and beyond. Therefore, this study steps into this cross-section of different fields and disciplines yet to be cultivated. In particular, by building a conceptual framework, this work purports to address a general issue in the context of international relations. For example, the framework presented above would be useful in considering various conflict/post-conflict situations around the world. In each of the now independent states which constituted former Yugoslavia, what kind of history is being or will be presented to students relating to what happened in the 1990s? Similar questions can be posed with regard to the CIS countries, Northern Ireland, and North and South Korea. These considerations also have serious implications for inter-


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ethnic or racial conflicts as in Rwanda and South Africa, and examples are endless. Nonetheless, few IR specialists have embarked on the dual task of developing a specific framework on this subject and investigating the practice of teaching history. Such a model or even an engaging discussion has long been absent in IR despite numerous passing references to the ways in which national history was presented and to the possible influence of such historical presentation on the worldviews held by the public. Yet the issues to be touched upon in this work such as history, historical consciousness, identities and understandings of the contemporary world, have been attracting growing interest in IR and across disciplines. Therefore, by presenting a framework of analysis, this study attempts to further discussions on history education and international relations. DIPLOMATIC DISPUTES OVER JAPANESE TEXTBOOKS AS A CASE STUDY AND RELEVANT LITERATURE

The primary purpose of the case study is to provide reference points for the framework of analysis outlined above. To this end, the work will mainly examine the diplomatic disputes over Japanese history textbooks which emerged between China and South Korea, and Japan in 1982 and 1986 — often called ‘the textbook issue’.31The sources of this diplomatic friction were the accounts of Japan’s colonial rule and aggressions in the Asia-Pacific, and the Japanese government’s role in authorizing schoolbooks. This study will also survey the public reactions and repercussions which the disputes triggered in many parts of Asia and other regions32 These two diplomatic disputes in the 1980s are important in four ways for this work. First, the controversies drew attention to the specific cases of the government’s indirect interference with the content of teaching, highlighting textbook authorization by the Japanese Ministry of Education (MOE). The rows, which exposed the latent nature of textbook screening, provide the framework with important reference points for the initial stage of government influence (Phase I) and the activities under government influence (Phase II). For this routine procedure in a concrete manner sets a range of historical events that students study and to a considerable extent defines the nature of the subject. In addition, the MOE’s authorization in 1982 and 1986 concerned the historical accounts leaning towards the opposite ends of the political spectrum respectively. Furthermore, since government influence was exerted on a particular publisher and authors concerned in the latter case, power relations between the government and the private authors were made very plain. The contrasts between the two cases are thus most instructive. Second, primarily forcing the Japanese government and more broadly Japanese society to react to overseas criticisms over the


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historical accounts, the disputes shed light on the ‘consequences’ of history education; hence, they provide the framework with some important clues to the formation of public dispositions (Phase III), uncovering Japanese people’s views towards their country’s past conduct. Indeed, it is ambiguous Japanese attitudes towards the diplomatic brouhaha that implicitly and explicitly indicated the influence of history education on Japanese people. Third, the controversies, under the extensive foreign attention and pressure, brought into focus the hitherto rarely explored link between history education and international relations. The episodes offer important connections to the remaining part of the framework, i.e. the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’). The disputes demonstrated that the very Japanese reactions to the foreign criticisms left many other Asian countries uneasy about their relations with Japan, directly involving the two foreign governments and attracting international attention at both governmental and non- governmental levels. Japan’s neighbours presumed that the views and attitudes of Japanese youths being formed through a particular type of history education would have a serious bearing on the country’s external relations and thus international relations in the long term. Finally, it seems that the highly charged diplomatic disputes in the 1980s led eventually to movements towards joint history research by individual scholars and study groups in Japan and its neighbours, which gradually gained momentum in the 1990s. In this sense, the 1982 and 1986 rows can be regarded as the very first catalyst for bilateral history research, and they are of additional importance in terms of the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’). Although later diplomatic skirmishes over Japanese history textbooks and other historical issues also attracted regional attention and further prompted joint studies between the countries concerned, proposals for joint research were made originally by the South Korean government at the time of the two disputes. In this way, the disputes in the 1980s bring us to the most crucial and controversial aspects of Japanese history education, central to this research. Yet the textbook issue as an independent subject has produced innumerable writings in Japanese over more than four decades. Since the first lawsuit filed by Ienaga Saburo (a historian and author of textbooks) in 1965, in protest at the rejection of his history textbook by the Education Ministry, educationalists, historians, politicians, bureaucrats, lawyers and critics have written on the subject from many conflicting points of view. Although the Japanese literature on the subject is simply too voluminous to review, some major authors should be noted here33 For example, Ienaga himself explained his personal experiences, giving examples


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of authorization.34 Yamazumi Masami explained the history of the Japanese education system since its establishment and revealed the increasingly coercive nature of curriculum guidelines after 1955. Tokutake Toshio offers comprehensive approaches to the textbook issue, examining domestic politics from the prewar/wartime years through the occupation and Cold War periods up to the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the Second World War, as well as international issues. Takashima Nobuyoshi draws our attention to what underlies the subject with reference to the amendment of the Japanese Constitution and rearmament.35 Some other Japanese authors offer international and comparative perspectives on the textbook issue. Fujisawa Hoei focuses on the treatment of responsibility for the Second World War in West German schoolbooks, while Kondo Takahiro presents an interesting survey of German-Polish historians’ cooperation which started in 1972.36 Kuroha Ryoichi considers the textbook issue in the context of modern and contemporary history, focusing on US-Japanese and Sino-Japanese relations.37 Nakamura Satoru evaluates Japanese history textbooks as well as those of many other countries, including the United States, Mexico, Nigeria, India and Egypt.38 However, it must be noted that there has been a striking gap in the Japanese literature on the subject between writings by educationalists or historians and those by IR specialists. In fact, few Japanese IR researchers have taken on board the subject until recently, except in a relatively limited context of bilateral relations.39 More recently, the textbook issue has been introduced to the English reader by Caroline Rose (1998).40 Since then several books have been published in the area dealing with the issue of history in Japan (the most broadly termed), with another few forthcoming. Still, this book seeks to offer a few fresh perspectives. First, the aim of this study is completely different from those of other books by Laura Hein and Mark Selden (2000), Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (2005), Sven Saaler (2005) and Philip A. Seaton (2007), which give largely descriptive accounts of how Japanese society has dealt with national history (in particular war history). It is also different from that of Christopher Barnard’s work (2003), which offers linguistic analysis of historical presentation.41 As the issue of history is unlikely to disappear from the news agenda, this kind of writing is likely for years to come, in commemorating ‘anniversaries’ of the end of the Second World War and other landmark events in Japan’s colonial and wartime history and in examining results of annual textbook authorization. In contrast, as stated earlier, this study aims to explore the implications of history education for international relations by building a conceptual framework. Second, whereas some of the above books focus on Japanese society proper, apart from edited volumes by Hein and Selden and by Vickers


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and Jones, with contributors giving cross-regional and regional comparative perspectives, this study looks at Japan and beyond in order to consider international repercussions — both governmental and non-governmental responses to the issue of historical presentation. Although the diplomatic controversies concerning the history textbooks appear to be isolated cases, the issues raised in the disputes are not confined to Japan and its neighbouring countries, as many researchers have pointed out. The Financial Times commented back in 1982 (at the time of the first dispute) that ‘a national bias in the teaching of history is not a Japanese monopoly’.42 The textbook disputes acutely reflect historical relations in which one state ruled the other in the form of occupation, colonization and subjugation.43 In particular, empirical data on overseas public responses have been extensively collected and summarized in this study in order to bring to light not only the voices of China and South Korea which were involved in the full-fledged diplomatic disputes, but also those of other Asian countries (including North Korea) and of Asian residents in the Unites States. By widening the scope of research, this study shows that the issue of historical presentation is not only about the historic enmity between particular states but also about a much broader international concern. Third, most of the aforementioned books naturally shed light on different aspects relating to the issue of history in Japan, either more generally on memory, identity, citizenship, ideology, culture and language or more specifically on the Nanjing Massacre, ‘comfort women’, the Yasukuni Shrine and war films/TV programmes; this work is focused primarily on the issue of historical presentation in schools. Therefore, while using the same diplomatic dispute in 1982 as a case study, this research is also different from Rose’s seminal work, which deals with the diplomatic ‘handling’ of the dispute, the decision-making processes involved and the other factors affecting these processes such as trade issues. Finally, this study is also different from ‘war memory’ approaches in two dimensions, while using similar historical materials. One is that this study also concerns genuine scholarly research on what happened in the past before it is presented in schools. It concerns ‘painstaking scholarly procedures’ to get closer to the truth on various aspects of what is called the past, rather than ‘a story derived from people’s reminiscences’, although memories are certainly an important part of our life.44 The other dimension is that this study maintains that the political role and responsibilities of those in power (i.e. the government and its agencies and officials) who are involved in presenting national history in schools have to be brought to light and made accountable. If we try to examine who contributes to war memories in general, we can look at what is happening in society at large. For example, in what manner private


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writers tell war stories, how manga authors depict past wars and what kinds of war films and TV programmes commercial producers make, are interesting questions to ask. However, these activities themselves belong to the private sector and can go on in any direction without being held politically responsible, although their social responsibility may be questioned if they are extreme. Therefore, these are a completely different matter and beyond the scope of this book. In sum, the book seeks to conceptualize the issue of historical presentation in schools in the context of international relations and to present reference points supporting this approach. CHAPTER OUTLINE

The two chapters which follow will develop arguments for each component of the framework outlined above in order to explore the link between history education and international relations. Chapter 2 will elaborate Phase I (the initial stage of government influence) and Phase II (the activities under government influence). It will consider the latent power relationship between the government and the public in the educational environment. The focus of Chapter 3 will be on Phase III (the formation of public dispositions) and the ‘Wider Context’ (the interplay between the domestic and external environments). The chapter will analyse what factors could come into play in the mental constructs of the future public through history education at school, and it will examine the interactive dimension of the two environments. Some preliminary conclusions are attempted in this chapter. The middle part of the book (Chapters 4 to 6) is devoted to the case study and its background information, and the relevance of the framework to empirical materials will be indicated. Chapter 4 will give an overall picture of Japanese history education, with prime emphasis being on the content of teaching. Through this general introduction to the educational situation in Japan, the chapter will bridge the framework and the case study. The aim of Chapter 5 is to survey the disputes over Japanese history textbooks in 1982 and 1986 and to consider the connections to Phases I and II of the framework. Chapter 6 will account for the public reactions and regional/ cross-regional repercussions which followed the disputes, and analyse the textbook issue with reference to Phase III and the ‘Wider Context’. In relation to the argument of the ‘Wider Context’, Chapter 7 will review recent joint history research between Japan on the one hand, and South Korea and China on the other at both transnational and intergovernmental levels. Then it will analyse the nature of these cross-border interactions, making some reference to the case of Germany. Finally, Chapter 8 will conclude by reviewing the case study and making an overall assessment of the framework of analysis.


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THE SCOPE OF THE BOOK

This work is an attempt to conceptualize the implications of history education for international relations with reference to the Japanese context. To this end, the diplomatic disputes of the 1980s over Japanese history textbooks will be examined. Accordingly, Japanese history, domestic politics and educational institutions which the case study mentions are not primary concerns of this book. Neither are Japan’s specific foreign policies towards particular countries. This study does not aim to explain these particular aspects in the Japanese context. For example, there is no attempt to research into the historical ‘facts’ which were highlighted in the diplomatic disputes. It also excludes constitutional questions such as freedom of speech and expression, and the freedom of education in the country, although these issues have been repeatedly debated in Japanese courts. The research materials concerning the administrative arrangements for textbook authorization and education policies are confined to those related directly to the case study. Although the textbook issue as a whole involves a great number of actors such as government and ministerial officials, Parliament, politicians, pressure groups, lawyers, academics, school teachers, the mass media and the general public, a comprehensive analysis of all the actors concerned in Japan and other countries is beyond the scope of this study. Furthermore, although the textbook issue itself is still an ongoing issue in Japan, this study focuses primarily on the textbook issue in the 1980s for the purpose of constructing the conceptual framework. Finally, it must be noted that, if we look at the current situation in Japan, we will certainly have a slightly different picture. For one thing, the historical accounts used in schoolbooks have changed gradually; for another, the student generation has certainly shifted since then. And more importantly, the learning environment for students has dramatically been transformed in the past decade or so, with abundant sources of information made available by the Internet and other media (and this is certainly true of other countries). However, these are also outside the scope of this book. This study will concentrate on the presentation of the framework of analysis for probing the connection between history education and international relations, and on the provision of the empirical data which demonstrate the relevance of the framework. NOTES 1

2

Robert W. Cox, ‘Social Forces, States, and World Orders: Beyond International Relations Theory’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 10, no. 2, 1981, p. 128. Barbara Tuchman, Practising History, 2nd ed., London, The Macmillan Press, 1982, pp. 25–6.


16 3

4 5

6

7

8 9 10

11

12

13 14 15 16

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History Education and International Relations Popper pointed out ‘the social and institutional character of scientific knowledge’. Kuhn also mentioned social and cultural conditions and subjective aspects or the element of arbitrariness in scientific judgement. See Karl Popper, The Poverty of Historicism, London and New York, Routledge, 1957, pp.154–7 and Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 3rd ed., Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press, 1996, pp. xii and 4–5. Bertrand Russell, Freedom and Organization 1814–1914, London, Allen & Unwin, 1934, p. 230. Donald P. Warwick, ‘Transnational Participation and International Peace’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 307. For policy-makers’ institutional experience and accommodation of the external environment, see Bernard C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, Boston, Little Brown, 1973, pp. 27 and 72. Colin Seymour-Ure, The Press, Politics and the Public: An Essay on the Role of the National Press in the British Political System, London, Methuen, 1968, pp. 277–8 and 284. F.S. Northedge, ‘Transnationalism: The American Illusion’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 5, no. 1, 1976, p. 21. Jan Aart Scholte, International Relations of Social Change, Buckingham and Philadelphia, Open University Press, 1993, p. 140. It can be defined more inclusively as relations with those whose origins are foreign, regardless of their place of residence. But this is closer to interethnic relations in a society. Although the framework is originally conceived on the basis of interstate relations, it is possible to extend its analogy to any unit, as long as power relations exist between political leadership and other members of a unit, and as long as there is some form of institutions which perform educational functions in the unit. Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism in the Twentieth Century, New York, New York University Press, 1979, pp. 192–3. For example, see Henry A. Giroux, ‘Introduction’, in Paulo Freire, The Politics of Education: Culture, Power and Liberation, Donaldo Madedo (trans.), Massachusetts, Bergin & Gravey Publishers, 1985, p. xv. Edward Vickers, a specialist in comparative education, points out that ‘the study of school curricula is generally seen as the province of specialists in education, and such specialists are seldom to be found within faculties or departments of history, politics or Asian studies. Even within education faculties, only a small number of researchers look in detail at school curricula …’. Edward Vickers, ‘Introduction: History, Nationalism, and the Politics of Memory’, in Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (eds), History Education and National Identity in East Asia, New York and London, Routledge, 2005, p. 3. Brian Salter and Ted Tapper, Education, Politics and the State: The Theory and Practice of Educational Change, London, Grant McIntyre, 1981, p. 2. Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, p. 44. Roger Dale, The State and Education Policy, Milton Keynes and Philadelphia, Open University Press, 1989, p. 24. Refer to Note 105 of Chapter 2. A.N. Oppenheim, ‘Psychological Aspects of International Relations’, in A.J.R. Groom and C.R. Mitchell, International Relations Theory: A Bibliography, London, Francis Pinter, 1978, p. 179.


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17 Edward Hallet Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, 1st ed., London, Macmillan, 1939, p. 170. 18 For example, see E.G. West, Education and the State: A Study in Political Economy, London, The Institute of Economic Affairs, 1965. Emile Durkheim listed two major functions of education: ‘to provide the skills needed for industrial economies’ and ‘to act as a vehicle of social integration through the transmission of culture’. See Andy Green, Education and State Formation: The Rise of Education Systems in England, France and the USA, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1990, p. 36. 19 Michael Walzer, ‘Political Decision-Making and Political Education’, in Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, p. 173. 20 Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, ‘Power and Interdependence Revisited’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and Interdependence, 2nd ed., Boston and London, Scott, Foresman, 1989, p. 267. 21 In a much broader sense, Strange argued the need to establish ‘the criteria of judgment or comparison’ in international political economy. Susan Strange, ‘The Study of Transnational Relations’, International Affairs, vol. 52, no. 3, 1976, pp. 341–2. 22 P.A. Reynolds, ‘Non-state Actors, Domestic Structures and International Outcomes’, British Journal of International Studies, vol. 5, no. 2, 1979, p.104. He mentioned patent protection. 23 Warwick, ‘Transnational Participation’, pp. 321 and 323. 24 James A. Field, Jr., ‘Transnationalism and the New Tribe’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 3. 25 James N. Rosenau, ‘Citizenship in a Changing Global Order’, in James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (eds), Governance without Government: Order and Change in World Politics, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 292–3. 26 Peter M. Haas, ‘Introduction: Epistemic Communities and International Policy Coordination’, in Peter M. Haas (ed.), Knowledge, Power, and International Policy Coordination, a special issue of International Organization, vol. 46, no. 1, 1992, pp. 1–35. 27 Thomas Risse-Kappen, ‘Ideas Do Not Float Freely: Transnational Coalitions, Domestic Structures, and the End of the Cold War’, International Organization, vol. 48, no. 2, 1994, p. 208. 28 See, for example, Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, New York, Simon & Schuster, 1996 and Friedrich V. Kratochwill and Yosef Lapid (ed.) The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory, Boulder, Colorado, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1996. 29 See Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics, Cambridge and New York, Cambridge University Press, 1999; Stefano Guzzini and Anna Leander (eds), Constructivism and International Relations: Alexander Wendt and His Critics, London and New York, Routledge, 2006; Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett, ‘Taking Identity and Our Critics Seriously’, Cooperation and Conflict, vol. 35, no. 3, 2000, pp. 321–9; Friedrich V. Kratochwill, ‘Constructing a New Orthodoxy? Wendt’s “Social Theory Of International Politics” and the Constructivist Challenge’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 29, no. 1, 2000, pp. 73–101. 30 In any event, if we approach the same subject matter either top-down or


18

31

32

33

34

35

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History Education and International Relations bottom-up with similar logic, resulting arguments would be highly tautological, for example, if constructivists try to trace back the origins of forces starting from the international level and educationalists seek to create a society starting from the individual level. But it seems that they both tend to stop at the national level or not much farther from that level, either downwards or upwards. The textbook issue is often used in a broader sense, to mean the whole subject concerning controversial accounts of historical events in Japanese textbooks, than just as a reference to the diplomatic disputes in the 1980s. See the special issue ‘Textbook Nationalism, Citizenship, and War: Comparative Perspectives’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, vol. 30, no. 2, 1998. In this study, Asia is defined as a region covering North and South Korea, China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, the ASEAN member countries in the 1980s (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Brunei (since January 1984)), Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Burma. The Indian subcontinent and Oceanic countries are excluded. As for personal experiences and examples of textbook authorization, see Teruoka Itsuko, ‘Kyokasho Kentei: Watashino Taiken (Textbook Screening: My Case)’, Bukkuretto Ikiru, no. 15, 1994. As for textbook lawsuits, see Ienaga Saburo and Teruoka Itsuko, ‘Naze Kyokasho Saiban o Tatakatta-noka (Why Have We Brought the Textbook Issue to Courts)’, Iwanami Booklet, no. 335, Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1994. As for modern and contemporary history and the textbook issue, see ‘Tokushu: Gendaishi no Kyoiku (Special Issue: Teaching Contemporary History)’, Gunshuku Mondai Shiryo, no. 146, 1993, in particular, Asai Motofumi, ‘Gekihen-suru Kokusai Seiji to Nihon no Yakuwari: Ajia o Chushin-toshite (Sweeping Changes in International Politics and Japan’s Role: the Asian Region)’, pp. 64–73 and Koshiba Masako, ‘Senso to Kyokasho: Kokumin So Maindo Kontororu no Nazo (Wars and Textbooks: The Mystery of Total Mind Control of the Public)’, Kamogawa Booklet, no. 131, 2000. Others explore international or comparative perspectives on the textbook issue. Teruoka Itsuko and Kato Shuichi, ‘Sekai ni Tsuyo-shinai Kyokasho Kentei (Textbook Screening Unacceptable to the International Community)’, Kyokasho Saiban Bukkuretto, 1992; Rekishi Kyoikusha Kyogikai (ed.), Atarashii Rekishi Kyoiku: Sekai no Kyokasho o Yomu (New Ways of Teaching History: An Investigation of Textbooks Used in the World), Tokyo, Otsuki Shoten, 1994; ‘Tokushu: Kyoiku no Kokusaisei (Special Issue: Internationalizing Education)’, Gunshuku Mondai Shiryo, no. 175, 1995; Kyokasho Kentei Sosho o Shien-suru Tokyo-to Renrakukai (ed.), Ajia kara Mita Nihon no Kyokasho Mondai (The Japanese Textbook Issue Seen from the Asian Perspective), Kyoto, Kamogawa Shuppan, 1995; and Chuo Kyoiku Kenkyusho, ‘Kokutei Kyokasho ni Okeru Kaigai Ninshiki no Kenkyu: Kenkyu Hokoku (A Research Report on the Worldviews Presented in State Textbooks)’, Tokyo, Chuo Kyoiku Kenkyusho, 1992. Ienaga Saburo, ‘Misshitsu’ Kentei no Kiroku: 80 Nendai Ienaga Nihonshi no Kentei (Records of Textbook Screening ‘Behind Closed Doors’: A Case of Ienaga’s ‘Japanese History’ in the 1980s), Tokyo, Meicho Kankokai, 1993 and Ienaga Saburo, Kyokasho Saiban (The Lawsuits on the Textbook Issue), Tokyo, Nihon-hyoronsha, 1981. Yamazumi Masami, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi (A Concise History of Japanese Education), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1987; Yamazumi Masami, ‘Gakushu


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37

38

39 40 41

42 43 44

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Shido Yoryo to Kyokasho (The Course of Study and Textbooks)’, Iwanami Booklet, no.140, Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1989; and Takashima Nobuyoshi, 80 Nendai no Kyokasho Mondai (The Textbook Issue in the 1980s), Tokyo, Shinnihon Shuppansha, 1984. Fujisawa Hoei, Doitsujin no Rekishi Ninshiki: Kyokasho ni Miru Senso Sekinin-ron (German Views of History: How Their Textbooks Explain Their Responsibilities for the War), Tokyo, Akishobo, 1986 and Kondo Takahiro, Kokusai Rekishi Kyokasho Taiwa: Yoroppa ni Okeru ‘Kako’ no Saihen (International Dialogue on History Textbooks: European Efforts to Reconsider the ‘Past’), Tokyo, Chukoshinsho, 1998. Kuroha Ryoichi, Kyokasho Mondai to Kingendaishi no Yomikata: Sengo 50 Nen no Kyoiku Shiko to Rekishi Ninshiki (The Textbook Issue and How to Read Modern and Contemporary History: the Feature of Postwar Japanese Education and Historical Perceptions), Volumes I and II, Tokyo, Kyoiku Kaihatsu Kenkyusho, 1995. See also Tokutake Toshio, Kyokasho no Sengoshi (A History of Postwar Textbooks), Tokyo, Shin-nihon Shuppansha, 1995. Nakamura Satoru, Rekishi wa Do Oshierarete-iruka: Kyokasho no Kokusai Hikaku kara (How History is Taught: A Comparison of Foreign Textbooks), Tokyo, NHK Books, 1995. See, for example, Tanaka Akihiko, Nitchu Kankei 1945–1990 (Sino-Japanese Relations 1945–1990), Tokyo, Tokyo University Press, 1991. Caroline Rose, Interpreting History in Sino-Japanese Relations: A Case Study in Political Decision Making, London, Routledge, 1998. See Laura Hein and Mark Selden (eds), Censoring History: Citizenship and Memory in Japan, Germany, and the United States, Armonk, N.Y and London, M.E. Sharpe, 2000; Christopher Barnard, Language, Ideology and Japanese History Textbooks, London and New York, Routledge Curzon, 2003; and Sven Saaler, Politics, Memory and Public Opinion: The History Textbook Controversy and Japanese Society, München, Iudicium, 2005. Refer also to Philip A. Seaton, Japan’s Contested War Memories: The ‘Memory Rifts’ in Historical Consciousness of World War II, London and New York, Routledge, 2007. See also Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (eds), History Education and National Identity in East Asia, New York and London, Routledge, 2005. In this volume, three chapters focus on Japan: Julian Dierkes, ‘Stability of Postwar Japanese History Education amid Global Change’, pp. 255–74, Yoshiko Nozaki, ‘Japanese Politics and the History Textbook Controversy, 1945–2001’, pp. 275–305 and Peter Cave, ‘Learning to Live with the Imperial Past? History Teaching, Empire, and War in Japan and England’, pp. 307–37. Other chapters in the volume look at history education in mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and North and South Korea. For an interesting overview of Confucian historiography and education, see Alisa Jones, ‘Shared Legacies, Diverse Evolutions: History, Education, and the State in East Asia’, pp. 31–63. FT, 18.8.82, p. 10. Kim Chong-so (professor at Seoul National University)’s comment on the textbook disputes, KH, 7.8.82, p. 8. Fujiwara Kiichi, ‘Naze Kokumin ga Katararerunoka (Why Talk About the People?)’, Rekishigaku Kenkyu (Journal of Historical Studies), March 2001, p. 35, translated in Japan Echo, ‘History and Nationalism’, vol. 28, no. 4, August 2001, p. 37.

02 Chapter:Hirano

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Government Influence and the Domestic Educational Environment his and the following chapters attempt to develop arguments for each component of the conceptual framework outlined in the previous chapter. The framework is a simple one which indicates only the main factors and actors sufficient to explore the link in question. All historical background and empirical reference points supporting the framework are presented in Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7. Thus, this chapter will focus on identifying and analysing concepts and arguments relevant to the first two phases, which may be called the aspect of ‘process’ in history education (indicated in the shadowed boxes and the encircled educational environment in Figure 2.1). The initial stage of government influence (Phase I) covers ‘Shaping public opinion’ and the activities under government influence (Phase II), ‘Writing history’, ‘Education’ and ‘History education’. The main purpose of this chapter is to shed light on how the government, through education, could exercise some influence over the future public (following the highlighted lines connecting the government and the public).

T

Figure 2.1 The Framework of Analysis (for Phases I and II)

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Government Influence

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The chapter will consider a latent power relationship between the government and the public in the educational environment. Phase III and the ‘Wider Context’ will be analysed in Chapter 3. 2.1 SHAPING PUBLIC OPINION

Policy-making maintains a delicate relationship with public opinion.1 It keeps public opinion at arm’s length but not beyond its reach. It does not necessarily cater for the voice of people nor does it entirely ignore it, whether public opinion is politically motivated or apolitical or the issue in question is domestic- or internationaloriented. In fact, the public may be apathetic and uninformed, yet not untouched by mass communication, and they can easily be subject to the speeches of demagogues and opportunists in adverse situations and crises. Thus, public opinion may play little constructive part; even worse, it may have a negative effect on the decision-making of the government, narrowing practical policy options.2 Yet, because the modern state gives citizens a voice in the form of elections and other mechanisms, and because public support is supposedly the main basis of its legitimacy and power, the state needs ‘the consent of the governed’ — whether genuine or forged.3 Even authoritarian states are not immune to the idea of democratization.4 In their way, they seek to anticipate public reactions and to vent their feelings. Moreover, if decision-makers have a political will to use a gap between citizens’ actual influence and their potential influence — what Robert Dahl called ‘a slack in the system’, this unused source, if fully mobilized, can be converted to a substantial political force in favour of decision-makers.5 In any circumstances, policy-makers are not the only players who seek to tailor public opinion to their advantage. Opinion leaders, pressure groups, opposition parties, the news media and even foreign governments compete for the opinion market.6 In the framework (see Figure 2.1), Phase I purports to indicate a stage where the government makes the very first move to influence the population. However, it is largely concerned with government influence that is yet to reach the public. In this phase, the target of government influence is intermediary actors and institutions such as historians and schools, which may act in the end to influence the formation of public opinion. At this stage, the government may or may not have a clear intention to lead public opinion on a particular issue in a certain direction. Indeed, states, if they wish, can employ a number of measures, formal or informal, to exert influence, sometimes with the help of financial incentives/disincentives or in extreme cases, even physical threat as in wartime.7 States can also rely on collective forces and social arrangements of compounded and subtle modes to exclude potential issues from the political agenda.8 With the cooperation of

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news agencies, the government may succeed in orchestrating public opinion up to a point where there is virtually no opposition, and thus the public voice will no longer matter. In extraordinary situations, government officials hear ‘more an echo of their own voices than their persuasive results’.9 In authoritarian states such as Myanmar and North Korea, the suppression of the popular voice may be a routine business. Yet, in Western democracies too, if office holders have a clear intention to do ‘something’ about public opinion, it is fairly predictable that they will do so. Despite their greater press freedoms and more liberal traditions, policymakers in democracies intervene with the news media.10 Therefore, despite the discernible difference in attitudes towards public opinion between democracies and authoritarian states, the contrast seems to be more blurred in practice. Moreover, the possibility that some kinds of government preferences and expectations inadvertently come into play cannot be overlooked. Certain government assumptions may permeate naturally into policies at the time of implementing them, within a normal range of practices but in an unspecified manner. And it is not that government political apparatus is composed solely of elected officials; civil servants, ad hoc advisers and party think tanks are often attached to it. The point is that it is not entirely a matter of explicit policy preference. Irrespective of government policy, both stated and unstated, the actual consequences of seemingly innocuous routine procedures and practices operating inside the state system must be examined closely. In the framework, the box labelled ‘Shaping public opinion’ purports to signify such consequences in varying degrees, depending on the strength of government will or inclination, the issues concerned or any other conditions which may effect government influence. In practice, power over public opinion is not without limits. At one level, it has self-defeating dimensions. The interruption of information channels and an overwhelming dose of coordinated mass propaganda may be found unjustifiable and unsustainable, in which case a political remedy is often difficult or extremely costly. Equally, in less extreme cases, the incremental effect of tacit but repeated statements, proposals and campaigns can be as pernicious as explicit propaganda in the long run.11 The very instrument to which the state has turned in order to involve the public can turn against itself and undermine its basis of legitimacy and power.12 At another level, power over opinion may be constrained by the inherent human tendency to resist coercive force. How far and how long can human nature endure the doctrine that might makes right?13 Do not state surveillance, control and intervention have a corrosive effect on the fabric of society itself? Finally, the exercise of power does not necessarily lead to the outcome intended or desired by government

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officials. At worst, the outcome can be quite opposite to their expectations; at best, it may be latent and diffuse in pluralistic societies and in the age of information and communications technology. The concept of power In the discussion of public opinion, the concept of power is vital.14 Military power, economic power and power over opinion, E.H. Carr argued, are the three essential aspects of political power in the international sphere.15 In his classic theory of international relations, Hans Morgenthau defined power as ‘man’s control over the minds and actions of other men’ and political power as ‘the mutual relations of control among the holders of public authority and between the latter and the people at large’.16 In his view, opinion formation is the beginning of an independent agency of influence — a political force. American political scientists like Robert Dahl, Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz analysed the concept and nature of power in a working democratic system in the United States.17 In particular, Bachrach and Baratz drew attention to the creation and the reinforcement of social and political values and of institutional practices which circumscribe public debates to a range of issues innocuous to policy-makers.18 To Steven Lukes, the ultimate exercise of power is: … to prevent people, to whatever degree, from having grievances by shaping their perceptions, cognitions and preferences in such a way that they accept their role in the existing order of things, either because they can see or imagine no alternative to it, or because they see it as natural and unchangeable, or because they value it as divinely ordained and beneficial.19

Still, the questions of who actually exercises power and who manipulates public opinion remain.20 If non-officials or outside groups have illegitimate access to decision-making in certain policy areas, political accountability also has to be investigated. Whoever exercises power over opinion, the important fact is that the act of manipulation has ‘an aspect of force’ since it leaves little option to those targeted and keeps them unaware of the nature of deception and compliance.21 Information A factor indispensable in the argument of power over opinion is information. Although originally applied to foreign policy-making situations, Joseph Frankel’s definition of information is useful in the general setting: ‘the link between the decision-makers and their environments’ and ‘the means of transforming the operational environment into the psychological one’.22 The information one receives may fill the blank mental canvass. It may clarify or obscure an origi-

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nally held image; it may change the image only in certain aspects or in a fundamental way. Besides this substantive aspect, access to information is crucial. It can be said that better access to information does not necessarily result in a more effective use of it by the public; the oversupply of data can clog communication channels. However, all conditions relating to the transmission of information may entail patterns of power relations in society.23 Arguably there still remains a gap in the coverage of foreign and domestic news. In contrast to the extensive use of news sources and the wide coverage of issues in the case of domestic news, international news sources were once in the hands of Foreign and Defence Ministries and the executive branch of the government. Some observers would argue that this asymmetry has been modified by the technological advance of communications systems in the late twentieth century and by real-time reporting styles which it made possible. Some democracies like Britain and New Zealand broadcast parliamentary debates.24 Yet technological prurience and increased and faster flow of news do not automatically translate into the equal distribution of its benefits.25 Moreover, information can still be blocked when it comes to issues of ‘national security’ or ‘vital interests’.26 There still remains the possibility that increased media exposure and public pressure paradoxically leads to the stricter and more sophisticated handling of confidential information on public relations fronts. Foreign policy officials may be unable to shelve certain issues with grave moral overtones indefinitely, but they are still able to disregard certain issues as being not in the national interest and, of course, to arrange the timing of disclosure.27 In short, influence over public opinion can take many forms, overt or covert, and the ways in which information is transmitted essentially reflects the pattern of power relations. Information (including even sober statistical data) is not simply another piece of data to be added; it is transmitted in such a way to sustain a particular value system of a society.28 Thus, this first phase signifies an initial stage where varying degrees of government influence are exerted over intermediary actors and institutions, which serve to circumscribe the scope of public opinion acceptable in society, whether the government has a clear intention to do so or not. 2.2 WRITING HISTORY

Now let us move onto the areas of actual activities which may be brought under government influence (Phase II), namely ‘Writing history’, ‘Education’ and ‘History education’. The rest of the chapter will in turn analyse the nature of these activities in relation to government influence over the public and the concomitant power relations between them. Here, the focus is on government influence

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through intermediaries such as historians, schools and teachers. Three points need to be clarified here. First, this division is made artificially for the purpose of analysis although the three activities overlap in practice. Second, the term ‘Writing history’ is used to mean historical studies in general, including both scholarly research and that of a more general nature. (‘Education’ and ‘History Education’, however, refer to teaching at pre-university levels as defined earlier.) Third, it is assumed that historians’ practice is not devoid of government influence, although, at first sight, their professional freedom appears to be guaranteed (and certainly specialists who work in democracies enjoy more freedom than those in authoritarian states). In the framework, government influence over education is considered to be more direct than over historians (arrows A’ and B’ in the framework). Below, two approaches to the discussion of power relations pertinent to historiography are analysed — postmodernist and empiricist. Although these approaches have broader theoretical implications for arguments of objectivity, subjectivity and intersubjectivity, the following sections focus on a more specific context that historians write history.29 Postmodernist approaches One approach, as represented by postmodernism, is to engage in an analysis of power relations as reflected in historians’ writings.30 Yet this analysis does not particularly focus on power relations either between the government and historians or between the government and the public. Rather, historical presentations are presupposed to share the status of authority, if not identical with it; therefore, the power relations being assumed here exist between historians’ work and their readers or society in general. From this position, the historian’s vantage point and epistemological issues behind it are examined. One can argue generally that whoever writes history is the prisoner of an age and a place in which one is accustomed to think; historical narratives are thus a product rooted in a particular society.31 Added to this are the personal dispositions of historians (political, socio-economic, ideological, racial, religious, etc.) including moral and ethical positioning.32 These connotations are conveyed to (or imposed on) readers through an individual historian’s writing. Furthermore, postmodernism has challenged modernist historiography in many dimensions. The biggest blow has been to the very premise of empiricist/positivist thinking and the conviction that the truth is ‘out there’ and there are ‘facts’ to be searched.33 Since the conventional practice of historians is to examine variant interpretations and inferences by referring to facts rather than by arguing about the nature of their work, most presume that factuality is the final resort.34 Facts have been the life-blood of modern historical

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scholarship. Consequently, their energies have been put into basic fact-finding and the investigation of sources through verification and comparison.35 On the other hand, the postmodern approach, seeing history as a complex narrative discourse, assumes that there is no truth untied to the subjectivity of the observer and that facts and values are intertwined.36 Following on from this, postmodernists seek to pin down and criticize those aspects of power relations contained in the very scientific ethos claimed by the modernist historiography: methodological impartiality and objectivity; the validity or credibility of evidence; the discovery of truths; the notion of a unitary history; and authoritative presentation. From the postmodernist perspective, there is little certainty about the empirical method of accessing reality other than the fact that it is conventional or established. Whereas simple statements containing a few facts may be easy to tell true or false, the narrative based on a collection of facts which requires a complex interpretative exercise in a broader context of events can hardly attain consensus.37 Although constrained by what happened, the line of demarcation between history and stories, or reality and fiction, becomes more arbitrary. In a nutshell, the question is: ‘How can we trust history we read?’38 In this thinking, the nineteenth-century modernist concept of the truth being discovered through evidence loses its meaning.39 In this way, postmodernism attempts to bring under close scrutiny the very foundation of historical knowledge and to reveal its authoritative nature.40 The transmission of historical knowledge (i.e. historical narratives) is perceived as the exercise of power itself. The function of historical presentations is therefore ‘a kind of self-legitimation’ which establishes historians’ authority within society according to accepted rules and practices, and reinforces society’s self-identity.41 Does historical scholarship offer an independent body of knowledge or a compromised past? If the essence of postmodernist claim to history is that no one can tell what actually happened, historical presentations have already become fragmented. But the relativism which all these variant narratives propound is not a new issue; it was also inherent in historical studies using theories. As Geoffrey Elton once said, historians’ job may be to cast doubt on any historical studies. Although few historians say that the case is ‘solved’, any statements have to be made in more indeterminate and relative terms.42 In a sense, postmodernists offer ‘a form of protection against what is politically right, wrong, correct or incorrect’.43 They maintain that historical knowledge which constitutes the fund of knowledge of the nation, the state or any movement is institutionalized, consciously or unconsciously. They warn that there are hidden plots in historical narratives. Their caveat is: the very act of organizing historical data into a narrative creates

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an illusion of the real world and exercises power thus historians’ impositionalist role must be understood.44 Nonetheless, the premise of the postmodernist approach to history is not unquestionable in considering power relations.45 One of the problems is its conceptual solipsism. Although historians’ writings are doubtless part of reality, for postmodernists the past (what actually happened) exists only in the world of historians’ work. The source of power is enshrined in historical narratives and the literary world. But the real question which must be asked is this: who produces historical knowledge and who approves it as general knowledge?46 A more practical problem deriving from this conceptual flaw is that evidence is not only a matter of interpretation; it also involves self-speaking materials, traces and visual records as in forensic investigations. George Iggers rightly points out that ‘the critics of historical realism who insisted on the autonomy of texts seldom went beyond theoretical statements to confront a concrete historical subject-matter, which for them could only be a linguistic construct’.47 The point is that we must go back to the truth content in the end in all historical inquires. Second, postmodernists almost categorically deny rational historical discourse and more importantly the notion of historical falsity, along with that of historical truth. While they critically examine the truth content, they at the same time seem to go to extremes so as to deny the very existence of truths. They eliminate the murky border between historical discourse which has always uncertain elements and fiction which is an interpretive story.48 In fact, the practical impasse of this problem was clearly pointed out: This blurring of borders has become particularly troublesome in recent discussions of the Holocaust as a historical event. The contradictions of resolving history into purely imaginative literature become apparent in Hayden White’s admission that from a moral perspective it is unacceptable to deny the reality of the Holocaust, yet it is impossible in a historical narrative to establish objectively that it happened.49

Similarly, postmodernism seems to remove a wall between historical research and propaganda, which could potentially create a political climate for the prevalence of the most flagrant propaganda. Yet the essence of the matter in practice is not black and white, but the degree to which historians get closer to the truth.50 Finally, while postmodernism defends the plurality of presentations and interpretations of history, it is uncertain whether or not there is any line to be drawn between what is allowed and what is not.51 Provided that there do exist some constraints from the actual past on what is acceptable in historical writing, where is the line to be drawn? While pointing out the subjectivity of historians and the

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impossibility of their objective research, the postmodernist approach could simultaneously endorse the very subjectivity they criticize. While offering opportunities for the marginalized, ignored and silenced voice,52 this approach at the same time enables anyone to present any version of history without the sanction of facts or the detailed forensic study of evidence. It follows that this promiscuity offers potentially unlimited opportunities to the holder of power — a paradoxical twist to the very critique of authentication of history which postmodernists have advanced. In the end, this whole argument seems to indicate that whatever methods to historical research are taken, they may still be brought under the influence of those in power. Then, the problem does not necessarily rest with historiography but goes back to the real sources of power. Otherwise, the real tension between the search for the truth and the exercise of power cannot be brought to light in the final analysis.53 We must thus go beyond postmodernist approaches to the writing of history. Empiricist approaches If the postmodernist way of analysing power relations as reflected in historians’ writings is not convincing, an alternative approach may be to examine historians’ actual working environment, both current and historical, empirically. In effect, there are many questions which can be asked before someone actually starts writing history. In the first place, we can look at the relatively visible aspects of authoritative control and the exercise of power — the government’s information policy over any issue-areas. In relation to shaping public opinion, an obvious example of this is the declassification (or otherwise) of official documents after a specified period.54 Yet this practice also depends on other issues such as national security and privacy protection; these are not always clear to the public. In effect, even the existence of documents might be unknown until disclosed. Besides, official records or statistics are not necessarily reliable, whether because manipulated or because of poor quality; there may not be much to be revealed from these sources. Thus, government practices will profoundly affect the scope of research areas and historians’ capacity to investigate.55 We can also review the history of historiography itself, which indicates its close relevance to the process of state formation. Apart from the fact that it is often the elite themselves who chronicle history,56 a strong cooperative relationship between historical scholarship and officialdom developed, for example, in nineteenth-century Europe as nationalism grew:57 Both in new nation-states like Germany and Italy, and in well-established ones like France, the state promoted historical research, encouraged the

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publication of source materials, and appointed the university professors who were responsible for the training of history teachers in schools.58

In Britain too, where national identity and legitimacy of the state were less open to challenge than in many continental counterparts, historical studies came to be seen as an important unifying element in the country’s political culture, against the background of an expanding and increasingly literate electorate. Many ‘official histories’ also came to be written. Outside Europe, where historical documents scarcely existed initially, independence movements and political upheavals gave a momentum to the recording of national history. Before the Revolution, colonial Americans identified themselves with the British history. With the consolidation of national identity among the thirteen colonies after the Revolution, they gradually came to realize that they needed ‘a distinctively American past’ and their own heritage.59 In India, the early generation of English-educated Bengalis was without doubt loyal to the East India Company at the time of the revolt in 1857. However, by the 1860s, they openly disputed the colonialist interpretation of Indian history. It was in the next decade that much of the writing of a nationalist history of India was prepared.60 In Africa, where indigenous history was silenced during the colonial period, the writing of history has assumed an important role in overcoming ‘the colonial psychology of dependence and inferiority’ since independence.61 Furthermore, in this parallel process of state formation and the advance of historical studies, the writing of history may have come to assume a role of counterforce against the universalism to which the Enlightenment had generally appealed. Naturally, educational activities were in essence attached to the Enlightenment; they appealed to its rationalist ideals of progress through science. But this universal claim clouds distinctive communal qualities at the same time. In this sense, recourse to historicism and the writing of history in general may be regarded as one way of resolving these contradictions, situated at the conjunction between universalism and particularism.62 Finally, we must consider a more straightforward use of history. Historians’ work may remain confined to academic circles, but it is not often the case. J.H. Plumb’s prediction that ‘[t]he old past is dying, its force weakening, and so it should’ seems far from today’s reality.63 In parallel to a human need for collective continuity through descendants,64 both those in power and those aspiring to ascend to it have attempted to use the past, by resurrecting or supplementing it, or even inventing one if a usable past has not been found, with the result of truth-content receding in the background.65 Thus, history is as open as ever to the use and misuse of

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power.66 With increased literacy and a larger audience who have access to the electronic and other media than was the case previously, the use of history as ammunition may have been increased accordingly. What must be put into perspective in connection with the process of state formation is the dual dimension of state sovereignty — spatial and temporal. The spatial dimension concerns the common understanding of a state defined as a territory, a purely geographical entity. The temporal, and more controversial, dimension concerns the origin or formation of a state, i.e. the state defined in terms of ‘the fixed point from which spatial extension is measured’.67 Rob Walker argues: Within states, time is conventionally understood as linear progress, while between states, time is understood as contingency and repetition. But relations between states are increasingly understood in terms of temporal progression, while the form of states is also understood to be as much a subject of temporal transformation as it is a place where historical change can occur.68

The temporal dimension is important as all states certainly differ in the strength and wealth of their political, socio-economic, cultural and religious heritage.69 While new states look for essential landmarks which are distinct from numerous others, old states select or discard from longer and richer historical records or the pre-existing ‘cultural wealth’.70 Societies which are able to consult well-documented sources of national history have an advantage over others which lack such leverage. In the latter case, intellectuals are expected to perform a double task internally and externally: to recover national history and convince their fellow countrymen of their illustrious past, and to present (or declare) a version of national history while persuading sceptical outsiders of its authenticity.71 ‘We must have a history!’ No history of Bengal was written by Bengalis themselves. Furthermore, in order to offset the lack of a chronicle, late comers sometimes have to engage in cultural wars in which philology, archaeology and anthropology are brought in ‘to trace uncertain genealogies, to root populations in their native terrains, to document their distinctive traits and cultures, and to annex earlier civilizations’.72 In this sense, national history may be something that has to be acquired, just like territories. The power holder is interested in history not only from the desirability of promoting national cohesion among its population but also from an awareness of ‘the subversive possibilities of untrammelled historical enquiry’.73 To the elite, the disturbing element of the past is that it can potentially reveal that things which are very

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much taken for granted have not always been as they are now, and that they need not remain the same in the future.74 In sum, the two approaches, postmodern and empirical, both indicate that historians are at the crossroads of power relations between the government and society. The role of historians’ work may be defined by themselves, the government or other actors, depending on where and when they live. Although historians’ efforts to put things right may not easily remove the distortions already permeated in society or officialdom, it is doubtless true that historians discharge varying degrees of political responsibility by writing history. 2.3 EDUCATION

One of the most widely accepted aims of education (here used in the most general sense) is the pursuit of knowledge and understanding.75 If education is considered in terms of its intellectual and literary merits for individual students, then pedagogical ideals can be enumerated. However, the central concern here is political interference in the pursuit of knowledge and understanding, in particular, the content of teaching.76 If it is the case, however subtle it may be, education can be regarded as an instrument for social engineering at the disposal of the government:77 ... the mass education system which inculcates these common values and outlooks [religious and regional] is a state system under state control. In Nigeria and Kenya, in Syria and Iraq, in Israel and Egypt, in Malaysia and Singapore, the state has intervened directly to guide as well as establish and fund the mass education system.78

In effect, the politics of education is an old theme which has been discussed since the time of Plato when education was essentially for a small group of rulers and leaders.79 Yet the theme continues to underscore the evolving role of education in changing society, reflecting parallel frictions, for example, one between individual existence and collectivity, another between ideologies, and yet another between competing cultures.80 On the one hand, it is arguable that government policy determines the orientation of education in society.81 On the other hand, it may be said that, if the institution of education is able to maintain a distance from officialdom, it can be a powerful counterforce and a balancer to the latter, and even an independent agent or catalyst of change.82 An endless tug of war still seems to occur between politicians and educationalists.83

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Education and state formation The close relationship between politics and education may also be explained in terms of the historical process of modern state formation, similar to the development of historiography. Where this process proceeded gradually, as it did in Europe,84 the state created legal and taxation systems and then a centralized administrative apparatus, finally establishing institutions for education, welfare and other functions.85 Various developments in the late nineteenth century – the burgeoning of industry, the growth of urban populations and workers’ organizations and the extension of franchise – necessitated the reinforcement of national consciousness over class and regional loyalties, and this led to the introduction of universal compulsory education.86 In the same vein, from the educationalist perspective, Andy Green explains state formation as: ... not only the construction of the political and administrative apparatus of government and all government-controlled agencies [of the modern state] which constitute the ‘public’ realm but also the formation of ideologies and collective beliefs which legitimate state power and underpin concepts of nationhood and national ‘character’.87

Thus, the creation of an education system can also be placed at the heart of the process of modern state formation and of the political realm.88 Some may point to other reasons for the establishment of the state-run education system. For example, it is arguable that the provision of public education required the facilities and resources of a state rather than those of small communities.89 However, this does not necessarily explain the foundation of state-run schools. Although a certain level of logistics may have been indispensable for the synchronization of an entire education system, the size and resources of the state differed (and still do) enormously from one state to another. Rather, reality seems to suggest that, where there was a need to create or sustain a unified political entity, educational institutions were set up to meet this need.90 It is more natural to think that the state had practical reasons for founding schools and colleges in order to train and recruit professional but amenable personnel fit to steer the state apparatus, be it bureaucracy, colonial administration or the military.91 The British education system which turned out generations of civilian colonial administrators is a typical example.92 Seen in this way, it can be argued that, as an institution, education came to assume an enduring role in sustaining the political life of the state.93

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The role of education in the domestic context The role of education needs analysing further. Although it would be possible to list many more functions of education, the following four, which are all mutually related, seem to be important here.94 Political socialization Educational institutions serve as an agency for political socialization.95 Behind all educational ideologies lie the broad concepts of ‘the desired society’ and of the individual as ‘the desired product’.96 As students learn skills, acquire knowledge, recognize social status and follow authority patterns, education reproduces ‘proper’ attitudes in members of a society and acts to consolidate the existing system.97 In fact, ‘[s]tates required civic religion (“patriotism”) all the more because they increasingly required more than passivity from their citizens’.98 This was what Rousseau had thought: ‘national character can be created by suitable institutions and this is eminently desirable’ and ‘[i]n the long run, it is government which mould peoples’.99 Of course, ‘peasants into Frenchmen’ is one historical example of this process.100 In other words, education can be regarded as a chief policy instrument for creating a sense of citizenship.101 In a discussion of Americanization, Robert Dahl similarly maintained that, among various social processes, it was formal schooling that had played the most important role in instilling the democratic creed in a heterogeneous mass of immigrants and in assimilating them.102 They were ‘Americans not by birth but by immigration’; thus ‘Americans had to be made’.103 In this grand mission, the educational system was transformed into ‘a machine for political socialization’, and the act of respect for the American flag became a daily ritual in schools from the 1880s onwards. 104 Few states encourage the future generation to study ideologies which promote the subversion of the state apparatus. Communist regimes of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe did not preach the idea of revolution after their ascension to power. Regardless of differences in the form of polity, children are usually brought up to respect the traditions, creeds and institutions of their country, but only when they fit the needs of political leaders. Indoctrination There is a possibility that education can turn into indoctrination, the most extreme form of political socialization.105 If educational choices are inherently political, it is difficult to draw a clear line between political education and indoctrination.106 Education certainly entails the aspect of communicating to individuals with little conviction what it is acceptable to think or not, and the range of interpretations and alternatives which will be tolerated in

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society.107 For example, the Chinese Communist Party used the print media and schools in order to instil Mao’s interpretation of Marxism-Leninism into every Chinese citizen, even to the point of repudiating Confucian heritage and historical writings.108 And Chinese education policies changed before, during and after the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.109 Kenneth Boulding emphasized a powerful role embedded in education which not only harnesses the biological drives and establishes the value system of a society, but, by constant repetition, even gives these acquired values ‘the same status in the image as biological values — or perhaps even a superior status’.110 In most extreme cases, as in Nazi Germany, teaching methods, curriculum and the permission to teach were gradually made subject to party control through intimidation, infiltration and political decrees. Accustomed to using educational institutions for the purposes of the German empire, the Germans conducted partisan propaganda throughout schooling without any hesitation.111 In these cases, education virtually became ‘a political instrument for injecting national spirit’.112 The establishment and maintenance of hegemony Education may lend support to the establishment and maintenance of hegemony in society. While not all educational issues have ideological dimensions, the aspect of power relations among various existing and emerging groups must always be taken into account.113 For educationalists like Paulo Freire, educational activities represent ‘a struggle for meaning and a struggle over power relations’.114 Antonio Gramsci was one of the first to stress the importance of ideas and culture in the context of power relations. For him, education was ‘a weapon in the struggle for hegemony’. Gramsci had strong belief in the possibilities of transforming popular consciousness and of raising the level of popular culture through education and thereby ultimately achieving an alternative hegemony. He also asserted the importance of broad general education for the advancement of the working class and advocated public schooling funded by the state.115 Keenly aware of the complexities of relations between various social forces as well as the historical particularities of nation, region and cultural formation, Gramsci presupposed the primacy of the educative and moral role the state plays in maintaining the hegemony of the dominant classes. In this sense, his theory of hegemony serves as a useful basis for understanding the historical genesis of state education.116 Explaining, interpreting and assessing political and socio-econo-mic issues Educational institutions can more specifically offer explanations, interpretations and assessments of political and socio-economic issues of the day, from genuine events, through institutional

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arrangements, to government policies, according to the level of students’ intellectual development.117 In this way, education may function, for example, to inculcate in future citizens a belief in the legitimacy of the incumbent government; to solicit their allegiance to the central government; and to jettison the idea of regional autonomy conducive to a separatist or independence movement.118 R. Murray Thomas has noted such a potential risk: ... once governments are in power, they are highly concerned about the way political-economic systems are presented to children and youths in the schools. When those in power suspect that the schools are extolling the virtues of other systems or are unduly critical of the existing one, the government or self-appointed patriotic groups seek to apply sanctions to school personnel to correct such political deviationism.119

Certainly, within each society, there are academics, journalists and critics who do this job for the whole society.120 In this regard, James Rosenau argued as follows: Our work as scholars helps define — through our students who subsequently enter leadership roles, through our empirical findings that eventually get translated into premises for journalists, through our interpretive essays on which politicians and other advocates may build their belief systems — the socio-political reality around which public affairs are organized.121

Although his point pertains more to higher and lifetime education than elementary and secondary levels, it can be said that education as an institution generally contributes to the assessment of various events and activities in society and conveys this self-evaluation to the next generation.122 Influence over public opinion through education Following on from the above arguments of the historical process of state formation and the role of education, this section will consider two things: the extent and the features of educational influence. In the first place, it is arguable that education is one of the most powerful and ‘legitimately’ accepted instruments for influencing public opinion in the hands of governments.123 The United Nations’ 1981 resolution on ‘Educational Rights’ called for all member countries to adopt authorized measures guaranteeing the full right to universal education. It is also commonplace today for governments to speak of the achievement of public education in terms of the restructuring of national industries and the labour market, and in terms of the overall performance of their economy vis-à-vis foreign competitors.124

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However, such educational influence cannot be assessed properly without taking into account a wide diversity of relationships between educational institutions and public authorities, and the socio-economic and political forces at work within each society.125 Important determinants of educational influence are summarized in Table 2.1. Second, the characteristics of educational influence over public opinion are comparable to those of the news media’s influence in many ways. There are at least two points of connection. The news media can be seen as a type of informal and private education while schooling is seen as formal education.126 When a new issue of which the public have little background knowledge emerges, the news media can virtually assume the role of public educators.127 Some analogous arguments for education can also be drawn from literature on the impact of the news media on society. For example, the influence of education and that of the news media obviously derive from the transmission of information or knowledge.128 The design Table 2.1 Important Determinants of Educational Influence The degree of centralization This is in terms of administration as well as curriculum, against the degree of autonomy given to regional/local administrators and individual schools/ teachers. A combination of Japan’s centralized education system and its highly homogenous society makes for a sharp contrast with the British-influenced Malaysian education system which has historically had Koranic, English, Malay, Chinese and Tamil schools operating in parallel. Access to schooling

This means not only children’s statutory rights to receive formal education but also their actual attendance at school. Five major dichotomies, often combined to amplify the gap in access to education are rich/poor, urban/rural, ethnic majorities/minorities, religious majorities/ minorities and politically favoured/disadvantaged regions. Language policy

The choice and number of languages used for instruction, be it a vernacular, an indigenous or a former ruler’s language, is an important issue. This choice could affect both the attendance of children with different ethnic backgrounds and their understanding of the instruction provided. In the former Yugoslavia where educational policies were decided at the provincial level with minimal centralization, compulsory reading was offered in twenty languages across provinces depending on the dominant local group. The training, selection and recruitment of administrators and teachers129

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and structure of the school curriculum shares common problems with the choice of news, the assessment of news values, rules governing news standards and priority settings and the accuracy of information.130 (Curricular problems will be mentioned in the next section.) The same is true with the geographical distribution of overseas correspondents and the news coverage of culturally proximate and distant places. The personal interests, predispositions, predilections and issue awareness of intellectuals and teachers also parallel those of correspondents and editors.131 Teaching in schools, like news transmission, is also largely one-way communication in the first place with a small number of senders dispatching messages to a large audience, allowing relatively limited feedback from the latter.132 Furthermore, both educational institutions and the news media can facilitate the creation of a political force in the long term.133 Of course, the relationship with public authority would be a vital factor in determining the character of such a political force. But, if the news media themselves can act as an effective opposition against the government, education as an institution may also indirectly encourage ‘a spirit of independent enquiry’ which militates against the manipulation and the suppression of opinion by political leaders.134 In particular situations, education may even provide political dissidents and subordinated people with opportunities to familiarize themselves with the methods of displacing a government and organizing independence movements.135 There are, of course, important differences between education and the news media, attributable to their institutional settings and communication methods, which also bring to light the nature of educational influence. First, education at the pre-university level is primarily for nationals of certain age groups living in a country, that is, a very differentiated audience. It is most unlikely to reach foreign nationals living abroad, except for particular arrangements. In contrast, the news media generally have a much wider, largely undifferentiated audience across state borders, although they may target small social or political organizations as well as scattered ethnic and linguistic communities, depending on the issues under discussion.136 Second, schooling at primary and secondary levels is often compulsory and long-term with far-reaching influence on the future public; hence, formal education is considered to have a strong generational effect on students compared to that of the news media on their audience. Another point is that it is doubtful that students are conscious of being a ‘receiver’; in contrast, the news media’s audience, generally cognizant of being the receiver, has choices.137 Finally, in terms of types of information distributed, school materials generally deal with more ‘established’ knowledge:138

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... there is a peculiar illusion incidental to all knowledge acquired in the way of education: the illusion of finality. When a student is in statu pupillari with respect of any subject whatever, he has to believe that things are settled because the textbooks and his teachers regard them as settled.139

On the other hand, the majority of news in general revolves around current affairs, ephemera and controversy. In sum, it is arguable that primary and secondary education has considerable potential to develop public opinion in particular directions in the long term; hence it may provide a preparatory stage for ‘the mass production of opinion’140 through political socialization, indoctrination, the maintenance of hegemony and the explanations, interpretations and assessments of political and socio-economic issues. Obviously, the entire argument depends on how far a central authority interferes in the content of teaching and thus enhances the potential leverage of public opinion through education. While the comparison between education and the news media is useful in analysing influence over public opinion through education, government influence over education differs from one state to another, just as its influence over the news media does, given that socialization patterns and social forces at work differ vastly between societies.141 2.4 HISTORY EDUCATION

History is sometimes learned and sometimes observed and experienced, then stored as historical memory or knowledge.142 If the essence of historical studies comes down to ‘commitment to truth, respect for the past … and impartiality’, this tenet should also apply to history education.143 Yet the teaching of history in schools represents a vicarious experience fundamentally different from history observed or experienced as real-time happenings. Further, if politics intervenes in education and the writing of history weaves in political threads, history education naturally shares the proclivities of both activities. This may happen even in an accentuated manner when the practice drifts off from both the pedagogical ideal of nurturing independent and critical thinking, and the scholarly purpose of seeking truths. When history courses appeared in universities in nineteenthcentury Europe, they were already closely related to the ethic of public service. Towards the end of the century, national history acquired a central place in the curriculum in tandem with the development of mass education under state control: History was conceived of as a way of teaching the principles of good government, and it was part of its dignity as a subject that it was

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concerned, almost exclusively, with national institutions and events. In the Board Schools history was no less closely associated with what was sometimes called, in the 1900s, ‘civics’, i.e. the principles of patriotism and the duties of the individual to the state.144

Similarly, contemporary tendencies in higher education suggest that national borders have been strongly preserved in the subject of history: In colleges and universities, the developing history curriculum froze in the nationalist pattern as the French endlessly refought their revolution, the British wrote the history of their liberties and the Germans that of their geist, and the Americans celebrated their freedoms and their frontier.145

In the 1980s, Christopher Hill, Raphael Samuel and Carolyn Steedman voiced their concerns regarding the British government’s intervention in school history teaching, while German and Italian historians fiercely debated the appropriate ways of teaching the period 1918-45.146 Conversely, these historical cases and contemporary echoes suggest that there is a tension between ‘academic history’ and ‘classroom history’. Geoffrey Elton explained his view on the teaching of history as follows: ... history is a subject in which the learned dispute as much as they agree .... Certainly there is an agreed body of knowledge to be transmitted, but no one supposes that such transmission constitutes the teaching of history ... the study of history consists of debates — between the historian and his evidence, between different students of history, between the historian and his own society — and if the teaching of history is to be successful it, too, must rest on debate.147

Provided that a healthy scholarly debate is advanced, there may be some truth in what Elton said: ‘… history is not a good subject to teach to children, or rather, the “real” thing — academic history — is the wrong thing for them’.148 In general, new knowledge only recently discovered by experts or events currently disputed by historians would not become subject-matters at the pre-university level.149 Yet should children learn history in the postmodern style of indeterminacy and relativism from the very beginning or should they study alternative critical history? At least, a tension between ‘academic history’ and ‘classroom history’ must be admitted.

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Curricular problems As the above arguments suggest, the content of teaching is the crux of the matter. What kind of content, then, matters in classroom history? It certainly shares the same problem as the writing of history: the selection and interpretation of facts (or what are believed to be facts). As indicated in the comparison between the news media and education, the extent of geographical and temporal coverage is crucial. Table 2.2 outlines the issues. Thus, even before the discussion of specific historical events, there are many problems concerning the structure of history courses.150 (This relates to the scope and depth of the conception of the past which will be discussed in the next chapter.) When it comes to specific historical facts, the problem is multiplied further by the variety of subject-matters with varying degrees of emphasis or marginalization. As suggested earlier, subjects like history (and geography), which deal directly with the origins and background of current political systems, territories, peoples and cultures of both home and foreign states, can hardly avoid controversial issues. Military victories/defeats, conquest/subjugation, control/suppression, trade/exploitation and ‘lies about crimes’ are essential components of these subjects.151 Thus the historical events which are ‘appropriate’ or ‘important’ to study are bound to be hierarchically ordered in the curriculum. Students usually study their home country first and then foreign countries (or even as an option), often in contradistinction to the former. Although this order alone cannot be regarded as problematic, it may induce the logic of the Procrustean Bed.152 Of course, even what to call a place can be controversial between states. For example, Benedict Anderson points out the case of ‘Viet Nam’ meaning roughly ‘to the south of Table 2.2 Problems Concerning Geographical and Temporal Coverage Geographical – Are both ‘national history’ and ‘world history’ in the curriculum or the latter optional or ‘national history’ only? – Do students have opportunities to study remote regions and countries from home in the same way as neighbouring regions? – Is the quantitative proportion equally balanced between various regions? – What about countries with which no diplomatic relations are established? – Is a similar level of quality maintained as to each geographical region? Temporal – Do students learn national history thoroughly from the beginning of the formation of the state (this itself is problematic) up to the present? – Do students study only part of national history, i.e. particular historical periods, for example, the ancient times or the contemporary period? (Similar questions apply to world history.)153

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Viet’ (a realm conquered by the Han) or ‘Nam Viet’ meaning ‘Southern Viet’ (virtually a Vietnamese ruler’s claim to the old realm). The former is in line with the Chinese view, and it was not well received by Vietnamese rulers in the past.154 Further, the interpretation of facts concerns not only a wide range of perspectives at a certain point in time but also viewpoints changing over time. Yet these evaluations may be one-sided or deviate completely from well-evidenced explanations. Whether and how alternative interpretations are explained are also important issues. In all these settings, to what extent and how are controversial domestic and interstate issues studied at school? For example, how are the Vietnam War and the repeated interventions into Central America viewed in US schools?155 What about national history as taught in Irish state schools and that taught in their English counterparts?156 These controversial issues are likely to be sidelined or alternatively presented to reflect the government’s stance. In 1988 and 1989, school history examinations were cancelled in the Soviet Union in order to rewrite the history of the Stalin and Brezhnev eras.157 In the case of the new states of Africa and Asia, standard literary and historical texts explain the contributions and achievements of states. School and university syllabuses feature the great experiments in statebuilding in pre-colonial Africa like the medieval empire of Ghana and Zimbabwe, and the record of resistance to white incursions like the rebellion against the Rhodesian settlers of 1896 or the Maji-Maji revolt in German East Africa in 1905 (both significantly based on inter-tribal cooperation).158

The problem is not confined to interstate aspects. Some Islamic states underscore a religious dimension of their history so as to recast what are essentially nationalist goals.159 Arabism’s vision of Zionism and Israel as its ‘absolute opposite’ is prevalent in education systems.160 Of course, 9/11 and the consequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq must be given some kind of explanations in schools at some stage not only in the United States but also in other countries and regions. The invocation of patriotism and domestic support Even from this cursory overview, it is clear that, in the teaching of history, there is plenty of room in which governments are able to manoeuvre so as to inculcate patriotism, whether they intend to do so or as it happens.161 Historical events which directly led to the formation of a state or had an decisive impact on its fate can be ideal resources for generating a sense of nationhood among the future public, creating ‘social cement’,162 and integrating them into

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a politically unified citizenry, while reviving memories and experiences of the past generation. In particular, the element of warfare in classroom history is of great importance for several reasons.163 First, since modern wars required an unprecedented scale of participation and sacrifice by the public (and today children themselves are involved in armed conflicts), war stories can provide students with abundant examples of civilian contribution to the defence of their country. Second, because an ever wider section of the populace is mobilized, wars are likely to appeal to students as an immediate issue involving their kith and kin. Third, the wars fought for the defence of territory have the effect of drawing the attention of students to the issue of boundaries — ‘territorializing public consciousness’.164 This is at the same time related to the projection of contrasting images of one party and the other in either favourable or unfavourable terms.165 In this way, the presentation of past conflicts crystallizes collective identity and a sense of national solidarity,166 while the teaching of history in a broader sense plays an important role in promoting a patriotic spirit. In this context, it is also possible to argue the presentation of ‘official history’ in terms of the dual process of ‘internal and external colonisation’ of historical knowledge in the long term.167 The charge of internal colonization has been made by many ethnic minority groups against the government in multicultural/ethnic societies around the world, involving the American Indians, the aborigines, black and Muslim communities, separatists and irredentists.168 Similar issues are also shared by heterogeneous and pluralistic Israel and China (which has more than fifty officially recognized ethnic minority groups).169 In most cases, hegemonic core communities, setting precedents and institutional norms in public life and selecting the languages of education and politics, decide the content of much of the history and literature taught in their schools:170 ... school culture functioned not only to confirm and privilege students from the dominant classes but also through exclusion and insult to discredit the histories, experiences, and dreams of subordinate groups.171

Similarly, Camilleri has said: ... the primacy of national history depends on stifling the histories of minorities and marginal communities. Similarly, the ascendancy of the colonial state rested in no small measure on the imposition of its own history on the colonized society.172

For ethnic communities which are not necessarily fixed to a geographic homeland, intangible resources like ethnic origins and

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descent give a powerful psychological and political lever in mobilizing or remobilizing the suppressed energies of their communities. If one takes an instrumental view of history education, its potentiality can be considered both in a more general sense and in a more specific sense than the nurturing of patriotism or ethnic solidarity. On the one hand, it is arguable that the teaching of various historical aspects of national life is essentially geared to creating a base for nationwide public support of any government and to raising a sense of national consciousness in order to pursue long-term national goals and insure against adverse situations. Even if the state is not faced with a crisis of falling apart, the fear of a decline of socio-political bonds may prompt the state to formulate new forms of civic loyalty. Political leaders cannot always rely on the automatic loyalty of citizens;173 nor is their support readily available when and in the form the leadership need it.

Table 2.3 The Potential of History Education In wartime Ends and military The continuation of conflict situa- fighting and victory tions in war

<Means Ends <Means The mobilization of War propaganda human, material and any available re- Education (history sources and geography) The inculcation of collective identity and national cohesion The promotion of patriotism and civilian morale

In post-conEnds flict and non- The creation of doviolent mestic support for a situations government or a regime in anticipation of emergencies

<Means

Ends

<Means

The integration of The mass media the masses and heterogeneous groups Education (history in society and geography)

The reinforcement The public endorse- of collective identity ment of policies and national cohesion The invocation of patriotism and civic loyalty

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On the other hand, there is a possibility that ‘classroom history’ serves more immediate, focused purposes, by endorsing/denouncing the legitimacy of home or foreign governments and by justifying the implementation of specific policies which may (or may not) have historical background (e.g. territorial disputes).174 In Western Europe where nation-states were formed earlier than other parts of the world, the term nationalism has come to point to something different. It no longer means political movements to create nationstates, but the assertive policies pursued by governments and the public support needed for such policies.175 In summary, this chapter has examined the means by which governments may exert influence over future citizens through the educational environment. It has analysed the influence of history education on students as the ‘process’ as against its ‘outcome’, by following it from the initial stage to the implementation stage. In other words, the possible influence of history education has been traced from the inception of government measures directed at intermediaries between the government and the public to the three mutually-related activities of writing history, education and history education. In so doing, the chapter has attempted to reveal the builtin process of consolidating a power relationship between the government and the public through the normal practice of education. NOTES 1 2

3

4

5 6

7 8 9

About public opinion, see, for example, John Zaller, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 40–52. Donald P. Warwick, ‘Transnational Participation and International Peace’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 320. Ergo, international election observers have been sent to Kosovo, TimorLeste, Guatemala, Ukraine, Afghanistan, etc. Karl W. Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundations of Nationality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Mass., The MIT Press, 1966, p. 4. Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp. 80, 83 and 86. Robert A. Dahl, Who Governs?: Democracy and Power in an American City, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1961, p. 305. Global warming campaigns are a typical example. Maureen B. Berman and Joseph E. Johnson, ‘The Growing Role of Unofficial Diplomacy’, in Maureen B. Berman and Joseph E. Johnson (eds), Unofficial Diplomats, New York, Columbia University Press, 1977, p. 25. Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication, p. 5. Steven Lukes, Power: A Radical View, London, Macmillan, 1974, pp. 22–3 and 38. Bernard C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, Boston, Little Brown, 1973, p. 179.

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Government Influence 10 11 12 13

14 15 16

17 18

19 20 21

22 23

24 25

26 27 28 29 30

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Many scandals with a ‘-gate’ suffix illustrate this. Dahl, Who Governs?, pp. 256–67, ‘Chapter 23 Control over Sources of Information’. Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication, p. 184. Anthony D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1995, p. 96. Edward Hallet Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, 2nd ed., London, The Macmillan Press, 1946, p. 145. See Lukes, Power, p. 31. E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 132. Hans Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, brief ed., Kenneth W. Thompson rev., New York, McGraw-Hill, 1993, pp. 30 and 42. Robert A. Dahl, ‘The Concept of Power’, Behavioral Science, vol. 2, no. 3, 1957, pp. 202–3. Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz, ‘The Two Faces of Power’, in Roderick Bell, David V. Edwards and R. Harrison Wagner (eds), Political Power: A Reader in Theory and Research, New York, The Free Press, 1969, p. 95. Lukes, Power, p. 24. Ernest Gellner, Thought and Change, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964, p. 217. Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz, ‘Decisions and Non-decisions: An Analytical Framework’, in Roderick Bell, David V. Edwards and R. Harrison Wagner (eds), Political Power: A Reader in Theory and Research, New York, The Free Press, 1969, pp. 103–4. Joseph Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy: An Analysis of Decision-Making, London, Oxford University Press, 1967, p. 95. Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972–1977, Colin Gordon (ed.), Colin Gordon, Leo Marshall, John Mepham and Kate Soper (trans.), New York and London, The Harvester Press, 1980, pp. 125–33. Yoel Cohen, Media Diplomacy: The Foreign Office in the Mass Communication Age, London, Frank Cass, 1986, p. 163. For example, see the United Nations General Assembly resolutions calling for the establishment of a New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO), A/RES 36/149 (16 December 1981) and A/RES/46/73 (11 December 1991). Some of the goals of NWICO are taken up in the UNESCO Convention on Cultural Diversity of 2005, especially with regard to the unbalanced global flow of mass media. See also Christopher J. Hill, ‘World Opinion and The Empire of Circumstance’, International Affairs, vol. 72, no. 1, 1996, p. 127. Y. Cohen, Media Diplomacy, pp. 40–1. About advocacy, see B.C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, pp. 146–7. Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy, p. 106. Refer to the section of ‘The Issue of History Education in International Relations’ and Note 33 in Chapter 1. See Steve Smith, Ken Booth, Marysia Zalewski (eds), International Theory: Positivism and Beyond, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996. As to the critique of post-positivism/postmodernism in international relations

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31

32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

41 42 43 44 45 46

47 48 49 50 51

52

53

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History Education and International Relations theory, see Fred Halliday, Rethinking International Relations, London, Macmillan Press, 1994, pp. 37–46. George G. Iggers, Historiography in the Twentieth Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge, Hanover and London, Wesleyan University Press, 1997, p. 9. Alun Munslow, Deconstructing History, London and New York, Routledge, 1997, pp. 165 and 172. Edward Hallet Carr, ‘The Historian and His Facts’, in What is History?, 2nd ed., London, Macmillan, 1986, pp. 1–25. Iggers, Historiography, p. 10. Munslow, Deconstructing History, p. 168. Gellner, Thought and Change, pp. 201–203. Iggers, Historiography, p. 18. Munslow, Deconstructing History, p. 165. Iggers, Historiography, pp. 11 and 15. See also Homi K. Bhabha (ed.), Nation and Narration, London and New York, Routledge, 1990, p. 4. See, for example, John A. Vasquez, ‘The Promise and Potential Pitfalls of Post-modernism: the Need for Theory Appraisal’, Power of Power Politics: From Classical Realism to Neotraditionalism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1998, pp. 214–39. Munslow, Deconstructing History, pp. 14 and 16. Geoffrey R. Elton, The Practice of History, London, Sydney University Press, 1967, pp. 153 and 165. Munslow, Deconstructing History, p. 171. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983, pp. 13 and 172. Vasquez, ‘The Promise and Potential Pitfalls’, pp. 214–39. John Tosh, The Pursuit of History: Aims, Methods and New Directions in the Study of Modern History, 2nd ed., London and New York, Longman, 1991, p. 2. Iggers, Historiography, p. 10. Ibid., p. 13. Ibid. Munslow, Deconstructing History, p. 164. James E. Dougherty and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., Contending Theories of International Relations: A Comprehensive Survey, 4th ed., New York, Longman, 1997, p. 36. See Cynthia Enloe, ‘Margins, Silences and Bottom Rungs: How to Overcome the Underestimation of Power in the Study of International Relations’, in Steve Smith, Ken Booth and Marysia Zalewski (eds), International Theory, pp. 186–202. William Wallace, ‘Truth and Power, Monks and Technocrats: Theory and Practice in International Relations’, Review of International Studies, vol. 22, no. 3, 1996, p. 302. In the case of Britain, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) Records, which document the conduct of British foreign policy and the organizational structures, are kept for thirty years by the FCO. ‘Records that are considered worthy of permanent preservation undergo a further examination by our Sensitivity Reviewers to identify information of continuing sensitivity that needs to be withheld for longer than thirty years old as allowed for under the terms of the Public Records Acts of 1958 and 1967. A

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55 56 57 58 59 60

61 62 63 64 65 66

67

68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75

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summary of the Guidance used to appraise these records is currently being revised and will be available in the Publication Scheme’. Currently, most of the records are available for public consultation at the National Archives, and only less than 2% of the records destined for release after 30 years is withheld. See the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s website: http:// www.fco.gov.uk/Files/kfile/FCOPublicationScheme_Oct05.pdf. In the United States, in accordance with Executive Order 12958, as amended, documents must be declassified after twenty-five years unless they fall under one of the nine exemptions outlined by Section 3.3(b) of the Order. The Freedom of Information Act (United States) does not guarantee that documents which include highly sensitive information will be released. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, ‘The Ministry also discloses to the public postwar documents that have been in custody more than thirty years. Where the making public of records would be detrimental to important national interests or prejudicial to private individuals or entities, such records shall not be declassified and may not be made public’. See MOFA’s website: http://www.mofa.go.jp/about/hq/record/docs.html. Steve Smith, ‘Power and Truth: A Reply to William Wallace’, Review of International Studies, vol. 23, no. 4, 1997, p. 516. Walker Conner, ‘When is a Nation?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, January 1990, p. 100. Michael Howard, War and the Nation State, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1978. Tosh, The Pursuit of History, pp.4 and 5. See also Iggers, Historiography, p. 142. Ibid., p. 4. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories, Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1993, pp. 88 and 91. Tosh, The Pursuit of History, p. 5. Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, Cambridge, New York and Melbourne, Cambridge University Press, 1981, pp. 91 and 97. J.H. Plumb, The Death of the Past, London, Macmillan, 1969, p. 145. Anthony D. Smith, ‘The Origin of Nations’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 12, no. 3, July 1989, p. 363. Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, London, Penguin Books, 1991, p. 164. Hobsbawm and Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, p. 12. See Moses I. Finley, The Use and Abuse of History, London, The Hogarth Press, 1986, pp. 11–33. R.B.J. Walker, ‘Sovereignty, Identity, Community: Reflections on the Horizons of Contemporary Political Practice’, in R.B.J. Walker and Saul H. Mendlovitz (eds), Contending Sovereignties: Redefining Political Community, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990, p. 173. Ibid., p. 176. Paul B. Brass, Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison, New Delhi and London, Sage Publications, 1991, p. 74. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, Oxford, Blackwell, 1983, p. 55. A.D. Smith, National Identity, p. 164. Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments, p. 76. Tosh, The Pursuit of History, p. 6. Harvey J. Kaye, Why Do Ruling Classes Fear History and Other Questions, London, Macmillan Press, 1996, pp. 7–28. In modern education theory, education can mean, in its broadest sense,

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76

77

78 79 80

81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88

89

90 91 92 93 94

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History Education and International Relations ‘experience’. In a narrower sense, it is the ‘guided experience’ offered in the social institution known as a school. See R.C. Lodge, Plato’s Theory of Education, London, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1947, pp. 10–11. Education can also be defined as ‘learning’. That is ‘changes in mental processes and in overt behavior as a result of a person’s experiences’. R. Murray Thomas, ‘The Symbiotic Linking of Politics and Education’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, p. 2. Salter and Tapper consider not only the organization of knowledge but also the ways in which knowledge is organized. See Brian Salter and Ted Tapper, Education, Politics and the State: The Theory and Practice of Educational Change, London, Grant McIntyre, 1981, pp. 20–1, 71–2 and 74. Roger Scruton, Angela Ellis-Jones and Dennis O’Keeffe, Education and Indoctrination: An Attempt at Definition and a Review of Social and Political Implications, London, Education Research Centre, 1985, pp. 7–8. A.D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era , p. 92. As for Plato’s theory of education, see Robin Barrow, Plato and Education, London and Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976, Chaps. 1, 2, 4 and 6. See Christopher J. Hill and Pamela Beshoff (eds), Two Worlds of International Relations: Academics, Practitioners and the Trade in Ideas, London, Routledge, 1994. R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, p. 23. Andy Green, Education and State Formation: The Rise of Education Systems in England, France and the USA, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1990, pp. viii–ix. R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, p. 7. As for ‘At what point in its development does a nation come into being?’, see Conner, ‘When is a Nation?’, p. 92. For the historical role of education in the nineteenth century, see Hobsbawm and Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, p. 293. Edward Hallet Carr, Nationalism and After, London, Macmillan, 1945, p. 18. Green, Education and State Formation, pp. 77, 80, 93 and 108–10. While investigating important aspects of education, much of the literature on nationalism has tended to direct attention away from ‘political rationality’ to ‘varieties of non-political theorizing’ and to seek ‘true meaning [of education] beyond politics’. See John Breuilly, Nationalism and the State, 2nd ed., Manchester, Manchester University Press, 1993, p. 398. A.D. Smith, Theories of Nationalism, 2nd ed., New York, Holms & Meier Publishers, 1983, p. 113 and Gellner, Thought and Change, pp. 158–9 and 163. As to the main objectives of the creation of national education systems, see Green, Education and State Formation, pp. 79 and 309. A.D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, pp. 95 and 116. Cynthia Behrman, ‘The Mythology of British Imperialism, 1890–1914’, University of Boston doctoral dissertation, 1965, p. 47. For the argument of education as ‘the secular church’, see Green, Education and State Formation, p. 80. Thomas enumerates seven functions of education: (1) political socialization or citizenship training, (2) political legitimation, (3) manpower production, (4) the selection of personnel for power hierarchy, (5) social assessment and interpretation, (6) social control and (7) the stimulation of social change. See R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, pp. 18–23.

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Government Influence 95

96 97 98 99

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103 104

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As to a more radical definition of socialization, see Edgar Friedenberg, ‘Current Patterns of Generational Conflict’, Journal of Social Issues, vol. 25, no. 2, 1969, p. 30. Salter and Tapper, Education, Politics and the State, p. 63. Ibid., p. 7. See Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz, Power and Poverty: Theory and Practice, New York, Oxford University Press, 1970, p. 105. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, p. 85. A.D. Smith, Theories of Nationalism, pp. 46, 48 and 170. As to Rousseau’s social spirit and patriotism, see John W. Chapman, Rousseau—Totalitarian or Liberal?, New York, AMS Press, 1968, pp. 55–73 and Robert Wokler, Rousseau, Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. 79–103. Hobsbawm and Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, p. 264. See Eugen Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870–1914, Stanford, Calififornia, Stanford University Press, 1976. A.D. Smith, Theories of Nationalism, p. xxvii. Dahl, Who Governs?, pp. 316–18. In his study of European states, Green argues that, in the early days, state regulation of schooling had no direct relevance to democratic control. See Green, Education and State Formation, p. 78. Hobsbawm and Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, p. 279. Ibid., p. 280. See also John Dewey, Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education, New York, Macmillan, 1916, pp. 24–5. Dewey said that, in a country composed of different groups with diversified traditional customs, the development of commerce, transportation and communication necessitated educational institutions which provide ‘a homogeneous and balanced environment’ for the young. The danger of indoctrination partly explains the decline of idealist education. Philosophical idealism faded away with the rise of totalitarianism. Whereas the idealists’ interest in the state was the reverse of totalitarian, the social doctrines of idealism—the elevation of the state and the insistence that individuals are only parts of society became repellent. Moral and political thinkers turned their back on all ‘organic’ theories of society and defended the rights of individuals against an almighty state. Educationalists also turned away from a state-oriented approach to those which allowed more room for individual autonomy. See Peter Gordon and John White, Philosophers as Education Reformers: The Influence of Idealism on British Educational Thought and Practice, London, Boston and Henley, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979, pp. xii, 205–206, 245 and 257–8. Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, p. 5. Charles A. Tesconi, Jr. and Van Cleve Morris, The Anti-Man Culture: Bureautechnocracy and the Schools, Ulbana, Chicago and London, University of Illinois Press, 1972, p. 146. See Hugh Seton-Watson, Nations and States: An Enquiry into the Origins of Nations and the Politics of Nationalism, London, Methuen, 1977, p. 287. John N. Hawkins, ‘The People’s Republic of China: Educational Policy and National Minorities—The Politics of Intergroup Relations’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, pp. 130–9. For a more comprehensive account, see Alisa Jones, ‘Changing the Past to Serve the Present: History Education in Mainland China’, in Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (eds),

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History Education and International Relations History Education and National Identity in East Asia, New York and London, Routledge, 2005, pp. 65–100. Kenneth E. Boulding, The Image, Michigan, University of Michigan Press, 1956, p. 73. Thomas Alexander and Beryl Parker, The New Education in the German Republic, London, Williams & Norgate, 1930, p.xix. Unfortunately, while the defenders of Weimar were dismissive of the social requirements for the constitution of liberty, those who wanted to destroy it knew exactly what to do. Werner Richter analysed German education as follows: ‘The fact that, despite a century of public education, fascism could triumph in Germany proves that the educational philosophies of the Enlightenment and of German idealism were too optimistic.’ See Werner Richter, Re-Educating Germany, Paul Lehmann (trans.), Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1945, p. 166. Yet the problem was probably not ‘too optimistic’ but ontological. A.D. Smith, Theories of Nationalism, p. 17. This was exactly in line with a prescription given by one of the most extreme exponents of state education— Fichte. Elie Kedourie, Nationalism, 4th expanded ed., Oxford UK and Cambridge USA, Blackwell, 1993, p. 78. The preamble to a manual for new teachers, which was published in 1936 by the Reich Ministry of Education, stated: ‘The chief purpose of the school is to train human beings in the doctrine that the State is more important than the individual, that individuals must be willing and ready to sacrifice themselves for Nation and Führer.’ The preamble, part of Education Minister Bernhard Rust’s personal statement, quoted in Susanne Charlotte Engelmann, German Education and Re-Education, New York, International Universities Press, 1945, p. 79. Emile Durkheim, with a ‘deliberately anti-idealist and anti-individualist stress’, is another thinker who drew attention to the historical role that the education system had played in fulfilling the social needs of the modern age in different societies. See Green, Education and State Formation, p. 37. Salter and Tapper, Education, Politics and the State, p. 53. Henry A. Giroux, ‘Introduction’ in Paulo Freire, The Politics of Education: Culture, Power and Liberation, Donaldo Madedo (trans.), Massachusetts, Bergin & Gravey Publishers, 1985, p. xiii. But the exact location of the school in the social formation is not clear, whether it is part of the state or it is in civil society. See Green, Education and State Formation, pp. 96 and 98–9. Gramsci’s concept of hegemony is broad, embracing the general way of seeing life and the world, economic and political influence and even ‘common sense’. His contribution, not reducing everything to the effects of economic and class determinism, can be found in his analysis of ‘the state as an active, organizing force in modern societies’. For Gramsci, there was no exact boundary between the state and civil society. See Madan Sarup, Education, State and Crisis: A Marxist Perspective, London and Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982, pp. 62, 93 and 102 and Green, Education and State Formation, pp. 77, 91–2, 95 and 105. Sheldon Wolin, ‘Political Theory and Political Commentary’, in Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, pp. 192–3. R. Murray Thomas, ‘The Nature of National Development Planning’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Education’s Role in National Development Plans: Ten Country Cases, New York and London, Praeger, 1992, p. 22.

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119 R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, p. 11. 120 As to Gramsci’s two types of intellectuals, organic and traditional, see Salter and Tapper, Education, Politics and the State, p.59. Gramsci’s concern with the two types of intellectuals developed further to the reflection of regional and national differences in the role of intellectuals and parties, after he saw Sardinia and Turin, and France, England, Germany and Italy in varying development stages. See ibid., p. 55. 121 James N. Rosenau, ‘A Pre-Theory Revisited: World Politics in an Era of Cascading Interdependence’, International Studies Quarterly, vol. 28, no. 3, 1984, p. 300. 122 R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, p. 21. 123 Hans N. Weiler, ‘West Germany: Educational Policy as Compensatory Legitimation’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, p. 50. 124 The study of political economy has dealt with the potential of job training and public education or human resources development in general. Thomas outlines roles assigned to education in national development, drawing examples from thirty countries. R. Murray Thomas, ‘The Nature of National Development Planning’, pp. 1–38 and ‘Lessons Learned’, pp. 265–75. 125 Green, Education and State Formation, pp. 71–2. 126 R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, p. 20. 127 Colin Seymour-Ure, The Press, Politics and the Public: An Essay on the Role of the National Press in the British Political System, London, Methuen, 1968, pp. 280–1. 128 B.C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, p. 2. 129 John N. Hawkins and Thomas T. La Belle (eds), Education and Intergroup Relations: An International Perspective, New York, Praeger, 1985. In this volume, see R. Murray Thomas, ‘Education and Intergroup Relations—An International Perspective: The Cases of Malaysia and Singapore’, pp. 202–204 and Anthony Layne, ‘Education and Intergroup Relations in Haiti’, p. 97. See also R.M. Thomas, Politics and Education, pp. 10–11 and 17. According to the UNESCO, estimated numbers of out-of-school children by region in 2004 are as follows: (unit: thousand) 38,020 in Sub-Saharan Africa; 6,585 in Arab states; 364 in Central Asia; 9,671 in East Asia and the Pacific; 15,644 in South and West Asia; 2,698 in Latin America and the Caribbean; 1,845 in North America and Western Europe; and 2,014 in Central and Eastern Europe. See UNESCO, ‘2.9 Estimated numbers of out-ofschool children by gender and region, 1999 and 2004’, Strong Foundations: Early Childhood Care and Education, 2006, p. 29. 130 Y. Cohen, Media Diplomacy, pp. 45 and 50. 131 For the role of professional commentators in political education, see Wolin, ‘Political Theory and Political Commentary’, pp. 190–203. 132 C.J. Hill, ‘World Opinion and The Empire of Circumstance’, International Affairs, vol. 72, no. 1, 1996, p. 126 and Colin Seymour-Ure, The Political Impact of Mass Media, London, Constable, 1974, p. 20. 133 As for the role of the press as a guardian, see Seymour-Ure, The Political Impact of Mass Media, pp. 18–19 and 305. 134 E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 144. Gramsci’s view on schooling also indicates the dual nature of education as an instrument of social control and a force for liberation. See Green, Education and State Formation, p. 98. 135 R.M. Thomas, ‘The Nature of National Development Planning’, p. 18.

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136 Seymour-Ure, The Political Impact of Mass Media, p. 20, A.D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era, p. 17 and Stephen D. Krasner, ‘Power Politics, Institutions, and Transnational Relations’, in Thomas Risse-Kappen (ed.), Bringing Transnational Relations Back In: Non-state Actors, Domestic Structures and International Institutions, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995, p. 269. 137 Seymour-Ure, The Political Impact of Mass Media, p. 23. It is arguable that education and the news media can be categorized roughly into two forms of manipulation respectively: spontaneous (a continuous effort to gain or maintain public support) and reactive (a more defensive and unplanned effort, a response in the wake of errors and criticisms of policy). As to the two forms of manipulation, see B.C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, pp. 172–4 and 176. 138 Kuhn similarly argued that a kind of training scientists receive is usually based on ‘stable outcome of past revolutions’ which determines the interpretation of a paradigm and its applications. Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 3rd ed., Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press, 1996, pp. 136–8. 139 Collingwood, The Idea of History, p. 8. 140 E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 134. 141 As to the censorship of news, see Article 19, Information, Freedom and Censorship: World Report 1991, Library Association Publishing, 1991. As for a secondary effect of opinion control such as voluntary compliance with government regulation, see Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy, p. 37. 142 Michael Fry, ‘Introduction’, in Michael. Fry (ed.), History, the White House and the Kremlin: Statesmen as Historians, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1991, p. 1. 143 Peter Lee, ‘Historical Knowledge and the National Curriculum’, in Richard Aldrich (ed.), History in the National Curriculum, London, Kogan Page in association with the Institute of Education, 1991, p. 51. 144 Raphael Samuel, ‘Continuous National History’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, p. 11. 145 James A. Field, Jr., ‘Transnationalism and the New Tribe’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 3. 146 Christopher Hill, ‘History and Patriotism’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, p. 3. This episode is mentioned in Note 22 of Chapter 3. 147 Elton, The Practice of History, p. 144. 148 Ibid., p. 146. 149 Ibid., p. 164. See also Collingwood, The Idea of History, pp. 7–8. 150 Julius Shoeps (professor of political science at Duisburg University and a Jewish historian) has drawn attention to the fact that there existed neither a single university chair for German-Jewish history nor a chair for Holocaust studies in West Germany until the late 1980s. See Shoeps’ comment, in Ralf Dahrendorf, The Unresolved Past: A Debate in German History, A Wheatland Foundation Conference (September 1987), Gina Thomas (ed.), London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990, p. 29. There are other relevant issues. for

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example, the balance between history and other subjects must be considered in the entire curriculum. G.N. Clark quoted in C. Hill, ‘History and Patriotism’, p. 3. Dray took note of Toynbee’s procedure of comparing various civilizations. William H. Dray, Philosophy of History, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall, 1964, p. 91. Conner, ‘When is a Nation?’, pp. 92 and 99. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and the Spread of Nationalism, rev. ed., London and New York, Verso, 1991, p. 157. David Hunt, ‘War Crimes and the Vietnamese People: American Representations and Silences’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 72–82. Alun Howkins, ‘A Defence of National History’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, p. 20. Richard Aldrich (ed.), History in the National Curriculum, London, Kogan Page in association with the Institute of Education, 1991, pp. 3–4. Tosh, The Pursuit of History, pp. 4–5 A.D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era , p. 92. Hamdi A. Hassan, The Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait: Religion, Identity and Otherness in the Analysis of War and Conflict, London and Sterling, Virginia, Pluto Press, 1999, p. 148. Brass, Ethnicity and Nationalism, p. 15. Richard Aldrich and Dennis Dean, ‘Historical Dimension’, in Richard Aldrich (ed.), History in the National Curriculum, London, Kogan Page in association with the Institute of Education, 1991, p. 102. See Robin Hall, ‘How Children Think and Feel about War and Peace—an Australian Study’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 30, no. 2, May 1993, pp. 181–96. A.D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, p. 78. Breuilly, Nationalism and the State, p. 64. Hobsbawm, 1990, p. 83 and A.D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, pp. 76-8. Joseph A. Camilleri, Joseph A. and Jim Falk, (eds), The End of Sovereignty?: The Politics of a Shrinking and Fragmenting World, Hans and Vermont, Edward Elgar, 1992, p. 223. A.D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, p.30. For the treatment of minority nationalities in China in the state’s officially prepared textbooks, see Stevan Harrell and Bamo Ayi, ‘Combining Ethnic Heritage and National Unity: A Paradox of Nuosu (Yi) Language Textbooks in China’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 62–71. About the changes of Chinese education policies towards minorities, before, during and after the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, see John N. Hawkins, ‘The People’s Republic of China’, pp. 128–47. The Programme of Jewish Consciousness (from the mid-1950s onwards) and another series (from 1975 onwards) were launched by the Israeli Ministry of Education and Culture. See Yaacov Iram, ‘Education Policy and Cultural Identity in Israel’, in Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 209–14. A.D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era, pp. 109–10. Giroux, ‘Introduction’, p. xv. Camilleri and Falk (eds), The End of Sovereignty?, pp. 223–4.

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173 Fred Halliday, ‘Three Concepts of Internationalism’, International Affairs, vol. 64, no. 2, 1988, p. 198. 174 B.C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, p.181, and James N. Rosenau, The Study of Global Interdependence: Essays on the Transnationalization of World Affairs, London and New York, Frances Pinter, 1980, p. 44. 175 Breuilly, Nationalism and the State, p. 380.

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3

The Domestic Environment and its Interaction with the External Environment laborating the framework further, this chapter will consider the formation of public dispositions (Phase III) and the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’). These are indicated by the shadowed circles and the highlighted outer frame in Figure 3.1. The third phase, the most speculative part of the whole framework, follows up the presumed consequences of Shaping public opinion (Phase I) and Writing history, Education and History education (Phase II). Moving on from the aspect of ‘process’ to that of ‘consequences’ of history education, attempts will be made to analyse what factors could come into play in the mental constructs of the future public through the teaching of history at school. ‘Forming views about home and foreign states’ and ‘Learning lessons from the past’ will be considered separately below, although

E

Figure 3.1 The Framework of Analysis (for Phase III and the ‘Wider Context’)

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they are ultimately indistinguishable in the complex make-up and development of the human mind. With all the three phases taken together, the focus of the chapter will then shift to the ‘Wider Context’. Just like its domestic counterpart, the external environment is composed of innumerable actors and factors. Yet, for the sake of simplification, it is conceptualized as one outside world, with one outward arrow in the framework (on the right hand side) signifying the implications of history education at the junction of a myriad of interactions across state boundaries. The chapter draws some preliminary conclusions in the end before moving onto the case study chapters which follow. 3.1 FORMING VIEWS ABOUT HOME AND FOREIGN STATES

While much attention has been paid to human consciousness and perceptions in the social sciences, the basic fact remains that little is known about the subliminal processes by which habits of mind, observations, attitudes and opinions are formed or transformed through human activities, to say nothing of this process at the collective level. In a similar vein, Collingwood once asked whether there can be ‘a history of memory or perception’ and answered negatively; he concluded that only acts done on purpose can be reconstructed and hence the targets of history.1 In this sense, it must be allowed that the argument which follows is confined to what can be inferred from the circumstantial settings faced by young people. Indeed, we are now entering the world of ‘unobservables’. Yet the particular usefulness of focusing on childhood in the analysis of a past is that childhood itself overlaps with an explanation about ‘the way we got to be the way we are’.2 In this attempt, ‘Forming views’ about states seems to fare better than ‘Learning lessons’. For the object of observation (i.e. states) at least exists, and there are traceable information sources or ‘circumstantial evidence’ such as curriculum and teaching materials, which may provide some clues to the developing views of students.3 With a view to outlining what factors could weigh in their minds, the formation of views about home and foreign states will be approached from two perspectives — psychological and cognitive.4 The psychological dimension The psychological dimension of ‘Forming views’ concerns the perceptions, images and beliefs about foreign lands and about themselves, held by students or the future public.5 What is at the bottom of these complex configurations in the mental realm, which have emotive significance and remain with them until later in their life? This dimension will be now considered in terms of three factors.

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Domestic Environment/External Environment

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National identity National identity is a kind of belief, held by individuals, that they consider themselves members of a nation-state.6 This means not merely retaining a legitimate membership or a ‘passport’ of a particular country by birth or residence (or through some other kind of arrangement) but also having a sense of belonging or an emotional attachment to that particular country, that is, to accept membership of it without major cognitive difficulties.7 In most cases, national identity is, like the family, ‘given’ and ‘not chosen’; most people usually retain the identity of their original birthplace throughout the rest of their life.8 Thus, national identity signifies socio-biological as well as political elements.9 It is a powerful prism which collectively provides individuals with their ‘self-definition and location’ in the world.10 It is at the same time a ‘sedimented history’ which defines who one is as an historical and social being. If national identity is defined in this uncomplicated manner and if it readily provides children with a clear sense of membership, the corollary will be simple: the natural evocation of feelings of ‘us’ in combination with pedagogical guidance and the moulding of such feelings, reinforced by institutional and social forces and, later, by their participation in society through work and other activities. In this case, nationality and national identity virtually converge: The principle of nationality, derived from the nurturing of national history, symbols and rituals (e.g. the national flag, national anthem, national festivities, system of national honours, national monuments and war memorials) reinforces the national/foreigner, inside/outside dichotomy which territorial boundaries are meant to express and concretize.11

Hence, the future public come to ‘take for granted’ their immediate living environment and then assess other societies through the lens of their own. Yet many would argue that national identity is not always as clearcut and self-contained in the age of ‘globalization’ as suggested above; some reservations need to be made here.12 The process of national identity formation has varied widely from one state to another in close relation to state formation. On the one hand, in front-runner states like England, France and the United States, the formation of national identity was slow and spontaneous, notwithstanding the major events which gave momentum to it.13 On the other hand, there are cases where there is a real or perceived mismatch of a political entity and community identity. A typical example is where the rulers are foreigners to the majority of the population; historically, African and Asian colonies had this experience.14 In fact, the arbitrary nature of political containers or

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‘state-nations’ acutely manifests itself in the form of irredentist or secessionist movements.15 Ethnic identity, probably more fixed from birth or early life than national identity and rooted in ‘non-rational foundations of the human personality’, can pose a serious challenge to national identity.16 The acceptance of ‘available’ national identity is not straightforward.17 Even if those movements do not come to the fore, if a current form of a state is created as a result of a conquest by another, indigenous people would certainly try to retain their own narration of their community up to the event, and would therefore offer an interpretation of the state formation different from that of the conqueror. The end of colonial rule does not automatically translate into the end of communal sentiments and grievances. Partha Chatterjee expressed it succinctly: ‘Even our imaginations must remain forever colonized.’ 18 In a more tacit form of subordination, be it political, socio-economic or religious, minority groups may not feel fully accepted by a dominant group or be able to identify with fellow citizens. The question of ‘whose independence’ may linger in a multiethnic state.19 All these uncertainties about national identity point back to its authenticity. Certainly, national identity itself may gradually change in the long term. Although national identity is believed to be closely tied with historical memories and cultural identity, which, in effect, can easily be fused into it, the historically given do not necessarily constitute or determine national identity. The conscious selection and active promotion of ‘available’ realities do.20 We know only too well that divided territories have played up different identities across border lines. Agency is a critical component. Of course, a realistic account of identity must incorporate both aspects largely fixed by birth and those malleable through socialization at later stages. This still begs the question ‘who is the guardian of national identity?’ 21 The situation relating to history education has already been outlined in the previous chapter. The question is whether students, when presented with agreeable national history or the blueprint for an ideal country in the form of the glorious past, have doubts over such history and seriously ask ‘can it be true?’. National pride Closely bound up with national identity yet less emotionally charged, national pride concerns the status and image of one’s country.22 The status area, composed of both intangible ends and means, induces more recalcitrant political orientations than the other three areas, namely the territorial area (means intangible, ends tangible), the human resources area (means tangible, ends intangible) and the non-human resources area (both tangible).23 Then, national pride may be close to the concept of ‘civic nationalisms’ in

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Western democracies (versus ‘ethnic nationalisms’).24 Its sources are usually excavated from familiar or popular historical episodes when there are few currently at hand. National pride is often associated with national heritage as embodied by monarchies, dynasties and empires and with charismatic political figures and successful government performance on the international scene. Individual youths may also attach a sense of national pride to different aspects of national life. It is from the seemingly innocuous admiration of tradition, practices and anything with national flair that the adolescent may develop an opinion about responsibility for and loyalty to their country and, in the extreme case, chauvinistic patriotism. Trust and mistrust of foreign countries and peoples This emotional element, which may be initially subconscious, is similar to common feelings of like and dislike or good and bad impressions about ‘outsiders’. Further, the conception of otherness is essentially posed and articulated against the self-image and collective identity of a state or any other unit (e.g. the world of Islam versus the non-Arab or the West in a very simplified form).25 In fact, it cannot be discussed without reference to identity formation and to the relational aspect of identity and difference, often described as them and us.26 Students may begin to conceive of foreign countries in a negative light, not because of the outright rejection of them but simply as a kind of anxiety about the unfamiliar and unencountered.27 The capacity for empathic understanding is often limited to small-scale groups in which people can maintain intimate and direct relationships.28 This kind of mental orientation may engender a sense of insecurity and self-protection against ‘strangers’, that is, just being different, foreign and unknown. A typical example presented by Harry Targ in the early 1970s is that American children saw the Soviet Union and China in increasingly negative terms at higher grade levels, in contrast to their increasingly opposite orientations to the home country, and to their constant positive evaluations of Canada.29 In most extreme cases, the perception of the other can even turn into an explicit refusal of being equal human beings and sharing a common human condition.30 More generally, students differentiate foreign countries in crude terms of friends/enemies in elementary grades, and on a more sophisticated scale such as reliability and rivalry at later stages in accordance with their developing reasoning capacity. The cognitive dimension The other dimension of ‘Forming views’ is cognitive. This section will deal with the more specific and factual aspects of views being formed in terms of three factors.

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Autostereotypes and heterostereotypes These stereotypes often relate to some aspects of national life, ranging from weather, landscape, primary or industrial products, to behavioural or habitual characteristics of people. These are fairly widespread and fixed images about one’s own country and foreign countries reinforced over years (certainly, they are not an overnight invention). Quite often, these stereotypes have traces of distinct national flavour and bias. Indeed, national stereotypes, sometimes appearing in caricatures and common language, may be just one step away from the feelings of ‘trust and distrust’ mentioned above. The stereotypes imprinted as the result of extreme experiences in the past are particularly difficult to replace, making people unable to adjust their perceptions to new realities. As John Farquharson and Stephen Holt said in the context of Franco-German mass contacts for postwar reconciliation, the point was whether or not it is possible ‘to dispel a false picture of the neighbour (or of oneself)’.31 The general problem is that, even if people know that some stereotypes are not entirely true and outdated, they tend to think that there is some truth in folklore and quite often behave as if they were still valid.32 There is certainly a widespread stereotype of Islam and Muslims that harks back to the Crusades and the long struggle with the Ottoman Turks. This Pan-European stereotype undermines the claims of Turkey, despite its official secularism and current democratic regime, to be ‘European’ and join the European Union. The Muslim character of much of its population and its historic enemy role make it suspect for most ‘Europeans’.33

Indeed, historical knowledge about compatriots and foreign nationals acquired and codified through schooling or other media may be mostly correct, partly correct, or almost completely wrong. Awareness and understanding of issue-areas This cognitive factor concerns issue-areas rather than specific states, although not irrelevant to national stereotypes. Given that some history courses adopt thematic approaches, the importance of issueareas cannot be overlooked. Here, it may be useful to draw an analogy from international news. It has been said that the general pattern is that people pay attention to foreign news as it affects their own lives and welfare in some way. Public awareness of world news is aroused most strongly when that news comes to have meaning for them.34 If there exists any motivational pattern (i.e. the way the public become involved in issues) with regard to foreign news, it is arguable that, depending on a range of awareness of issue categories, views about home and foreign states could vary considerably. It is often the case that a particular issue-area draws the attention and

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commitments of certain states or serves the interests of given states. Hence, the extent to which students encounter issue-areas (military conflicts, human rights, social and economic problems, industries, technology, etc.) through historical studies may significantly determine their views about individual states. In this sense, the more issue-areas they are aware of, the more balanced view of a given state they potentially develop; the fewer they are cognizant of, the narrower and more fixed view they conceive. National consciousness Partly corresponding to, but unlike national identity which is more close and vital to personal identity and being, national consciousness seems to be associated primarily with the public sphere, and is detached from the immediate living space of individuals. It is a mass phenomenon, and it depends on the masses’ view of group-self.35 It pertains to the understanding of relational aspects of the state vis-àvis its foreign counterparts and the world in general.36 In other words, national consciousness is grounded in ideas about external relations — wars, trade, alliances and regional cooperation in the past as well as their impact on current national welfare and prosperity. Like national identity, national consciousness presupposes a sense of the presence of others (and a sense of circumscription from the external environment). It is often related to either competitive/conflictive or cooperative aspects of interdependent relations among states. For students, a handy comparative yardstick may derive from international institutional patterns, for example, the membership of international organizations and special status within/without them such as the EU, OECD, NATO, the G8, the P5 and the UN.37 Or such a yardstick may derive from international sports events like World Cups and Olympic Games which are to a certain extent an indicator of economic development. Notwithstanding the claim to equality among states, the membership and internal arrangements of these organizations indicate where each state stands in the world or regional league table, which also derives from historical backgrounds. The same can be said of the status of currencies in international settlements. 3.2 LEARNING LESSONS FROM THE PAST

The other aspect to be considered in the formation of public dispositions towards the external environment is ‘Learning lessons’. Two points must be made here. One is that the lessons students absorb through the study of history are much more difficult to infer than their views about home and foreign states, although the arguments to follow also put into perspective what is taught to students and what may be called ‘circumstantial evidence’ such as teaching materials. For one thing, history courses do not necessarily indicate or

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aim to indicate what lessons future citizens should draw from past events. For another, when history courses do so, it means that the teaching of history is already laced with political instructions. The other point is that the ways in which students extract lessons from historical studies and develop historical thinking beyond factual knowledge are inferred from the experience of decision-makers. This is not groundless. Students not only accumulate factual information but also develop skills for learning, and the analysis of foreign policy decision-making offers useful clues to patterns of learning with reference to historical lessons. While Michael Walzer has called for a vision of ‘vicarious decision-making’, there is not necessarily a social distance between the decision-maker and the public.38 (Vicarious decision-making will be discussed later.) With these points in mind, we consider how ‘Learning lessons’ can take place and what might block it. What lessons do students learn from the past? The events which individuals encounter in early adult life or career and the ideas and concepts which take root in the young mind are likely to have a discernible effect for the rest of their life.39 Donald Warwick has argued that individuals between fourteen and twentyfive years of age, who are generally in search of identity and reference points, are most likely to go through fundamental changes in their orientation towards foreign countries.40 Therefore, students’ encounters with history at school may leave a strong impression on them and consequently guide their understanding of historical lessons. In this regard, a few hypotheses can be suggested here about what factors are likely to define a range of lessons students draw in the light of their circumstantial settings. In the first place, whether or not historical events have immediate relevance to students’ personal experience is crucial. The direct experience of events usually has a strong impact on people, and they generally learn most from first-hand experience.41 For example, if the national events students study in the classroom are related directly to their family history, these events are more likely to lodge in their minds straight away than others, thus becoming something to consider repeatedly. Second and equally important is the commonality of students’ interest. This means whether historical episodes attract the attention of a large proportion of classmates or schoolmates and hence powerfully influence a group’s memory. This has an element of organizational learning. The point here is that a majority of peers have shared interests in particular situations, and not that isolated individuals have particular interest in separate incidents. Events which appeal to students collectively are more likely to have a strong, lasting impression on them than otherwise. In this sense, local history has certainly the great advantage of providing common

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ground among students who go to the same school in their neighbourhoods. Third, the climate of opinion must be taken into account. Even without direct involvement in a historical event, the young generation is constantly exposed to the climate of opinion, intellectual discourse and values and beliefs prevailing at a particular point in time. These surroundings are likely to cause a collective effect on students of the same age group sharing a historical period — the generation effect.42 It is inconceivable that history courses make no reference to what is happening in society or that it will be completely immune to it. For example, Miriam Spielmann has highlighted the changes in the views of Israeli children and youth before and after President Sadat’s monumental visit to Jerusalem in 1977.43 It would also be surprising if the generations who are only familiar with Cold War thinking and the post-1989 generations had the same worldview. Finally, the importance of vicarious experience must be pointed out. When it comes to the countless specific events of human history, young learners are not, under normal circumstances, familiar with a wide range of historical episodes. Nor can it be assumed that many of the events have direct relevance to their individual lives or make references to their local community. The influence of schooling and that of the news media have already been compared in the previous chapter. Still, Dahl’s point about vicarious experience through the media is relevant here: … only a few citizens have any direct experience; at best the others have only derivative or vicarious experience. The more that citizens have direct experience, the more they seem to rely on talking with other people as a source of news; the more vicarious or indirect their experience, the more they seem to rely on the mass media.44

In this sense, classroom teaching may virtually be the very limited window open for children and youths to have a first glimpse of events in the distant past and remote lands in an organized context, unless they study quite comprehensively outside formal education through reading, travelling or other media. Seen in this way, the national ordeals, traumatic experiences and humiliations or landmark achievements which are highlighted in classroom teaching can have a considerable impact on their thinking of historical lessons, especially when these national experiences are emphasized so as to appeal to students’ imagination and interest. What could block learning lessons from the past? Two obstacles will be considered below. One is that the scope and depth of the conception of the past itself is limited; the other

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concerns the patterns of recognition, analysis and interpretation of specific realities. The conception of the past certainly raises a broad epistemological question: how do people think of history other than specific episodes in its stream?45 This question brings out a whole array of issues at both individual and collective levels. One of these issues has already been explored in the discussion of postmodernist and empiricist presuppositions about reality (and this is certainly germane to the definition of history itself). Yet a more vital issue here is the geographical and temporal scope of the past, which has also been implicated in relation to the structure of history courses. The conception of the past cannot be properly grasped without putting into perspective the cultural, religious or socio-economic diversity of societies. Even if there is one trajectory of history, every society has a different timescale, and the weight of a decade and a century varies from one society to another.46 The exploration of ancient civilizations would offer the scope of the past in terms of millennia; in the case of the Cold War, the timescale will be reduced practically to a half century. Even if we compare societies in modern times, as Daniel Lerner said, ‘societies-in-a hurry [non-Western societies] have little patience with the historical pace of Western development; what happened in the West over centuries, some Middle Easterners seek to accomplish in years’.47 Whether in terms of the presuppositions about reality or the two-dimensional scope of the past, students cannot contemplate historical lessons if they have little or no knowledge of events in the first place. In this sense, classroom history could circumscribe the scope and depth of students’ historical knowledge and understanding from which lessons could be spun.48 Yet, even if one transcends these constraints and arrives at a fair view of history, whether or not one seeks lessons from the past is another question. If learning is based on the trial-and-error method, precedents are certainly valuable sources. One may search the drawers of historical knowledge for guidance. Or, one may choose not to listen to the voice of history. In fact, to see history essentially as a useful manual which offers past case studies and future scenarios is equally slippery since history may be deconstructed out of its context, and/or be quarried to prove or justify one’s point. These opposite views also could narrow the conception of the past. At still another level, it is worth questioning whether historical lessons can be drawn only from those events which took place in a geographically proximate area and in a contemporary period. Is a half century too long ago or is a geographically remote area too different from home for this purpose? With the secular decline of old tradition and custom and with the massive overdose of information made available by today’s technologies, the past itself may be becoming increasingly distant to contemporary life.49

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What could prevent students from learning historical lessons? The second obstacle we analyse is the patterns of recognition, analysis and interpretation of specific phenomena. It is not only factual knowledge but also these patterns that students acquire as they study history at school. In this respect, the analysis of foreign policy decision-making is suggestive in identifying problematic patterns, and some of these patterns are explained here.50 Dual-track information processing One of the pitfalls in learning lessons from the past draws our attention to the fact that historical experience does not always lead to learning, even in spite of the recurrence of such experience. In analysing what he has termed as ‘blocked learning’ in American foreign policy, Lloyd Etheredge points to certain ‘dual-track’ decision-making in which rational analysis and imagination-driven thinking coexist. Etheredge maintains that a system of strong imagery associated with motives determines policy more than analytical reasoning. 51 To a considerable extent, this echoes a delicate balance between academic history and classroom history which pursue different goals. This readdresses the weight of students’ personal and firsthand experience as well as their shared memory and interest in historical studies. As Joseph Frankel said, ‘[W]hat penetrates our cognition is so remote from the operational environment and so personal that instead of using the expression “knowledge” it may be more appropriate to speak of “the image”.’ 52 The image already held may not be easy to remedy, and dominant images and reliance on particular past analogies tend to make one blind even to obvious facts and precedents which suggest lessons and alternative images — ‘the tyranny of the past upon the imagination’.53 Cognitive dissonance Particularly related to the patterns of recognition is cognitive dissonance.54 Not only in decision-making situations but also in other learning circumstances, it is conceivable that one chooses to close one’s eyes to uncomfortable facts and prefers positive over negative news to avoid psychological conflict.55 For example, it is much easier for political commentators to point out problems in foreign countries than at home, be they human rights abuse or financial scandals.56 One may know exactly what the consequence will be if one faces reality; but one may ‘refuse to interpret it correctly’ against all available evidence because it does not fit with their prejudgement and vision.57 In the case of decision-makers, they are able to avoid issues they do not wish to deal with by preselecting advisers. Policymakers may even manipulate the record in an attempt to justify their decisions. But a state characterized by a persistent pattern of

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falsehood and deception is more likely to lose diplomatic credibility and prevent itself from learning in the long term. Humility, as Charles Ziegler points out, is a crucial quality for genuine learning even at the state level.58 The problem which must be addressed here is that, whereas the cognitive dissonance of individual decisionmakers or a group of leaders comes to an end when they leave office, when it takes institutionalized forms as in teaching and learning at school, its influence is more likely to be long lasting, and it may become part of political culture.59 In this case, it is extremely difficult to overcome this inclination. Simple categorization of outcomes Another pitfall we should be aware of is a simple categorization of outcomes as successes or failures when analysing and interpreting historical events. If one is to assess policy performance simply in terms of whether the situation has improved or deteriorated as a result of the implementation of a particular policy, one is very likely to make misjudgements. Despite a successful outcome, one may have paid heavy material and human costs, and these costs may have conveniently been forgotten. Because of the seeming success, much more effective measures may have been ignored. The reverse may also be true. Apparent failure may not be such a disaster as it first seems, and it may turn out to be the best option available.60 This kind of oversimplification of outcomes, a very superficial and all-ornothing way of understanding of historical events, does not promote sound learning when dealing with complex realities. False analogies Drawing historical analogies may be a habitual part of human reasoning, and historical knowledge as a reference point may help to define reality and analyse the nature of a problem alongside the information at hand.61 Yet the choice of historical precedents on the basis of which one interprets the current situation and from which one tries to draw lessons can be ill-informed as well as arbitrary. Insufficient background knowledge of the current problem or poor reference to historical incidents in a completely different context may engender wrong analogies. Certainly, it needs more caution when drawing an analogy between situations seemingly very similar but involving countries with different political systems and cultural traditions. Frankel’s caveat in the early 1960s still remains valid: ‘... analogies from one state to another which were legitimate within the narrow context of European politics, have become dangerously misleading now’.62 Furthermore, historical myths may be used as convenient shorthands for argument or tools of political rhetoric, hence serving as catalysts for consensus rather than induce rational argument. Even worse, historical analogy may become an oracle.

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There is invariably a danger that the uniqueness and change of history is unjustifiably denied and that history itself is conceived as a pattern.63 Failure to grasp underlying mechanisms A fundamental pitfall related to the preceding two is a failure to grasp the crucial characteristics of situations and recurrent patterns — the underlying mechanisms which impose order and phenomena.64 A flaw may derive from the fact that primary attention is paid simply to what has happened rather than to why it has happened3/4poor understanding of causal linkages. Causation does not reveal itself nor does abundant evidence necessarily indicate the underlying order of events. Of course, searching for causes in this manner is beyond pre-university levels, and more often than not, particular reasons are explained in summary form. Even if efforts are made to look for reasons, it is the immediate origins of a problem which often catch attention. In other words, attention must be directed to the smaller and less dramatic aspects of the whole episode.65 Causality may not be easily traced when an event involves complex chain reactions composed of many variables. In this type of event, only subtle changes take place at each stage, but a sweeping change may emerge in the end. Indeed, without a careful consideration of ‘why’ questions, the most vital dimensions of historical phenomena could not be exposed, and the whole foundation of historical studies would be greatly vitiated. In sum, this section has considered the hypotheses that personal experience, the commonality of students’ interest, the climate of opinion and vicarious experience could come into play in students’ learning of historical lessons, on top of early experience. In addition, two possibilities which could block learning from the past have been considered: the scope and depth of the conception of the past and the potential pitfalls at each stage of recognizing, analysing and interpreting particular events. 3.3 THE INTERPLAY BETWEEN THE DOMESTIC AND EXTERNAL ENVIRONMENTS

With all the three phases in the domestic environment now having being considered, this section will look at the ‘Wider Context’. Although the domestic and external environments have been presented separately so far, the purpose here is to juxtapose them and probe interactions across state borders. To this end, the approach of political culture will be analysed first, and then those interactions will be examined. In the latter context, education as an interstate or a transnational activity will also be considered.

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The political culture approach One way of reintegrating conceptually the domestic environment which has been deconstructed into the three phases in the framework may be through the concept of political culture. It focuses on the collective attitudes held by members of a political system, combining a micro-analysis based on the psychological interpretation of individual political behaviour, with a macro-analysis of variables common to political sociology.66 It simultaneously handles the personality structure of individuals and the social patterns formed from this structure.67 Lucian Pye argued that: A political culture is the product of both the collective history of a political system and the life histories of the individuals who currently make up the system; and thus it is rooted equally in public events and private experiences.68

This approach is useful for this study in several ways.69 First, the above definition itself has intrinsic merit. Second, its simultaneous analysis of two levels, the individual and the collective, is readily applicable to a discussion of the educational influence on a society.70 In this connection, Anthony Smith argues as follows: True education is a process of self-fulfilment through self-understanding; and such a process is inevitably a collective or rather communal and historical project. It is a process by which the individual comes to realise his role in the particular historic culture in which he has been brought up, and simultaneously to understand the history and destiny of the community to which his fate is linked, by birth or residence or choice. There is no ‘education’ outside the community, properly understood, without the self-consciousness that education instils.71

Of course, schooling itself has a built-in purpose of connecting the individual to society, by providing children with places to communicate among themselves.72 Third, and related to the previous point, this approach allows the formation of public opinion to be understood as an aggregate, cumulative process built on observations, judgements and decisions at the individual level. Certainly, the formation of public opinion is not a one-off event, although opinion polls are conducted at a certain point in time and those results are presented on particular occasions. In the same vein, James Rosenau has mentioned ‘the process of aggregation’ — a process in which the micro level of individuals is fused into the macro level of collectivities.73 Thus, he regards the forces operating at the top official level as societal and systematic variables, governmental variables as institutional practices and indi-

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vidual variables as previously acquired values.74 From the long-term perspective, he describes the causal flow between micro transformations and macro consequences and proposes a two-way process framework consisting of macro and micro variables. Similarly, Jan Aart Scholte stresses the inevitable coexistence of self (or psychic condition) and social context, and the social change concomitant with the transformation of self.75 Finally, by integrating dimensions of individual psychology and those of sociology, the political culture approach allows the proposition that the political orientations of government officials and of the public do not have to be differentiated sharply. (See the dotted line C in the framework in Figure 3.1.) It is arguable that the provision of fairly standardized public education would prompt the inclination that members of a society share similar dispositions, values and attitudes, narrowing the political distance between decision-makers and citizens. Similarly, the approach leaves room for extending the analysis of leadership psychology to the general public. In other words, the factors considered in the conventional analysis of the personal background of decision-makers such as family background, schooling, early life experiences, the formation of predispositions and these interactions with later political activities are also applicable to individual citizens.76 This conversely corresponds to what Michael Walzer has termed ‘vicarious decision-making’, both anticipative and retrospective. It essentially purports to bridge the gap between societal processes and the behaviour of officialdom. By it he means that there is no social distance between the decision-maker and the public and that ‘with only a modest imaginative effort, the citizen can put himself in the place of his elected representative’.77 In fact, Walzer and Melvin Richter have stressed the salience of the political education for citizens, a more specific and focused form of political socialization, to this end. The positive objectives of such education, Richter has maintained, are to ‘school citizens how to make moral decisions as future actors in politics or as vicarious decision-makers’ and ‘to generate in the community at large a tradition of discourse with a shared knowledge of how such cases have been decided in the past’.78 Emphasizing the practical application of moral and political principles and comparing the function of the law school with that of political education, Walzer has asserted that, in democracies, the study of politics ‘should prepare leaders, would-be leaders, and vicarious leaders — which is to say, it should prepare all of us’.79 However, if this type of political socialization is to develop, institutional memory is indispensable. The sweeping change of supporting personnel following the presidential election in the United States and frequent changes of government could potentially undermine the continuous investigation of historical cases, unless

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there are concerted efforts to follow them up.80 The operation of an intelligence service in foreign countries also requires a substantial number of historians specializing in those countries. Where there exist few ties of culture, language, trade and business or no diplomatic relations between states, the government cannot retain working knowledge on overseas situations. Ernest May pointed out in the early 1970s that no American had studied Vietnamese history using native sources before the United States first became involved in Vietnam.81 However, the problem of an absence or interruption of institutional memory rests not only with government organizations but also with various institutions within a society. This means that ‘if lessons learned by one cohort are to be assimilated by another’, a society as a whole requires socialization procedures to build an institutional memory.82 This point leads to the next argument regarding the relationship between political culture and education. Whereas the domestic environment can be reconceptualized by way of the political culture approach, the crucial hinge between political culture and education requires explanation. The previous chapter has already argued that education is one of the institutions which influence beliefs, values and attitudes of people, and that the educational system as a whole can be seen as a mechanism of cultural transmission.83 At the same time, education can be considered as an outcome of the interplay of numerous forces operating in a society. As Siobhán McEvoy’s study on Catholic youth in Northern Ireland indicated, education, at the crossroads of the family and society and other institutions operating between them, cannot avoid being affected by various forces such as tradition, class consciousness and religion.84 For example, the schools administered directly by the church are naturally considered to disseminate religious influences, beyond the actual religious teaching in the classroom. Different social strata often value different types of instruction — traditional, formal, nationalistic, or more open and internationalist. Therefore, the relationship of political culture and education points to a version of the chicken-and-egg problem — which came first? Nonetheless, it does not follow that each stage of this cycle cannot be analysed separately: the reproduction process and the growing-up process. And it is not totally impossible to suspend the cycle. Of course, the suspension in this analogy has politically far more radical implications in practice.85 On the one hand, the prevalence of, for example, nationalistic sentiments among citizens may not totally be the result of the government’s (or any other actor’s) deliberate ideological engineering from above. It would be true that such an exercise is most successful when there exist such sentiments, or even stronger demotic xenophobia or chauvinism, among the public.86 On the other hand, nobody is born as a nationalist or a

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chauvinist, or imbued with ideologies. Therefore, it is arguable that although political culture and education may mutually recreate and reinforce each other, if there is any practical possibility for change, the key may lie in education rather than in political culture. In this sense, what Walzer and Richter have argued in relation to the political education of citizens has far-reaching implications.87 Cross-border interactions The domestic environment reconceptualized in this way now has to be placed in the ‘Wider Context’. If a society is simply turned ‘inside out’, with no limitations on the myriad forces operating from the external environment, such a society can hardly resist influence from the outside world indefinitely.88 Doubtless, hundreds of millions of people (including those who have no choice) move or communicate across state borders daily, be they businessmen, academics, students, travellers, guest workers or refugees, whether or not they are equipped with new aptitudes and skills.89 Individuals may have opportunities to speak face to face to foreigners, and they will surely have responses from them. Apart from these tangible contacts, the public consciously or inadvertently have some form of interaction with the external environment. However, even today when the word ‘globalization’ has in a sense become a blanket term after being overused, the full-scale exposure of a society to the external environment may not be so prevalent as one thinks or as it appears. While the world sometimes seems to be just one click away on the Internet and some people worry about their carbon footprints of air travels, others continue to live without telephones or television. In effect, life goes on without these in many places, virtually cut off from the outside world. It must be remembered that we still live in a world where half of the population live on two dollars a day (while this is certainly not the only measure of living standards or quality of life).90 It is still premature to say that: ‘...the times are global. Communication systems bring virtually every point of the earth’s surface into close to instant contact’.91 Geographical, cultural, political and other circumstances still determine the pattern of communication.92 Furthermore, it is an undeniable fact that, although it is almost impossible to be ‘immune’ to foreign influence today, a great majority of populaces in the world receive primary and secondary education where they are born. They are taught in particular ways which reflect their cultural tradition, customs and value systems and which meet their societal needs at home. Their views and attitudes about international affairs are ‘domesticated’. If this is the case, their fundamental dispositions towards the external environment are already in store and will only come out when they have contact with the outside world. The dispositions developed in this way are

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presumably not necessarily geared to encountering and coping with situations that are not only unfamiliar but also potentially offending and hostile. Individuals crossing state borders bring with them their national identity, national pride, a trust and distrust of foreigners, stereotypes, national consciousness and attitudes towards international affairs. They bring with them their own domestic environment. It is no surprise that the views and attitudes different nationalities develop may cause tension when they communicate directly with each other. In the mid-1960s, Karl Deutsch noted the methods used to reverse the flow of external impact. Apart from disconnecting or reducing linkages between the domestic system and the international environment, he argued that the stable, strong economic and political foundation of the system itself could allow the state to resist and reverse external influence without resorting to censorship or mistreating minority groups — by way of what he called ‘psychological national defense’.93 In this sense, education as an institution is perfectly positioned for this task. The medium of instruction (and the official language), usually one or two languages in most countries, virtually creates a communication barrier.94 The usefulness of history education for political leaders has already been argued in the preceding chapter. If education is one of key background factors which guard members of a state against cross-border influence and makes communication between different nationalities difficult, it may be worth exploring how the institution of education in one state interacts with that in another.95 Here, two concepts are useful: issue-areas and interdependence. The concept of issue-area highlights a distinct combination of actors involved and activated (policy-makers, segments of political parties and interest groups), their motives, policy-making structures and procedures, politicization and all interactions between these variables.96 With regard to interdependence, in their seminal work, Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane stated that global interactions consist of ‘movements of information, money, physical objects, people, or other tangible or intangible items across state boundaries’.97 The concept, long discounted in economic and other issue-areas in international relations, can give a fresh look at a much less discussed issue-area like education. Several observations arise from these two concepts. First, education seems to be one of the last issue-areas to arrive on the interstate agenda. Very preliminary intergovernmental efforts were made by the League of Nations in early years of the twentieth century in order to coordinate educational activities and influence the views of younger generations on global problems. However, the League was not unaware of its limited influence in the field of education.98 After the Second World War, UNESCO was conceived as an organization

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of no supranational authority with a view to promoting the general advancement of education and to extending educational facilities in various parts of the world, but not much else beyond these objectives. In this regard, Europe is exceptional since the Council of Europe has a long history of educational cooperation which goes back to as early as the 1950s.99 Still, such cooperation seems to have been concentrated in the member countries of the EC/EU. With regard to cross-regional educational cooperation (i.e. with Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Central/Latin America, etc.), there seems to be a long way to go. In other words, there are issues outside the government’s concern.100 It seems that the low profile of education in the interstate agenda is due in part to our conventional tendency to think of it as a domestic matter and in part to the nature of educational activities, which generally seek long-term incremental achievements and hardly create immediate problems in interstate business. Certainly, education is least likely to engender a crisis situation in the short term. It would be interesting to ask how educational institutions in respective societies deal with the issue of obligations deriving from international treaties and agreements, but these international pledges do not usually specify how particular issues should be treated at school. If compliance is ‘not just to the letter of the law but to the spirit as well’, this arrangement is left to the discretion of states.101 While foreign ministries or concerned offices may regularly examine the news content presented by foreign news services,102 it seems rather extraordinary if foreign governments regularly pay attention to what is happening at school.103 Yet another reason for the low profile of education may be that bureaucrats exercise strong leverage in this area. Precisely because they are often domesticoriented with their responsibilities being confined to relatively narrow domains, education authorities tend to show strong reactions (and even recalcitrant resistance), when foreigners encroach on their bastion with unfamiliar goals and approaches.104 Although intergovernmental initiatives may open the door for educational cooperation across national boundaries, governments tend to refrain from intervening in the education system and policies of another state. While many governments in democracies support student exchanges and internship programmes, two-way interactions and commitments, i.e. the domestication of international issues and the internationalization of domestic issues, are still not a major trend in the area of education.105 Second, if education as an issue-area is yet to gain status in interstate business, transnational educational cooperation and contacts also indicate considerable regional and disciplinary asymmetry.106 If the quest for a common body of knowledge is an essential barometer of the degree of interdependence, that quest varies between

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academic fields. In his comparative historical study, Kjell Skjelsbaek presented interesting findings on fields of study in which international non-governmental organizations (founded between 1693 and 1954) were involved. The fields of social science, literature, geography and history ranked among the lowest, while economics, political economy and finance dominated the top band.107 International textbook research projects organized by the Georg Eckert Institute (Germany) from 1950 to the mid-1990s, covering subjects of history, geography, etc., also indicate regional differences (concentration in Western Europe and scarcity in Eastern Europe, Africa and Asia) as well as temporal gaps (early start in the mid1950s in Western Europe and more recent engagement from the 1980s onwards in other regions).108 The concept of complex interdependence, at first glance, appears to fit with a typically non-military issue-area like education. Educators’ networks between societies look set to flourish given that states can no longer monitor, let alone control, the multitude of activities burgeoning within, emanating from and intruding into their territory, except for security issues over which governments generally maintain tighter control.109 Although transportation and communication technologies have markedly reduced the geographical distance between domestic markets, groups and societies, a world atlas based on primary and secondary education may still look like a conventional one based on national territories.110 Indeed, Keohane and Nye did not broach the concept of interdependence unconditionally. Interdependence matters more to advanced industrial countries than to communist and less developed countries, and social interdependence is more relevant to societies that are more open.111 Samuel Huntington summarized the general trend as ‘tribalism in politics’ and ‘transnationalism in economics’, and these two coexist in liberal internationalism.112 Yet, even in economic and financial activities, not all cross-border interactions have powerful ‘transmission belts’ such as multinational firms and international banks which facilitate global communication on a literally minute basis, with the result of sensitizing government economic policies.113 Seen in this way, the issue-area of education arguably represents a unique enclave relatively untouched in an interdependent world. If the wall between the domestic and the foreign in the educational environment is still thick and high, political culture and education may mutually reinforce each other inside this wall. If so, the role of education — the pursuit of knowledge and understanding, political socialization, the establishment of hegemony, indoctrination and social assessment and interpretation — seems to come down to the self-preservation of the domestic environment against outside influence (possibly except for knowledge). What emerges as an overall pattern here is integration at the national level

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and compartmentalization at the international level.114 Based on various case studies, John Hawkins, Thomas J. La Belle and Peter White have explained the complex interactions which occur between classes, cultures and educational policies in a multiethnic society.115 Although the case studies they have presented deal with intra-societal situations, the level of analysis appears to be interchangeable between the national and the international.116 In fact, similar logic has already been applied to the dual process of the imposition of official history on domestic communities and on foreign countries (as mentioned in Chapter 2) and to the formation of national identity against others. A final point is that integration and fragmentation are not completely separate or irrevocable phenomena. At both domestic and international levels and between them, the opposing movements could set in at intervals, reversing the macro-micro balance and shifting the locus of authority.117 One possible reason for this oscillation may be found in heightened awareness and increased analytical capacities of the public, which may be attributable to the educational effect.118 With a streamlined education system, the state itself may be contributing to a rise of new intelligentsia and leaders among ethnic minorities and other groups.119 In a society which has become too complex and diffuse to meet its members’ demands, a sense of isolation and discontent may turn individuals to seek refuge in a more intimate and less complicated group. They may seek a modicum of control and the fulfilment of their interests in a smaller group. This may result in a resurgence of the family, the church and ethnic groups. Yet the same analytical capacities which turned individuals to a more immediate group can also lead them to open their eyes to intra-group conflicts and to make concessions within a wider system. In this oscillating situation, the role of education cannot be overlooked, either as a background catalyst or as a more direct pointer to the course of events. In short, this section has analysed the concept of political culture as one way of reintegrating the various factors constituting the domestic environment, a concept which refers to personal and collective history and approaches socio-political phenomena in the micro and macro continuum. The section has argued that mutual reinforcement between political culture and education serves to integrate the domestic environment while compartmentalizing the world, although these phenomena are not irreversible. 3.4 FROM SHAPING PUBLIC OPINION TO LEARNING LESSONS FROM HISTORY

Having traced the three phases — the initial stage of government influence, the activities under government influence, the formation of public dispositions — and the interplay between the domestic

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and external environments, this section will draw some preliminary conclusions before moving onto the case study chapters. Since E.H. Carr argued about the increasing importance of power over opinion against the broadening basis of political opinion, the international environment surrounding the public has apparently moved a long way.120 There remains the difficulty of defining what public opinion is — the view from below, not that held by political activists or opinion leaders but by laypersons in the streets, who are the objects of campaigns and propaganda.121 Notwithstanding, with public education and advanced communications systems being more prevalent, a growing number of citizens have become more often exposed to a foreign policy parlance previously familiar only to a select elite. Although the quantitative abundance of communication channels cannot be seen as a measure of equality of access to them, a greater proportion of people have surely come to communicate across state borders more frequently than previously thought. For example, it is now commonplace that public views about ongoing conflicts in the world are recorded directly by the international news media and reach a worldwide audience. Even voices in towns and streets may be picked up by the local media and eventually relayed to many broadcasting stations around the world. Today, it is inconceivable not to mention public reactions, if not public opinion, in the discourse of international relations. There is also the possibility that public opinion is incorporated into foreign policy, even if indirectly or partially. It has often been said that, even in democracies, the influence of public opinion on foreign policy remains considerably limited. For example, the electorate have little opportunity to focus on specific foreign policy issues in most elections, although they may be able to express their general preference as to the direction of government policy and a package of policies. Furthermore, the public often find few occasions to voice their say on post-election government commitments until another election is called.122 Nonetheless, the public can still place direct pressure on the government in the form of legislative votes, local elections and by-elections, opinion polls and national referenda.123 Indirectly, they may also influence foreign policy through the climate or mood of public opinion. Persistent petitions, rallies and lawsuits by citizens’ groups may catch the attention of the news media, and policy-makers may be pressured to take on board certain issues highlighted by the press. Therefore, even if one focuses narrowly on foreign policy as the output of government decisions, various forces at work in a society, including public reactions and views, may be brought into perspective in its decision-making structures and processes, which could eventually precondition the course of foreign policy, if not specific government decisions.124 When this complex configuration of domestic processes and the

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equally intricate external environment are placed side by side, where does history have its place? If learning lessons from the past means seeing time as a stream and ‘imagining the future as it may be when it becomes the past’,125 much cruder approaches are taken in the world of politics. At the time of exigencies and difficult situations for both policy-makers and the public, there may be little latitude for pondering the political consequences of one’s judgements and deeds, let alone retrospective political accountability. Besides, a society is usually expected to encompass the desires, expectations, frustrations and grievances of its members in many respects. However, by combining conventional wisdom and interpretations of the present with those from previous periods, ‘vicarious experience’ may provide a reference point in coping with the pressing, new external environment. The three forms of historical knowledge — history learned, observed and experienced — may variously reinforce but may also conflict with each other.126 A society may build a distinct inventory of the past based on its common experience, and this inventory reciprocally provides a basis for images, beliefs, convictions as well as values, preferences and expectations shared by most of its members. On the other hand, a society may have divided, undefined and changing memories with countless diversifying ramifications. In both cases, decision-makers and the public often forget how much their thinking and behaviour are predetermined by the views formed in the past or inherited from their predecessors over generations. What is often underestimated is how much the voice of the past stored as historical knowledge affects the processes of thinking, adaptation and learning.127 If politics continues to intervene in history, is a society more likely to learn less from the past? If a government indulges in the business of rewriting chronicles and manipulating historical knowledge, are future governments and citizens inclined to abuse history intentionally or unintentionally in communicating with foreign countries? Do the revision of history courses in educational practice and the presentation of modified images of each other, in the long run, change the nature of external and ultimately international relations? Do favourable images improve bilateral relations which were wrecked by wars, or unfavourable images do the opposite?128 On the assumption that there exists some significant relationship between history education and international relations, this study set out to explore the link in question. Certainly, we need to take into account the delayed effect and the generational effect. The degree of the delayed effect depends in part on the duration of an event which dominated the political scene, whether short but recurrent, or longlasting but one-off, and in part on the age-band of those affected.129 On the other hand, the generation effect in political circles will be

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diluted when generations participating in the power structure considerably vary, and accentuated when they are composed of those with similar formative experiences. The influence of history education may permeate over time but reappear, in later years, in various facets of government policy and regional/international relations through the articulation of national identity or national consciousness and through implicit or explicit attitudes towards particular events involving foreign actors. One may assert that young people’s perspectives on foreign countries and the nature of international affairs substantially differ from those of the older generation. Yet it is not the case that there is a sudden discontinuity between generations: even if the younger generation begins to develop different views at some stage, at least one or two generations usually share the time and memories. A society usually inherits both liabilities and assets from the past, even if the political system goes through major changes. General political orientations and historical memories, formed in response to these liabilities and assets, are conveyed from the older generation in power to the next generation who will run the state in the future. In this way, in the process of generational shifts, the succeeding generation carries over the effects of major events and the political climate of the past and the lessons learned by the older generation. Yet we must enter the caveat that, whereas a society probably learns something from precedents, it can be merely procedural, instrumental and technical and not necessarily substantive.130 If drawing lessons from the past demands ‘the elimination of blank spots’ by opening up the critical debate about issues which have been ignored, concealed or distorted purposefully or inadvertently by the government or other actors,131 each society has a lot more to question and answer. By doing so, a society may be able to extract lessons from history and to incorporate them into the management of international relations. In sum, this and the preceding chapters have developed arguments relevant to each component of the framework outlined in Chapter 1. Having constructed the framework of analysis, the study will explain history education in Japan in the next chapter in order to provide for the background information of the case study: the disputes over Japanese history textbooks in the 1980s. It will examine how history courses have been prepared and how historical knowledge has been disseminated at school in the country. NOTES 1 2

Robin G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, London, Oxford University Press, 1946, pp. 307 and 310. Carolyn Steedman, ‘True Romances’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, p. 27.

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As for a seminal work on children’s developing awareness of homeland and other countries and of international politics, see Harry R. Targ, ‘Children’s Developing Orientations to International Politics’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 7, no. 2, 1970, pp. 79–98. Collingwood argued the philosopher’s approach to history in terms of psychological aspects and a system of knowledge. See Collingwood, The Idea of History, p. 3. As for the analysis of three psychological dimensions of individuals’ worldviews, see David Singer, ‘The Global System and its Sub-systems: A Developmental View’, in James N. Rosenau (ed.), Linkage Politics, New York, The Free Press, 1969, pp. 33–4. Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, London, Penguin Books, 1991 and William Wallace, ‘Foreign Policy and National Identity in the United Kingdom’, International Affairs, vol. 67, no. 1, 1991, pp. 65–70. In relation to identity, the nationalist question can be defined as follows: ‘[T]he nation is ultimately a group whose identity is forged by a particular interpretation of its own history’. James Mayall, Nationalism and International Society, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990, p. 51. Sidney Verba, ‘Conclusion’, in Lucian W. Pye and Sidney Verba (eds), Political Culture and Political Development, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1965, p. 529. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and the Spread of Nationalism, rev. ed., London and New York, Verso, 1991, p. 143. Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990, p. 11. A.D. Smith, National Identity, p. 13. Joseph A. Camilleri and Jim Falk (eds), The End of Sovereignty?: The Politics of a Shrinking and Fragmenting World, Hans and Vermont, Edward Elgar, 1992, p. 226. As for the fixity of identity, see Nathan Widder, ‘Liberalism, Communitarianism and Otherness’, Essex Papers in Politics and Government, no. 5, April 1995, p. 4n. Hugh Seton-Watson, Nations and States: An Enquiry into the Origins of Nations and the Politics of Nationalism, London, Methuen, 1977, p. 8. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, Oxford, Blackwell, 1983, p. 1. Warren Magnusson, ‘The Reification of Political Community’, in R.B.J. Walker and Saul H. Mendlovitz (eds), Contending Sovereignties: Redefining Political Community, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990, p. 48. Paul B. Brass, Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison, New Delhi and London, Sage Publications, 1991, p. 267. R.B.J. Walker, ‘Sovereignty, Identity, Community: Reflections on the Horizons of Contemporary Political Practice’, in R.B.J. Walker and Saul H. Mendlovitz (eds), Contending Sovereignties: Redefining Political Community, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990, p. 181. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories, Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1993, p. 5. Samuel P. Huntington, ‘Transnational Organizations in World Politics’, World Politics, vol. 25, no. 3, 1973, p. 337. Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, ‘The concept of Identity’, in Colin Brock

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History Education and International Relations and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 4–5. A.D. Smith, National Identity, p. 168. The primordialist-instrumentalist debate on ethnic identity formation is suggestive. See p. 25. Somewhat similar to the recent argument on ‘Britishness’, Education Minister Sir Keith Joseph urged teachers to develop ‘proper pride’ in his speech to the Historical Association in 1983, following the call by Lord Hugh Thomas (historian-adviser to Prime Minister Thatcher) for a more patriotic history teaching in the schools. See Raphael Samuel, ‘Continuous National History’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, p. 9. See James N. Rosenau, ‘Pre-Theories and Theories of Foreign Policy’, in R. Barry Farrell (ed.), Approaches to Comparative and International Politics, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1966, pp. 87–8. Anthony D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1995, p. 101. Hamdi A. Hassan, The Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait: Religion, Identity and Otherness in the Analysis of War and Conflict, London and Sterling, Virginia, Pluto Press, 1999, pp. 8–11. For young Jewish beliefs about the Arabs, see Miriam Spielmann, ‘If Peace Comes ... Future Expectations of Israeli Children and Youth’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 23, no. 1, 1986, pp. 52–67. Widder, ‘Liberalism, Communitarianism and Otherness’, pp. 7–8 and Vilho Harle, ‘European Roots of Dualism and its Alternatives in International Relations’, in Vilho Harle (ed.), European Values in International Relations, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1990, pp. 1–14. Ettore Gelpi, Lifelong Education and International Relations, London, Croom Helm, 1985, p. 17. Robert A. Dahl, ‘Participation and the Problem of Civic Understanding’, in Amitai Etzioni (ed.), Rights and the Common Good: The Communitarian Perspective, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1995, pp. 268–70. Targ, ‘Children’s Developing Orientations’, pp. 85–97. Hassan, The Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait, p. 150. See also James A. Aho, ‘Heroism, the Construction of Evil, and Violence’, in Vilho Harle (ed.), European Values in International Relations, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1990, pp. 15–28. John E. Farquharson and Stephen C. Holt, Europe from Below: An Assessment of Franco-German Popular Contacts, London, George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1975, p. vii. R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, p. 200. A.D. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era, p. 136. In an extreme form, rabid xenophobia and ethnic violence against immigrants, Gastarbeiter (guest workers) and asylum-seekers have been observed at the popular level such as anti-Semitism in Germany, France, Poland and Hungary, and hatred against the Turkish, the Albanians, gypsies and other immigrants in Germany, Italy, France and the Czech Republic, inflamed by neo-fascist or neo-Nazi organizations. At the official level, there were tightened rules of entry against asylum-seekers and immigrants against the background of European unification. See p. 46.

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34 About the relationship between public opinion and foreign policy, see, for example, James N. Rosenau, ‘The Attentive Public and Foreign Policy: A Theory of Growth and Some New Evidence’, Research Monograph No.31, Center of International Studies, Woodrow Wilson, School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University, March 1968. 35 Walker Conner, ‘When is a Nation?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, January 1990, p. 97. 36 As for geocentric and heliocentric orientations of American and Canadian children (respectively), see David Staat, ‘The Influence of National Power on the Child’s View of the World’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 11, no. 3, 1974, pp. 245–6. 37 Targ, ‘Children’s Developing Orientations’, p. 81. 38 Michael Walzer, ‘Political Decision-Making and Political Education’, in Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, p. 159. 39 Early studies deal with the correlation between age and children’s concepts of war and peace, see, for example, Trond Ålvik, ‘The Development of Views on Conflict, War and Peace among School Children: A Norwegian Case Study’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 5, no. 2, 1968, pp. 171–95 and Leif Rosell, ‘Children’s Views of War and Peace’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 5, no. 3, 1968, pp. 268–76. 40 Donald P. Warwick, ‘Transnational Participation and International Peace’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 308. 41 Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1976, pp. 238–9. 42 Ibid., pp. 253, 256 and 260–1. 43 Miriam Spielmann, ‘If Peace Comes...’, pp. 52–67. 44 Robert A. Dahl, Who Governs?: Democracy and Power in an American City, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1961, p. 262. 45 Michael Howard, ‘Structure and Process in History’, in The Lessons of History, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1991, pp. 188–200 and Edward Hallet Carr, ‘History as Progress’, in What is History?, 2nd ed., London, Macmillan, 1986, pp. 103– 27. 46 See George G. Iggers, Historiography in the Twentieth Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge, Hanover and London, Wesleyan University Press, 1997, p. 7. 47 Daniel Lerner, The Passing of Traditional Society: Modernizing The Middle East, London, Collier-Macmillan, 1958, p. 47. 48 As for ‘a too narrow conception of the past’, see Jervis, Perception and Misperception, p. 217. 49 Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983, p. 11. 50 Neustadt and May presented various cases of ‘what went wrong’, diverging from policy intentions in American foreign policy such as the Bay of Pigs, the Vietnam War and the Carter Administration’s Arms’ Control Initiative of 1977. These are certainly cases of dubious presumptions (the first one) or illconceived missions combined with a lack of historical understanding (the latter two) from which lessons can be drawn. But they do not explain why policy makers failed to learn lessons. Richard E. Neustadt and Ernest May,

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History Education and International Relations Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision-Makers, New York and London, The Free Press, 1986. Lloyd S. Etheredge, Can Governments Learn?: American Foreign Policy and Central American Revolutions, Oxford, Pergamon Press, 1985, p. ix. Joseph Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy: An Analysis of Decision-Making, London, Oxford University Press, 1967, p. 105. Jervis, Perception and Misperception, pp. 217–18. About this subject, see Leon Festinger, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Tavistock Publications, 1961. Barbara Tuchman, Practising History, 2nd ed., London, The Macmillan Press, 1982, pp. 290–1. Frankel compared problems in South Africa and those in the Deep South for American human rights activists. Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy, p. 101. Tuchman, Practising History, p. 250. Charles E. Ziegler, Foreign Policy and East Asia: Learning and Adaptation in the Gorbachev Era, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1993, p. 156. Irving L. Janis, Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decision and Fiascos, 2nd ed., Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1982, pp. 174–97. Jervis, Perception and Misperception, pp. 232–3. Alex Hybel, ‘Learning and Reasoning by Analogy’, in Michael Fry (ed.), History, the White House and the Kremlin: Statesmen as Historians, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1991, pp. 215–38 and Fry (ed.), ibid., p. 2. See also Marijke Breuning, ‘The Role of Analogies and Abstract Reasoning in Decision-Making: Evidence from the Debate over Truman’s Proposal for Development Assistance, International Studies Quarterly, vol. 47, 2003, pp. 229–45. Breuning throws light on not only ‘which analogies’ but also ‘whether analogies’. Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy, p. vi. Beatrice Heuser and Cyril Buffet, ‘Conclusions: Historical Myths and the Denial of Change’, in Cyril Buffet and Beatrice Heuser (eds), Haunted by History: Myths in International Relations, Providence and Oxford, Berghahn Books, 1998, pp. 265–6, 269 and 272. Jervis, Perception and Misperception, p. 229. Gunnar Myrdal, ‘The Principle of Cumulation’, in Paul Streeten (ed.), Value in Social Theory: A Selection of Essays on Methodology, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1958, pp. 198–205. The political culture approach in many ways corresponds to the discourse of nationalism. ‘[T]he essence of nationalism is that the will of the individual should merge in the will of the nation …’. Elie Kedourie, Nationalism, 4th expanded ed., Oxford UK and Cambridge USA, Blackwell, 1993, p. 105. Karl W. Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundations of Nationality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Mass., The MIT Press, 1966, p. 28. Lucian W. Pye, ‘Introduction’, in Lucian W. Pye and Sidney Verba (eds), Political Culture and Political Development, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1965, p. 8. See Thomas Risse-Kappen, ‘Ideas Do Not Float Freely: Transnational Coalitions, Domestic Structures, and the End of the Cold War’, International Organization, vol. 48, no. 2, 1994, p. 212. The discourse of nationalism also employs two levels in explaining education. But it is more complicated since it often involves the role of intellectuals

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who are presented as the prototype of individuals in the modern world. See Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Revival, Cambridge, New York and Melbourne, Cambridge University Press, 1981, pp. 105–106. Ibid., p. 127. Brian Salter and Ted Tapper, Education, Politics and the State: The Theory and Practice of Educational Change, London, McIntyre, 1981, pp. 26–7. James N. Rosenau, ‘A Pre-Theory Revisited: World Politics in an Era of Cascading Interdependence’, International Studies Quarterly, vol. 28, no. 3, 1984, pp. 281–2. Ibid., p. 268. Jan Aart Scholte, International Relations of Social Change, Buckingham and Philadelphia, Open University Press, 1993, p. 107. Frankel, The Making of Foreign Policy, p. 120. Walzer, ‘Political Decision-Making’, p. 159. Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, p. 43. Walzer said: ‘Theory is an argument about the choices we should make; history is an argument about the choices we have made’. Walzer, ‘Political Decision-Making’, p. 173. Walzer, ‘Political Decision-Making’, p. 160. Etheredge, Can Governments Learn?, p. 108. Ernest May, ‘Lessons’ of the Past: The Use and Misuse of History in American Foreign Policy, New York, Oxford University Press, 1973, p. 180. Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, ‘Power and Interdependence Revisited’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and Interdependence, 2nd ed., Boston and London, Scott, Foresman, 1989, p. 265. Paul Hurst, ‘Critical Education and Islamic Culture’, in Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, p. 198. As for communal influence on the young, see Siobhán McEvoy, ‘Communities and Peace: Catholic Youth in Northern Ireland’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 37, no. 1, 2000, pp. 85–103. As for the interplay of social forces, see Daniel Alfred Prescott, Education and International Relations: A Study of the Social Forces that Determine the Influence of Education, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1930, pp. 24–5, 46–7 and 121–3. In a sense, this point is not irrelevant to the Allied Powers’ reeducation programmes, which were apparently a huge challenge to the wartime culture of Japan and Germany, although only their total defeat had made this attempt possible. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780, p. 92. The consolidation of democratic political structures, not the reverse order, led to more democratic political orientation among greater proportions of the Germans. See Mary Fulbrook, ‘Nation, State and Political Culture in Divided Germany, 1945–90’, in John Breuilly (ed.), The State of Germany: The National Idea in the Making, Unmaking and Remaking of a Modern Nation-State, London and New York, Longman, 1992, p. 197. Dahrendorf argued that if there were such solid properties like national character, ‘why is there something like education at all — or history for that matter?’. Ralf Dahrendorf, Society and Democracy in Germany, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1968, p. 6. James N. Rosenau, ‘Pre-Theories and Theories of Foreign Policy’, in R. Barry Farrell (ed.), Approaches to Comparative and International Politics, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1966, p. 65.

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89 James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (eds), Governance without Government: Order and Change in World Politics, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 272. 90 UN-HABITAT, the 21st Session of the Governing Council, 16–20 April 2007, Nairobi, Kenya, a quote from Nobel Laureate Muhammed Yunus. 91 Camilleri and Falk (eds), The End of Sovereignty?, p. 1. 92 Scholte, International Relations of Social Change, pp. 35–6. 93 Karl W. Deutsch, ‘External Influence on the Internal Behavior of States’, in R. Barry Farrell (ed.), Approaches to Comparative and International Politics, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1966, p. 11. 94 As for the national differentiation through education, see Ernest Gellner, Thought and Change, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964, p. 172. 95 The discourse of nationalism has noted the importance of education; yet its primary emphasis has been on the importance of education essentially for internal community life. Among sociologists (and historians) who focus on transnational aspects of education, see Laura Hein and Mark Selden, ‘Learning Citizenship from the Past: Textbook Nationalism, Global Context, and Social Change’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 3–15 and Yasemin Soysal, ‘Identity and Transnationalization in German School Textbooks’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 53–61. 96 Rosenau notes three main points as to an issue-area: ‘(1) a cluster of values, the allocation or potential allocation of which (2) leads the affected or potentially affected actors to differ so greatly over (a) the way in which the values should be allocated or (b) the horizontal levels at which the allocations should be authorized that (3) they engage in distinctive behavior designed to mobilize support for the attainment of their particular values’. Rosenau, ‘PreTheories and Theories of Foreign Policy’, p. 81. In their account of the issue structure model, Keohane and Nye similarly argued for the varying relevance of economic and military capabilities, patterns of politicization and various interest groups involved. See Keohane and Nye, Power and Interdependence, p. 50. 97 Nye and Keohane listed four major types of global interactions: ‘(1) communication, the movement of information, including the transmission of beliefs, ideas, and doctrines; (2) transportation, the movement of physical objects, including war material and personal property as well as merchandise; (3) finance, the movement of money and instruments of credit; (4) travel, the movement of persons’. Nye and Keohane, Transnational Relations and World Politics, p. xii. 98 See the League of Nations, Official Journal, Special Supplement, No.11, ‘Resolutions and Recommendations adopted by the Assembly during the Fourth Session (September 3rd to 29th, 1923)’, pp. 24–6 and Special Supplement, No. 21, ‘Resolutions and Recommendations adopted by the Assembly during the Fifth Session (September 1st to October 2nd, 1924)’, pp. 16–18 and 46. The Committee on Intellectual Cooperation stated in January 1926: ‘… the Committee never forgot that its competence in this sphere [education] was strictly limited … National education and moral education alike lie outside, and will always lie outside, their competence’. The League of Nations, Official Journal, April 1926, Annex 848a, p. 571. 99 The European Cultural Convention (with effect from May 1955) was designed as a general framework for the Council’s cultural work. In May 1960, the

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cultural and social activities of the Western European Union was transferred to the Council of Europe under an agreement between the seven WEU countries (Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxemburg, Netherlands and the UK) and a Council for European Cultural Cooperation was set up in January 1962. The Council organized a series of meetings of international experts at intervals from 1952 to 1958 for the revision of history textbooks in order to reduce errors and national prejudices and a similar series of meetings on the revision of geography textbooks. The Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research is one which conducts comparative research on curriculum coverage of many subjects of social studies. In Europe, UNESCO also began to work with Germany and Poland on their textbooks from the 1970s. 100 Susan Strange, ‘The Study of Transnational Relations’, International Affairs, vol. 52, no. 3, 1976, p. 338. Strange pointed out that there were ‘extensive and significant areas of anarchy in which little or no authority is exercised over the economic process, and its consequences’, p. 341. As to ‘a nonregime situation’ and the murky zones between regime and nonregime situations, see Keohane and Nye, Power and Interdependence, pp. 19–21. 101 Keohane and Nye, ‘Two Cheers for Multilateralism’, p. 276. The treatment of ‘Taiwan’ after the normalization of Sino-Japanese relations is an example. The Ministry of Education of Japan amended world maps in approved Japanese textbooks (from ‘Republic of China’ to ‘Taiwan’) according to a Chinese claim in 1973. See D-96-HC, ED, 19.8.82, p. 6. 102 Yoel Cohen, Media Diplomacy: The Foreign Office in the Mass Communication Age, London, Frank Cass, 1986, p. 97. 103 Bernard C. Cohen, The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, Boston, Little Brown, 1973, p. 170. 104 In relation to the nature of bureaucracy, Risse-Kappen analyses the correlation between the domestic structure (the state-dominated and the society-dominated) and the formation of transnational coalitions. See RisseKappen, ‘Ideas Do Not Float Freely’, pp. 210–11. 105 Gourevitch highlighted ‘international sources of domestic politics’, seeing international politics as a cause of domestic structure rather than its consequence. Peter Gourevitch, ‘The Second Image Reversed: The International Sources of Domestic Politics’, International Organization, vol. 32, no. 4, 1978, pp. 882 and 901. In February 1996, a report for the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations called on Japan to include historical facts in its curriculum with reference to the ‘comfort women’. See Gavan McCormack, ‘The Japanese Movement to “Correct” History’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 16–23. 106 As to asymmetries created by growing interdependence and a gap between developed and developing states, see also Kal J. Holsti, ‘A New International Politics? Diplomacy in Complex Interdependence’, International Organization, vol. 32, no. 2, 1978, p. 514. With regard to informal social structure in the international scientific community and its asymmetrical patterns of participation by country and discipline, and of relationship between national research and international research, see Diana Crane, ‘Transnational Networks in Basic Science’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, pp. 235–51.

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107 Kjell Skjelsbaek, ‘The Growth of International Non-governmental Organization in the Twentieth Century’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press 1970, p. 79. See also Peter M. Haas, ‘Knowledge, Power and International Policy Coordination’, A Special Issue, International Organization, vol. 46, no. 1, 1992. Risse-Kappen, ‘Ideas Do Not Float Freely’, p. 214. 108 See Georg Eckert Institute, Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research Braunschweig (an English brochure), 1995, pp. 20–3. 109 Maureen B. Berman and Joseph E. Johnson, ‘The Growing Role of Unofficial Diplomacy’, in Maureen B. Berman and Joseph E. Johnson (eds), Unofficial Diplomats, New York, Columbia University Press, 1977, p. 16. 110 Thomas Risse-Kappen, ‘Structures of Governance and Transnational Relations: What Have We Learned?’, in Thomas Risse-Kappen (ed.), Bringing Transnational Relations Back In: Non-state Actors, Domestic Structures and International Institutions, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995, p. 305. Field cast doubt on the usefulness of the conventional political map, convenient for empires, war and treaties, and underlined the validity of other kinds of maps, geological, meteorological, religious, educational, transportation and industrial. James A. Field, Jr., ‘Transnationalism and the New Tribe’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 4. 111 Keohane and Nye, Power and Interdependence, pp. 226 and 228. Regarding their comment on transnationalism as the ideology of some of the rich and nationalism as the ideology of many of the poor, see Nye and Keohane (eds), 1970, p. 388. About ‘the transnationally mobile’ and ‘the nationally immobile’, see p. 389. 112Huntington, ‘Transnational Organizations in World Politics’, p. 365. Economic interdependence will not lead to a new political understanding. Halliday, ‘Three Concepts of Internationalism’, p. 193. 113 Keohane and Nye, Power and Interdependence pp. 26 and 261. 114 For ‘a high degree of cultural homogenisation, territorial crystallisation and social penetration’, see Anthony D. Smith, ‘Ethnie and Nation in the Modern World’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 14, no. 2, 1985, p. 130. 115 Thomas J. La Belle and Peter S. White, ‘Educational Policy Analysis and Intergroup Relations: International and Comparative Analysis’, in John N. Hawkins and Thomas T. La Belle (eds), Education and Intergroup Relations: An International Perspective, New York, Praeger, 1985, pp. 9–22 and 333–46. 116 ‘Internationalism legitimates nationalism’. Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism in the Twentieth Century, New York, New York University Press, 1979, pp. 192–3. 117 James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (eds), Governance without Government, p. 280. 118 Rosenau, ‘A Pre-Theory Revisited’ , pp. 253 and 296–8. 119 Camilleri and Falk (eds), The End of Sovereignty?, p. 204. 120 Edward Hallet Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, 2nd ed., London, The Macmillan Press, 1946, pp. 132–3.

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121 Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780, p. 11. See Christopher J. Hill, ‘“Where Are We Going?” International Relations and the Voice from Below’, Review of International Studies, 1999, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 107–22. 122 Dahl, Who Governs?, pp. 5 and 100 and Bernard C. Cohen, ‘National International Linkages: Superpolities’, in James N. Rosenau, Linkage Politics, New York, The Free Press, 1969, p. 142. 123 See Karl Kaiser, ‘Transnational Relations as a Threat to the Democratic Process’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, pp. 356–7. 124 See, for example, James N. Rosenau (ed.), Domestic Sources of Foreign Policy, New York, The Free Press, 1967. NB also Stelios Stavridis and Christopher J. Hill (eds), Domestic Sources of Foreign Policy: West European Reactions to the Falklands Conflict, Oxford and Washington D.C., Berg Publishers, 1996. 125 Neustadt and May, Thinking in Time, pp. 253–4. 126 Fry (ed.), History, the White House and the Kremlin, p. 1. 127 Jervis, Perception and Misperception, p. 237. 128 Farquharson and Holt, Europe from Below, p. 70. 129 For delayed effects, see Jervis, Perception and Misperception, pp. 260–1. 130 B.C. Cohen, ‘National International Linkages: Superpolities’, p. 142. 131 Ziegler, Foreign Policy and East Asia, p. 32.

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4

History Education in Japan he preceding two chapters have elaborated each component of the conceptual framework in order to explore the link between history education and international relations. The aim of the current chapter is to give an overall picture of Japanese history education, with prime emphasis on the content of teaching. The chapter will present background information on the aspect of ‘process’ in history education, i.e. the disseminating side of historical knowledge, before moving onto the case study on the disputes over Japanese history textbooks in the 1980s. This chapter is divided into three sections. The first section looks at the historical perspectives of Japanese history education in order to give general ideas about the contemporary educational environment surrounding the teaching of history in the country. In the second section, the design, structure and general trend of the national history curriculum guidelines that were used in the 1980s are outlined in connection with the case study, and the writing of history textbooks will be explained. The focus of the final section is on the authorization of schoolbooks or so-called ‘textbook screening’ and the adoption of textbooks/teaching materials. Through this general introduction to the educational practice in Japan, the chapter seeks to connect what has been presented in the framework and the case study in which more specific problems will be analysed in the light of the framework.

T

4.1 THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF CONTEMPORARY HISTORY EDUCATION

The importance of ‘history’ as a subject was recognized already in the early years of the establishment of Japanese education system. The government’s acute apprehension of its importance in achieving political ends — in both internal and external contexts — was manifest in the early 1880s. But this cannot be explained separately from the development of the education system itself; in other words, the Japanese government was generally inclined to utilize education for national purposes ever since the establishment of a school system in the early 1870s. At that time, the country found that its policy of isolation of over two centuries resulted in ‘a tremendous lack of knowledge about

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foreign affairs among all but a few of the elite’.1 In fact, a handbook for elementary school teachers published in 1881 said that the rise and fall of the state depended on the achievement of universal education.2 With a legacy of nearly 300 feudal domains, the government was anxious to heighten a sense of national identity and unity, which led eventually to the creation of an imperial cult — State Shintoism.3 The military also demanded unified schooling so as to achieve domestic stability and prepare for overseas expansion in the future. Reactions to the excess of Western influence were reaching a peak. In this historical setting, primary education played a key role in maintaining traditional values as well as promoting national solidarity. This was accomplished through the teaching of not only history but also morals, language, geography and the imperial cult, and through the creation of an atmosphere in schools where the concepts of loyalty, filial piety and patriotism were propagated. The Imperial Rescript on Education of 1890 effectively bound the relationships between family, village and the whole nation to the imperial ancestors.4 Public education served to promote ‘a common sense of nationhood’ and to pursue ‘the displacement of regional by national loyalties’ in the country’s modernization process.5 Whereas the initial guidelines for curriculum and textbooks (issued with the Fundamental Code of Education in 1872) were not binding, it is noteworthy that, prior to the regulation of schoolbooks, the Ministry of Education swiftly took over publication control, just a month after its establishment in July 1871. In the first concerted textbook regulation of 1880, translations of foreign morals books and writings by specialists of Western studies were removed from the teaching syllabus. The next year, the teaching of world history was banned, and Japanese history was taught mainly for the purpose of fostering reverence for the emperor. Concepts such as freedom, equality, humanism and independence often associated with the French Revolution or the American Independence were subversive in the eyes of the Japanese authorities. In this endeavour, school textbooks played a major role, partly because of educational administrators’ firm belief that the essence of education lies in schoolbooks and partly because of the visible uniformity which is possible in books but not in other forms. In effect, teachers came virtually to ‘teach textbooks’ word by word. Because of the limited availability of other materials at school and home, schoolbooks were the best source of information.6 Following a textbook bribery scandal in 1902, officially approved texts came into use for Japanese language, calligraphy, morals, Japanese history and geography in 1904, while other subjects gradually followed suit; schoolbooks remained under complete government control until 1945.7 During these years, ministerial officials and well-known

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scholars wrote state textbooks for elementary schools, while professors at universities and other academics prepared those for middle schools.8 Given this background, it logically follows that education policies were incorporated into the country’s war efforts during the First World War. After the war, history courses began to focus on heroic figures rather than events, following the textbook revision in 1920.9 The establishment of youth schools for military training in 192610 and the presentation of Japan as the Land of the Gods, with emphasis on the divine origin of the country and the emperor’s reign in the history texts of the 1930s, are just a few examples of the militarization of education. In 1937, the Education Ministry joined the Cabinet’s campaign for national mobilization and embarked on a crusade against Western influence by distributing copies of Kokutai no Hongi (Cardinal Principles of the National Entity of Japan).11 Historical knowledge was restricted to that of collective national hardships and developments, and scientific knowledge to that of weaponry or military issues.12 One of the most visual and concrete examples of this would be the map of Great East Asia that was posted in most classrooms with small flags of the rising sun indicating the Japanese Imperial Army’s ‘advance’. Geography textbooks were correspondingly rewritten over time.13 In this way, children were imbued with images of glorious war.14 A full one-third of the curriculum covered the country’s apparent nationalistic inclinations between the 1930s and the early 1940s with an increasing proportion of the contents focusing on the state (from 20 per cent in 1933 to 38 per cent in 1941).15 The principal purpose of the national course in elementary schools, which consisted of history, geography, morals and language, was that: [Pupils should] learn about national conditions, the land, history, language, and morals of our country, making clear the glory and fundamental character of our Empire, and thereby cultivate a national spirit to realize the Empire’s mission. The national course must make clear to the pupil the true significance of service and piety, impressing on him the happiness which the nation finds in the Empire.16

Never seriously challenged in Japanese society, this brand of education geared to national goals continued for well over a half century from the 1880s onwards.17 A major turning point in Japanese education was the democratization programmes which the US occupying forces initiated in 1945.18 Education reform was one of the cornerstones of US policies for building a new Japan and bringing changes to the thoughts and life of Japanese people. Indeed, Japanese nationals experienced another brand of political education, this time by ‘foreigners’ and ‘victors’.19

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The Education Division of the Civil Information and Education Section (CIE) of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP) set two major goals: ‘the removal of all militarism and ultranationalism from the school system’ and ‘the gradual introduction of new educational patterns to ensure the development of schools and the training of young people and teachers for a democratic Japan’.20 To this end, the General Headquarters (GHQ) of the SCAP conducted a thorough investigation of prewar/wartime schoolbooks and concluded that they were imbued with objectionable doctrines unsuitable for school education.21 Although the SCAP maintained in principle that the writing of history textbooks should be left to Japanese historians, it specified some preliminary requirements: • The new textbooks must be objective and contain only those items which could stand the test of historical evidence; • In the writing of history the story of the Japanese people as a whole should be given, and not the story of the Imperial House alone; • The social and cultural life of the people should be included together with the story of political events; and • The work should be done by competent historians, free to write with the sincerity and honesty which should characterize professional men in any field.22 Furthermore, the SCAP’s basic guidelines for the treatment of mythology called on Japan: • To exclude traditional beliefs and mythology if possible; • To indicate the insufficiency of evidence where necessary even if the material is supported by historical study; and • To stress the modern period of Japanese history much more than the previous curriculum, including the process of the rise of militarists to power and their control of the nation from the Manchurian Incident onwards and the Japanese people’s multiracial origins.23 Eventually, because of the time constraints and the shortage of teaching materials, old textbooks continued to be used in schools on condition that the contents indicating ultranationalism, militarism and religious discrimination were deleted, as determined by the SCAP. (See the SCAP’s criteria.)

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Table 4.1 Education Policies during the Initial Stage of the US Occupation

Main reform programmes

The responsible office: The Education Division of the Civil Information and Education Section of the General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers The GHQ’s four major directives:

(1) To prohibit the promotion of militaristic and ultra-nationalistic ideologies, to ban militaristic education and training and to promote the teaching of various concepts which underpin fundamental human rights, the parliamentary system, international peace, individual dignity and freedom of meetings, speech and religion (issued on 22 October 1945); (2) To dismiss unqualified teachers and to reappoint teachers who were forced to leave schools during the war years (30 October 1945); (3) To ban governmental approval, support, surveillance and promotion of State Shinto and shrines (15 December 1945); and (4) To suspend courses on morals, Japanese history and geography and to ban textbooks used in these courses (31 December 1945).24

The postwar education reform based on the Japanese Constitution and the Fundamental Law of Education25 The basic education reform policies are formulated by a special United States Education Mission invited by GHQ (March 1946), with the CIE acting as an advisory body to the Japanese government and the MOE. The main recommendations made in the Report of the Education Mission (March 1946):

Textbook policies A thorough investigation of prewar/wartime textbooks reveals that these textbooks are deeply imbued with objectionable doctrines and thus unsuitable for school education. The SCAP spells out the criteria for deleting subject matters relating to ultranationalism, militarism and religious discrimination. The SCAP maintains that the writing of Japanese history textbooks should be left to Japanese historians but it makes some preliminary requirements.

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Main reform programmes (a) To bring education closer to the people and to replace the conventional Japanese concept of education as injection with new study methods to enhance individual students’ ability and initiatives; (b) To decentralize the administrative system, including the formulation and implementation of education policies, to elect prefectural and local administrative agencies and to give them considerable powers to approve schools, license teachers and select textbooks; (c) To extend the compulsory education period to nine years, to provide coeducational and free public schools and to provide fouryear higher institutions for professional and liberal education; (d) To develop a broader range of courses beyond the previous pattern of a single prescribed textbook and manual; (e) To rewrite textbooks and teaching materials in history and geography; and (f) To organize a sound health instruction and physical training.26

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Textbook policies Textbooks for social studies and new subjects for the 1947–8 curriculum should be written based on entirely new materials. As to the adoption of school textbooks, the Education Mission recommends free competition among private publishers.27

The SCAP’s Criteria for Removing Ultranationalistic and Militaristic Ideologies from Japanese Textbooks (Excerpts) ●

On ultranationalism

In order that the educational programme shall not be hampered in developing concepts and attitudes conducive to democratic tendencies and friendly international relations based upon principles of equal rights and individual responsibilities, all subject matter will be deleted that: (1) promotes the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere doctrine or any other doctrine of expansion; (2) advocates the idea that the Japanese people are superior to other races or nationalities; (3) teaches concepts and attitudes contrary to the principles set forth in the Charter of the United Nations; (4) propagates the idea that the Emperor should be obeyed with unquestioning loyalty or that the Emperor is

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superior to the heads of other states or that the Tenno (Emperor) system is sacred and immutable. ●

On militarism

In order that the educational system shall not be hampered in developing concepts and attitudes which will contribute to a peaceful non-aggressive government in Japan, all subject matter shall be deleted from textbooks which is designed to promote: (1) the spirit of militarism and aggression through the glorification of war as heroic and [an] acceptable way of settling disputes; (2) glorification of dying for the Emperor with unquestioning loyalty; (3) idealization of war heroes by glorifying their military achievements; (4) development of the idea that military service is the only patriotic manner of serving one’s country; and (5) glorification of military objects such as guns, warships, tanks, fortresses, etc.28

Despite its initial difficulty in distancing itself from prewar/ wartime education,29 the Ministry of Education (MOE) published a history textbook titled ‘Kuni no Ayumi (The Footsteps of the Country)’ in September 1946 (the first of its kind which begins with the Stone Age and not from a mythological age of Gods), and the GHQ approved the resumption of history courses the next month.30 Another two schoolbooks were prepared by the Japanese authorities in close cooperation with the SCAP — ‘Atarashii Kempo no Hanashi (The Story of the New Constitution)’ published in August 1947 and ‘Minshushugi (Democracy)’ published for senior high schools in 1948 and 1949. Interestingly, the latter text even mentioned the nature of previous militaristic training and the compulsory study of Japanese history and criticized the government’s domination of education policy. As a matter of fact, following the adoption of a new constitution, the substance of history education underwent a radical transformation from the prewar adoration of the imperial family.31 A comparison between the prewar/wartime history curriculum and its contemporary counterpart reveals striking differences. For example, when compared to the situation in the 1980s, prewar/wartime classroom hours are double (140 hours versus 70 hours); individual names appeared in old textbooks seven to eight times as frequently as in their more recent counterparts; and the prewar/wartime texts assigned more pages to the medieval age, the other ones to contemporary history.32 On the whole, postwar education reform proceeded along the lines with the principles and ideals of the new Constitution and educational laws, namely the Fundamental Law of Education, the School Education Law and the Board of Education Law.33 However, there was a setback in the approval of schoolbooks. Despite the US

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Education Mission’s recommendation for free competition among private publishers and despite the insistence in some Japanese quarters that the writing of textbooks should be left to the Japanese public and not government officials, a textbook authorization system was eventually incorporated in the School Education Law of 1947.34 This apparently put an end to official schoolbooks; the free selection and use of teaching materials in the classroom was allowed to some extent.35 But the MOE actually retained the right to inspect texts prepared by private publishers at the final stage. The Curriculum Committee of the MOE also opted for the standardization of courses and teaching materials in order to eliminate discrimination and inequality.36 The turning point which defeat brought was followed shortly by another, when Cold War compulsions overshadowed US occupation policies from the late 1940s onwards. Indeed, the Second Education Mission of September 1950 had an object completely different from the first one of March 1946. It contended that one of the most powerful ways of resisting communism in the Far East was to cultivate the Japanese electorate.37 Similarly, the MOE was trying gradually to reverse the education reform initiated by the First Mission. Just after the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty in September 1951, the Advisory Committee for the Reform of Government Orders suggested that the government should prepare standard textbooks, although this did not materialize. In 1953, the Curriculum Council (an advisory organ attached to the MOE) proposed that courses such as history and geography should be revised to promote ethical education.38 The curricular problem became further entangled with defence priorities in US-Japanese relations. When Ikeda Hayato (personal representative of Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru) and Walter S. Robertson (Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs) met in October 1953, the Japanese side pointed to education as one of the four constraints on Japan’s efforts to increase its defence capability (the other three being legal, economic and physical).39 In other words, Japanese adolescents who might be expected to defend the country were being taught not to take up arms. At the end of this meeting, it was proposed that the Japanese government should be responsible for creating a climate in which a patriotic spirit and a spirit of voluntary defence of the home country prevail.40 Importantly, this whole process was meant to redress the imbalance of the reforms imposed during the occupation, which was in essence a nationalistic reaction against ‘imported’ education and the application of the American model to indigenous Japanese cultural and social conditions.41 Unfortunately, yet another bribery scandal in 1955, involving private schoolbook publishers and officiallyappointed textbook inspectors, resulted mistakenly in harsh

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criticisms over textbook accounts such as those supporting teachers’ unions, labour movements, the socialist systems of the Soviet Union and China and communist ideology.42 It was around this time that the ruling Democratic Party published the booklet ‘Deplorable Textbooks’. In less than a decade from the end of the war, the MOE resumed regulating the content of history education as it saw fit and reversed the postwar efforts to transfer powers over educational matters to local school boards.43 After teaching guidelines were revised in 1958, a course of morals in elementary and junior high schools was resumed, and the song Kimigayo (Your Reign) was reintroduced in one of the grades. At the same time, the proportion of the curriculum devoted to war and peace and the Constitution decreased. It was in this period when the MOE and regional education boards were exerting increasingly strong influence over teaching materials, that Ienaga Saburo, a textbook author and historian, filed his first lawsuit of 1965 against the Japanese government, accusing it of overstepping the jurisdiction of educational administration.44 In the 1970s, education developments moved in several directions. The internationalization of education emerged as a central theme. A report by the Central Council for Education of 1974 gave prominence to international exchanges in education, science and culture.45 Not only Japanese history courses but also Japanese language classes adopted a wider variety of teaching materials, some chosen by teachers themselves.46 Simultaneously, the government even attempted to revive the Imperial Rescript on Education of the Meiji Era.47 Strangely enough, the song Kimigayo was designated as the national anthem in the revised national curriculum guidelines for elementary and junior high schools in 1977.48 When RussianJapanese and superpower relations became contentious and the voices advocating increased defence efforts became louder in the late 1970s, some Japanese politicians took the opportunity to assert more nationalistic education, especially in history courses, which set the scene for the advent of the textbook disputes in the 1980s. 4.2 HISTORY CURRICULUM GUIDELINES AND THE WRITING OF HISTORY TEXTBOOKS IN THE 1980S

Having reviewed the historical perspectives of Japanese history education and the contemporary educational environment, this study will move on to explain what the history syllabus was like and how history textbooks were written in the 1980s (most of the basic practices explained here are still maintained today, unless stated otherwise). This section will explain the design, structure and general trend of the syllabus, since it provided a basis on which each school prepared its curriculum and also gave textbook publishers and authors general guidelines for what should be covered in

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schoolbooks. With the focus of this research being on the content of teaching rather than procedural matters, the section will explain the preparation of the curriculum and the process of writing textbooks in summary form. The basic principles for organizing the school curriculum are prescribed by the Enforcement Regulations of the School Education Law (Ministry of Education Ordinance No.11, 23 May 1947). The standards of curriculum organization such as the objectives and contents of each subject are stipulated in the ‘Course of Study’ (i.e. national curriculum guidelines) determined by the MOE (the MEXT since January 2001).49 In accordance with these regulations and the Course of Study, every school is to prepare a curriculum in the light of regional/school conditions and students’ characteristics. Each school is permitted to include some subjects in addition to those indicated in the Course of Study, but the school curriculum in principle must not deviate from its objectives and contents nor impose an excessive burden on students.50 The school curriculum also has to be approved by local boards of education, prefectural and municipal.51 To publish schoolbooks, private publishers in principle commission historians, university professors and school teachers to write manuscripts, and then compile and edit them to publish in textbook form.52 Publishers are to a considerable extent free to design and organize texts according to their own ideas and schemes, but they must be written in accordance with the Course of Study and screening standards, both specified by the Education Ministry.53 In other respects, there is no governmental or ministerial control over the content of texts at this stage; in effect textbook writers work independently, though consulting publishers. In this sense, there is no obvious constraint which holds back Japanese schoolbook authors from cooperating with foreign historians and incorporating their new findings and interpretations, provided that they have no concern about the authorization process which awaits their final draft.54 (As for international educational cooperation, see Chapter 7.) Therefore, what restrains or guides historians or textbook writers at the time of writing manuscripts is only the Course of Study. A general trend in the history curriculum Before moving onto a more detailed analysis of the Course of Study, the major revisions made in the late 1970s need explanation since these revisions set the tone of the history curriculum in the next decade. For ‘the field of history’ for junior high schools, several features of the revisions should be noted.55 First, in a new Course of Study of 1977, school unit hours for history were reduced dramatically, thus allocating only about half of the previous space in terms of the main text of textbooks. Second, priority was given to Japanese

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history, with world history being referred to only when it is related to the former. In practice, this meant that world history before the modern age was given less space, and students would study premodern Asia in relation to Japan. In this connection, it must be pointed out that a proclivity to underscore national history more than international history was not a new trend. Emphasizing the importance of making students understand national history fully in compulsory education, a previous Course of Study noted (but not officially designated) that it would be appropriate to keep the ratio between national and world history at about 7:3, as had been the case. It also said that this ratio should be adjusted depending on each period, for example, 8:2 before the modern era and 6:4 for the contemporary period.56 Third, the new version dealt with not only political history but also the life and culture of the Japanese, taking on board the achievements of folkloristics. Finally, the importance of teaching local history was stressed, especially in terms of linking in a concrete manner the study of history and students’ life and surroundings, which seems to suggest communal approaches. Thus, the study of local and natural environments was included in ‘the field of history’, while historical perspectives were incorporated in ‘the field of geography’ so that both courses might be cross-referred. Similarly, a couple of features can be pointed out about the Course of Study of 1978 for senior high schools.57 First, it laid particular stress on cultural aspects of political, economic and social phenomena. In effect, it explicitly stated that the main thrust of the ‘Japanese History’ course was the comprehensive study of culture. The new guidelines maintained that it was important to grasp the cultural characteristics of the nation from broad perspectives along with the formation and development of its culture. The views formed through insights into one’s own culture, the syllabus also contended, would lead to an understanding of other countries and peoples, hence to real international understanding on the basis of mutual appreciation. Yet the problematic point latent in this argument is that, while making connections between political, economic and social affairs and cultural phenomena, the guidelines made an equivocal statement that it is necessary to ‘avoid’ dealing with detailed and highly sophisticated subjects.58 The second feature of the new course outline is the introduction of local history, which was aimed to raise students’ awareness of the presence of history in their life and contemporary society. The course of ‘World History’ similarly emphasized the study of cultural zones and looked at the Orient as well as the West, with more space being assigned to Asia than in the previous version. On the whole, the revised Courses of Study for both junior and senior high school levels seem to indicate a more ethnocentric nature, by placing more priority on national and local history and by giving prominence to cultural dimensions.

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An outline of history curriculum guidelines The Course of Study in general stipulates the objectives and structure of each course and offers teaching guidelines about subjects which must be covered under the headlines of historical periods or landmark events. Below, this study will briefly look at these points in the history curriculum guidelines used in the 1980s. For the history course for junior high schools, which deals with both national and world history, the syllabus enumerated the following objectives of the course: (1) To understand Japanese history against the background of the events happening in the world and foster students’ consciousness of being Japanese; (2) To comprehend the features and transition of historical periods and consider the influence of each period on the present social life; (3) To study the accomplishments of those who in the past contributed to the development of the nation and society and cultivate an attitude of understanding, loving and respecting cultural heritages of local areas as well as the country; (4) To give an overview of international relations, arouse an interest in the life and culture of other peoples and promote a spirit of international cooperation; and (5) To stimulate students’ interest in history by looking at concrete phenomena rather than something conceptual and abstract and encourage multi-dimensional examinations and impartial judgement.59

On the other hand, the Course of Study for senior high schools stressed the need to foster proper attitudes for studying history in general, while both national consciousness and international understanding and cooperation were the common themes running through history courses for both school levels. For example, it stipulated the objectives of ‘Japanese History’ as follows: (1) Not only to know historical facts but also to develop the ability to consider past and present phenomena in the historical context, i.e. to grasp the essence of phenomena in the process of their formation; (2) To deepen an understanding of contemporary Japan and the consciousness of being Japanese by studying the historical process leading to the formation of modern Japan and the characteristics of national culture; and (3) To foster the ability to observe the world and human culture, which is conducive to international understanding and international cooperation.60

The overall aims of ‘World History’ were similar in perspective: (1) To understand the basic facts concerning world history and further the ability to think from historical perspectives;

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(2) To grasp the historical process in the formation of the modern world and understand the way of living and thinking of peoples living in different parts of the world by studying the characteristics of each cultural zone; and (3) To cultivate the temperament to live in an international society as Japanese nationals.61

The Structure of History Courses in the 1980s (the Main Headlines) ●

Junior high schools (the field of history)

(1) Origins of civilization and Japan (2) Capitals of Nara and Heian, and government by the nobility (3) The development of warrior class government and the improvement of the life of common people (4) Steps towards national unification (5) The Edo shogunate and national seclusion (6) Japan on the eve of the opening of the country towards the world (7) The Meiji Restoration (8) Steps towards modern Japan (9) The two world wars and Japan (10) New Japan and the world62 ●

Senior high schools (Japanese History)

(1) The dawn of Japanese culture (2) The adoption of the continental culture and the nationalization of culture (3) The formation of warriors’ class culture and the emergence of the culture of common people (4) Cultural trends under the shogunate-clan system (5) The formation and growth of modern culture The introduction of Western culture and the Meiji Restoration The formation of the modern nation and political thought The development of capitalism and people’s life Japan’s modernization and Asia Domestic and foreign affairs and the trends of thought in the period between the First World War and the Second World War (6) Contemporary society and the creation of culture Reforms after the Second World War and changes in people’s life The contemporary world and Japanese culture (7) The history and culture of community63 ●

Senior high schools (World History)

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

Origins of civilization The formation and development of the East Asian cultural zone The formation and development of the West Asian cultural zone The formation and development of the European cultural zone The world in the nineteenth century The formation of European civil society and its culture The development of the Industrial Revolution and Asia Various revolutions in Europe and the American Continent Imperialism relating to Asia and Africa

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(6) The world between the two world wars The First World War and the formation of the USSR Europe after the First World War and racial movements in Asia and Africa Trends in the USA and the Great Depression The emergence of totalitarianism and the Second World War (7) The modern world and Japan International society after the Second World War Changing international situations and Japan The development of science and technology, and modern culture64

When it comes to specific themes, the Course of Study only gives an outline of historical periods and major events, which is rather simple and superficial. It is in fact far from regulating or imposing particular views; but it leaves out or avoids making judgements on certain issues. Even with its complementary explanations and guidelines for teachers, it does not sufficiently flesh out the content of teaching. It does little more than enumerate minimum essential points which textbooks or teachers should mention; it is literally a set of guidelines. Notwithstanding, exemplary teaching guidelines about Japan’s foreign relations in modern and contemporary periods should be analysed here. Under the headlines of ‘Japan on the eve of the opening of the country towards the world’ and ‘the Meiji Restoration’(1868), the syllabus for junior high schools outlined European countries’ ‘advance’ into Asia and its reactions (with the main focus on India and China), Japan’s reactions to Westerners’ advance in terms of foreign policy and naval defence and the impact of these events on Japan’s modernization.65 It explained that external pressure prompted Japan to unite itself in a short period and that domestic reform demands and movements resulted in the overturn of the Edo government (1603–1867) and the Meiji Restoration. The role of individuals who contributed to the maintenance of Japan’s independence and development was also mentioned. However, a further examination of later periods reveals that this sequential exposition of events was confined only to the Western impact on Japan. In other words, little reference was made to Japan’s influence on foreign states, especially on Asian neighbours in terms of their reactions to Japan’s intervention and aggression, except in a positive sense (e.g. Japan’s victory in the Russo-Japanese War enhancing Asian peoples’ national consciousness).66 Asian countries’ influence on modern and contemporary Japan was not sufficiently explored either. Therefore, the Course of Study seems to have emphasized Western influence on Japan but not other aspects of interdependent relations; in particular, the impact of Japanese behaviour on Asia was conspicuously left unstated.

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Similarly, only a partial picture of Japan’s relations with the Asian continent was presented in the guidelines under review.67 For example, whereas competition between European countries and America to acquire overseas colonies (especially leases in China) was mentioned, Japan does not, according to the guidelines, seem to have been a party to this competition. While touching upon Japan’s efforts to establish diplomatic relations on equal terms with Western countries, the course outline did not provide the same perspective with regard to Japanese-Asian relations. While the Meiji government’s diplomacy was underlined (e.g. the conclusion of treaties with Korea and China and the demarcation of territories), an analysis of Asian countries’ struggle for survival and independence was almost non-existent. The syllabus mentioned anti-war opinion in Japan at the time of the Russo-Japanese War and the Japanese people’s perception of themselves as being leaders of Asian peoples. It also said that students needed to understand the reasons why the Sino-Japanese War (1894–95) broke out in view of Japan’s relations with China and Korea and the circumstances under which Japan went to war with Russia, ‘advanced’ into China and ‘annexed’ Korea. However, substantive commentaries on the very reasons for all this and the very circumstances were missing in the guidelines. ‘Japanese History’ for senior high schools adopted a similar style of explanations, presenting a ‘list’ of major events as indicated above, with other developments preceding and following these monumental events but few complementary interpretations.68 In the same vein, the guidelines for ‘World History’ referred to great powers’ imperialistic policies in Asia and Africa and the reactions and changes which these policies caused on these continents.69 But again, Japan is not portrayed to have been part of this historical landscape. This is particularly contradictory, since the Course of Study proposed that students should study situations in Japan, Asia, Africa, Latin America, etc. and consider trends in each region with special attention to the events and matters relating closely to Japan. In this connection, the guidelines also explained as follows: … the period from the late nineteenth century to the Russo-Japanese War in the early twentieth century is considered in the light of Asian and African peoples’ history and its evolution, rather than under conventional headlines such as ‘Asian despots’, ‘European countries’ advance’ and ‘the division of the world’.70

While it is welcome to give a fresh look at Asian and African people’s history, the syllabus seems to have suggested rather apolitical approaches. In fact, it stated that it was important not to pay attention to details of political history but to understand the life of people in a concrete manner.71

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Regarding ‘the world in transition and Japan’, junior high school students were to study deepening economic recession and social uncertainty in the late Taisho Era and the early Showa Era (the 1920s).72 The syllabus explained that the concentration of capital, weakening political parties and socio-economic problems engendered the rise of the Japanese military, which prompted the country to ‘advance’ into China, and finally pointed to the profound influence of these problems on the politics and foreign relations of Japan. However, how Japan’s domestic politics and foreign policy changed due to the very profound influence was left unmentioned; so were Sino-Japanese relations surrounding the long protracted war to follow. The Course of Study then traced a series of developments, from the outbreak of the Marco Polo Bridge (Logouqiao) Incident, the spread of war to the rest of China and to Chinese nationalist movements.73 But the whole explanation failed to make a crucial link with Japan’s expansionist policy, although it must be admitted that it would be an enormous task to study a whole array of events on the Chinese continent in this period. The course outline for ‘Japanese History’ summarized Japan’s domestic and foreign affairs during the interwar period with the focus similar to that mentioned above. But it at least drew attention to the trend of thought, for example, the emergence of nationalistic thought in Japan, following the development of the Chinese revolution.74 Outlining events chronologically only in a general manner, however, the syllabus fell short of analysing the causality between these domestic and international events. For compulsory education, the sub-section of ‘the two world wars’ offered rather cursory explanation. The syllabus said that it was important to treat this period in a concise manner, to grasp major events and not to go into details in a sophisticated manner.75 For example, in a typical way, it ‘mentioned’ the course of events from the outbreak of the Second World War to Japan’s defeat and the life of people during the war.76 But it hardly evaluated this series of events. At one place, it offered a good analysis: close relations among states in the world; the interplay between domestic and international situations; the nature of total war affecting many dimensions of national life; and the global scale of warfare and its hazardous effects on people in modern times.77 But in this analysis, Japan is strikingly out of sight; the examination of Japan’s influence on foreign countries is absent. In the ‘Japanese History’ course for senior high schools, some new perspectives were introduced, e.g. a shift to the war system and the changes in the life of Japanese people and national consciousness.78 However, to look at a few approved textbooks for this course, the treatment of the Second World War was rather slight, with only ten to twenty pages or 3 to 6 per cent of the whole text used. (See Table

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4.2.) The ‘World History’ guidelines were similar in focus and style. While explaining the growing tension between the United States and Japan over China and the Pacific and the eventual outbreak of the Pacific War79 (not mentioned in the syllabus for junior high schools), the syllabus ended up cataloguing events that could be presented in a chronological table. Another important issue to which the course outline drew attention was the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It stressed that it was essential for students to understand that the prevention of war and the building of a democratic and peaceful international society are important tasks in the atomic age.80 This guidance was shared at the senior school level, and the threat of nuclear weapons and the enormous calamity these weapons inflicted on human beings were highlighted in the same context.81 But the issue of nuclear weapons seems to have been emphasized in a more global sense as one of the problems which humanity faces.82 There was no particular reference to the reasons behind the bombing or the situations leading to Japan’s experience of the atomic bombs, i.e. the devastation and casualties Japan’s aggression brought to Asia and the Pacific and to the Allied Powers fighting there. Finally, the guidelines for ‘the field of history’ and ‘Japanese History’ dealt with the postwar period from the process of democratization and reconstruction of Japan, the Cold War, the independence of Asian and African peoples, Japan’s independence and up to its rejoining with the international community.83 However, there was little reference to US-Japanese relations in this context. This is particularly surprising as the ‘Japanese History’ course paid attention to reform policies, the new constitution and economic recovery. In ‘World History’, more international views were presented. Although giving few clues to the answer, the guidelines raised interesting questions as to West Germany and Japan: what roles should they play and what responsibilities should they bear in the increasingly complex international situation?84 Another point worthy of note in relation to the case study is that the syllabus did take into account ‘international understanding and international cooperation’ through an understanding of issues such as human rights, peace, welfare and different cultures, while at the same time underlining the national consciousness of the Japanese people.85 In sum, the Course of Study under review is to a large extent a halfway house between regulating the content of teaching and leaving it to historians and teachers, and at the same time between presenting overall programmes of study and offering selective explanations and interpretations. In fact, the syllabus for ‘Japanese History’ noted that countless historical phenomena could be cited, unless the scope and depth of study and the vantage point were determined; hence the selection and treatment of historical

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105

Table 4.2 Samples of History Textbooks (1/2)

Junior high school textbooks for ‘the field of history’ in 1983 Textbook publishers

Historical periods

Kyoiku Shuppan

Shimizu Shoin

Pages and the percentage


Total 310 pages of which*

%


%

Ancient civilizations and the formation of ancient Japan

33

11

26

9

Ancient Japan and East Asian countries

30

10

30

10

The formation of a feudalistic society

32

10

38

13

The development of the feudalistic society

46

15

58

20

The formation of the modern world

40

13

22

8

28

10

22

8

The formation of modern Japan 50

16

The two world wars and Japan

42

14

36

12

The contemporary world

28

9

24

8

Modern Japan and East Asia

phenomena should be ‘appropriate’.86 Yet this nuanced and ambiguous guidance seems to be the key to understanding the very political nature of the syllabus.

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Table 4.3 Samples of History Textbooks (2/2)

Senior high school textbooks for ‘Japanese History’ in 1983

Textbook publishers

Historical periods

Jikkyo Shuppan

Sanseido

Yamakawa





%


%


%

Primitive to ancient

78

23

68

25

80

22

Medieval (Early feudalistic)

52

15

42

16

62

17

Premodern (Late feudalistic)

80

24

56

21

76

21

Modern and contemporary

129

38

105

39

136

38

(In this section) The Second World War

20

6

12

4

11

3

*Note: The approximate pages of the main text (excluding chronological tables, index, etc.)

4.3 THE AUTHORIZATION AND SELECTION OF TEXTBOOKS IN THE 1980S

While the Course of Study is useful for coming to grips with the contours of history courses, such as historical periods and milestones that the Ministry of Education regards as essential, its function is still confined to providing for a teaching plan only in summary form. Therefore, if government influence over the content of history courses needs to be scrutinized, the textbook authoriza-

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tion (or screening) system, which in practice determines the precise textual content, must be examined fully. Of course, unless schoolbooks play a significant role in communicating subject-matters to students, they do not deserve close examination. However, textbooks in reality continue to be the main teaching materials in schools despite the availability of various printed media and images, and a great majority of Japanese teachers seem to rely on textbooks.87 Therefore, the rest of the chapter will concentrate on the practice of certifying and selecting schoolbooks (and the exact content of history textbooks will be examined in the case study). An outline of the textbook screening system The power of authorizing schoolbooks rests with the Education Ministry, which examines in detail all textbook manuscripts for elementary and secondary schools, and only those approved by the Ministry are permitted for use in either public or private schools. In the early-to-mid 1980s, texts were revised every three years in rotation;88 for those already in use, there were procedures for partial revision or ‘revision authorization’ and for those newly compiled, ‘new authorization’.89 The Textbook Research Centre in Japan (affiliated with the Ministry) defines the aim of screening in terms of the following three key areas: (1) To examine whether or not manuscripts are appropriate as textbooks to be used in schools; (2) To leave private authors and publishers to write and edit textbooks in order to allow their originality in teaching materials and at the same time to secure appropriate textbooks; and (3) To maintain and raise the standard of education across the country, guarantee opportunities for education and maintain neutrality in education.90

However, the screening system arguably serves the purpose of official endorsement, if not censorship, since the Ministry can in practice demand that authors rewrite the text or part of it before approval is given. Here, certification procedures need more explanation. In principle, the Education Ministry refers the textbook drafts submitted by publishers to the Textbook Authorization Research Council (TARC). The Council is an advisory body attached to the Ministry, and the Education Minister appoints all of its members, in most cases university faculty members, school teachers and those who have substantial experience in academia.91 The TARC has subcommittees with each being in charge of a different area of study; the social studies division checks history textbooks. Then the Ministry makes a

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final decision on whether to give approval or not according to the TARC’s recommendations. However, prior to formal appraisal by the Council’s subcommittees, textbook examiners, who are full-time officers of the Ministry, closely examine manuscripts. On the basis of their findings and comments, the TARC makes recommendations (approval or rejection); hence these officers in practice play a decisive role in determining the results of authorization, which may indicate that the Ministry’s consultation to the Council is a sheer formality.92 As a matter of fact, back in the 1980s, meetings were repeatedly held between MOE’s examiners and applicants, i.e. textbook publishers or authors, until final approval was accorded. At this stage, the MOE gave two types of comments on specific points: instructions for correction, which were compulsory if the manuscript was to be approved, and recommendations for improvement, which were non-compulsory and left to authors’ final judgement. According to these two types of comments, textbook writers made amendments and resubmitted a revised manuscript to the MOE. When corrections were made as instructed, the textbook proceeded to the final editorial check for publication. Screening principles The examination of textbook manuscripts proceeds in accordance with a set of screening standards stipulated by the Education Ministry. For each area of study, the screening standards used until the late 1980s were divided into the following sub-categories: the scope, the depth, the selection and treatment, the structure, layout and amount, the accuracy and the drawing/writing and expressions.93 (For the gist of the screening standards used in the 1980s, see Appendix 4.1.) However, some standards were rather ‘abstract and open to broad interpretation’, which could allow sufficient room to invite intervention into the content of textbooks or arbitrary judgement on approval; 94 others were nothing more than editorial comments. In fact, the MOE commented that, since the national curriculum guidelines and a set of screening standards only broadly outlined the goals of study but did not prescribe specific wording, the Ministry would examine historical accounts case by case.95 This in fact made it difficult to assess the actual workings of the screening practice, since the MOE’s comments — both compulsory instructions and non-compulsory recommendations — were not made public in the 1980s (whereas the MEXT’s instructions for correction and other related documents are now disclosed after the screening). Therefore, the picture emerging from what has been revealed is that the textbook screening standards themselves do not play a crucial role in determining the precise content of the subject-matter, let alone descriptions used, other than the possibility that these standards

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could be interpreted arbitrarily and applied subjectively to the judgement of approval or rejection of textbooks, which is one of the highlights dealt with in the case study to follow. The adoption of schoolbooks and teaching materials Textbooks that have been approved by the Education Ministry finally proceed to the selection process. Certified schoolbooks are exhibited at textbook centres around the country for a certain period so that those responsible for selection may investigate them. The authority of adopting schoolbooks rests with the local board of education in the case of prefectural and municipal schools, while the same power rests with the principal of each school in the case of national (but not under the jurisdiction of local authorities) and private schools. This means that at least all municipal schools in a city use the same textbook for each subject.96 Here, how the local board of education works in the selection process needs brief explanation.97 At an initial stage, the prefectural board of education sets up a selection council composed of board members, principals, teachers and scholars (all unknown to the public),98 and they investigate schoolbooks that are already in use. Based on their preliminary examination, the board determines selection criteria, prepares references and informs its members responsible for selection. At the municipal or more local level, a selection council is also set up, and textbook inspectors (usually school teachers and also unidentified) conduct joint investigations of schoolbooks with the prefectural board. According to their reports and the references prepared by the prefectural board, the municipal or more local board chooses textbooks for each subject.99 From this selection process, it is clear that individual teachers and parents, let alone students, have virtually no say in this business,100 the result being that there is a very limited variety in the teaching materials used.101 CONCLUSION

The chapter has presented an overall picture of Japanese history education, in particular, the disseminating side of historical knowledge. This review of the historical background of Japanese history education has shown that the Japanese authorities have been very keen to utilize this subject in order to achieve national goals since the national school system was first established in the late nineteenth century. The examination of the contemporary Japanese educational environment has also shown that political judgement and arbitrariness can directly or indirectly influence the teaching of history, and that it is also possible through the postwar institutional arrangements such as the national curriculum guidelines, textbook authorization and the adoption of teaching materials. Seemingly,

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the syllabus used in the 1980s set only an overall tone for history courses and encapsulated landmark events selectively. However, the closer analysis of the syllabus has brought to light its characteristics. First, it clearly placed national history at the heart of the subject with increased emphasis on local history. Second, it encouraged students to pay attention to the cultural aspects of political, economic and social phenomena. Third and not irrelevantly, it suggested rather apolitical approaches, with political history being sidelined. Another point is that, while the guidelines suggested bringing into focus the Asian region, only a partial picture of Japan’s relations with Asian neighbours was presented; in particular, the analysis of Japan’s influence on Asian countries was virtually absent. Fifth, by sharp contrast, the syllabus under review seems to have emphasized Western influence on Japan, the only exception being US-Japanese relations in the early postwar period. Finally, some of these problems were further compounded by methodological drawbacks such as superficial explanations, a partial exposition of sequential events and the absence or lack of analysis, in particular the analysis of causality. Seen in this way, it is not surprising that history education in Japan has indicated a recurrent, if not consistent, pattern of nationalistic and self-serving inclination. Ironically, even the standardization of education for carrying out egalitarian reform, one of the key pillars of the postwar democratization programmes, also lent support to this inclination. In fact, such standardization over time has resulted in a system somewhat reminiscent of the old prewar system offering the same courses and teaching materials approved by the Education Ministry in all types of schools,102 with academics, teachers, parents and students fading into the background. With the same ruling party remaining in power for most of the postwar years, the nationalistic residue of wartime education may have survived, though in subtle form. The LDP’s organ ‘Jiyu Shimpo (Liberal News)’ carried a series featuring ‘problematic’ textbooks from January to August in 1980. 103 After the LDP’s fortuitous victory in the elections for both Houses in June of that year, the government, the LDP and financial circles joined their forces in the so-called ‘second textbook criticism’ that far exceeded the first concerted effort in and around 1955.104 Then, Justice Minister Okuno Seisuke addressed the issue of insufficient patriotic education in schoolbooks, as did Education Minister Tanaka Tatsuo. About a year later, in August 1981, the Defence White Paper echoed the point. In tandem with this growing criticism, the MOE applied stricter screening to textbooks for history courses as well as for other social studies.105 It was in these circumstances that there arose the textbook disputes of the 1980s, which will be the focus of the case study chapters which follow.

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111

NOTES 1 2

3

4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

14

15

16

17

18

Richard H. Mitchell, Censorship in Imperial Japan, Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1983, p. 12. Yamazumi Masami, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi (A Concise History of Japanese Education), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1987, p. 43. As for Japan’s pragmatic eclecticism at that time, see Wolf Mendl, Japan’s Asia Policy: Regional Security and Global Interests, London and New York, Routledge, 1995, p. 36. Robert E. Ward, ‘Japan: The Continuity of Modernization’, in Lucian W. Pye and Sidney Verba (eds), Political Culture and Political Development, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1965, p. 75. Donald K. Adams, Education and Modernization in Asia, Reading, Massachusetts, Addison-Wesley, 1970, p. 30. Herbert Passin, Society and Education in Japan, New York, The Teachers College Press, Columbia University, 1965, p. 62. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta (Textbook Research Centre), ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, 1991, p. 19. Ibid. Ibid., p. 20. Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, p. 93. Tokyo Metropolitan Government (Liaison and Protocol Section, Bureau of General Affairs) (ed.), Education in Tokyo, Tokyo, 1979, p. 28. R.H. Mitchell, Censorship in Imperial Japan, p. 282. Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, p. 131. Yamazumi Masami, ‘State Control and the Evolution of Ultranationalistic Textbooks’, in James J. Shields, Jr. (ed), Japanese Schooling, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1989, p. 236. National League for Support of the School Textbook Screening Suits (NLSTS), ‘Truth in Textbooks, Freedom in Education and Peace for Children: The 27 Year Struggle of the Ienaga Textbook Lawsuits’, Tokyo, 1992, p. 6. Passin, Society and Education in Japan, p. 156. These figures are based on data provided in Karasawa Tomitaro, ‘Changes in Japanese Education as Revealed in Textbooks’, Japan Quarterly, vol. 2, no. 3, 1955, p. 373. General Headquarters, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (the Education Division of the Civil Information and Education Section (CIE)), Education in the New Japan, Volume I, Tokyo, 1948, pp. 181–2. There was little serious challenge in Japanese society where there was little concept of freedom of expression, and few fought the creeping tide of censorship. There was a general lack of concern over civil liberties among politicians, intellectuals and journalists. When the Imperial Rescript on Education was issued in 1890, the conservatives already won an important victory over the liberals. R.H. Mitchell, Censorship in Imperial Japan, p. 338. In many ways, the prewar German situation is comparable to the Japanese situation. Like the Japanese authorities, the German counterparts were willing to utilize educational institutions to meet their political objectives in the early twentieth century. Thomas Alexander and Beryl Parker, The New Education in the German Republic, London Williams & Norgate, 1930, p. xix. As for educational reforms in conjunction with socio-economic reforms in postwar Japan, see Kenneth Bok Lee, The Postwar Reforms and Educational Development in Japan, 1945–1970, Ph.D. thesis at University of Southern California, 1974.

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19 In many ways, it was problematic that the victors had imposed democratic principles on Japan (and Germany) in the manner that was contradictory to what they preached; this in turn caused a backlash and resentment against a whole new set of reeducation programmes. Refer to Camilleri’s argument on a contradiction regarding the attempt to graft democratic institutions on to the sovereign state. Joseph A. Camilleri, ‘Rethinking Sovereignty in a Shrinking, Fragmented World’, in R.B.J. Walker and Saul H. Mendlovitz (eds), Contending Sovereignties: Redefining Political Community, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990, p. 23. 20 CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume I, p. 136. 21 Ibid., pp. 238–9. 22 Ibid., p. 249. See also CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume II, ’28. Instruction in Japanese History’, pp. 178–80. 23 CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume I, pp. 251–2. 24 Ibid., pp. 137–9 and 238–9. 25 Tokyo Metropolitan Government (ed.), Education in Tokyo, pp. 36–7 and CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume I, p. 162. 26 CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume I, 1948, pp. 141–3 and ‘Report of the United States Education Mission to Japan’, Volume II, 1948, pp. 50–6. See also Benjamin C. Duke, ‘Variations on Democratic Education: Divergent Patterns in Japan and the United States’, in James J. Shields, Jr. (ed), Japanese Schooling, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1989, pp. 261–2. 27 CIE, Education in the New Japan, Volume I, p. 242. 28 Ibid., p. 240. 29 Neither the Japanese government nor the MOE was able to clarify their stance towards the imperial system and the old education system closely related to it. The Japanese Education Committee (set up to work with the first United States Education Mission in March 1946) as well as postwar Education Ministers still advocated the Imperial Rescript on Education of the Meiji Era until it was finally denounced in the Diet along with other imperial ordinances in June 1948. 30 Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, p. 160. 31 NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, p. 8. 32 Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, pp. 25– 6. 33 NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, pp. 7 and 12 and Tokyo Metropolitan Government (ed.), Education in Tokyo, pp. 34–5, 52 and 54. The new law was promulgated and came into effect in December 2006. 34 Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, pp. 165–6. For a detailed explanation of the first US education mission, see Gary H. Tsuchimochi, Education Reform in Postwar Japan: The 1946 U.S. Education Mission, Tokyo, University of Tokyo Press, 1993. 35 Yamazumi, ‘State Control’, p. 238. 36 Despite the far-reaching US policies at the initial stage, education reforms were not accomplished. The CIE reported that, since August 1945, 22% of prewar/wartime teachers and educational officers withdrew or were removed from their positions and that this was a major achievement. However, the CIE also acknowledged that some of the basic reforms would take many years. See CIE, Education in the New Japan, pp. 157, 387 and 389. 37 Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, p. 188. See also Pat Murdo, ‘Textbook Controversies in Japan: How Dead Are They?’, in Thomas Rholen and

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38 39

40 41

42 43

44 45 46

47 48

49

50

51

113

Christopher Björk (eds), Education and Training in Japan, Volume I, London and New York, Routledge, 1998, p. 239. Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, pp. 189–90 and 199–202. About this meeting, see Hosoya Chihiro, Aruga Tadashi, Ishii Osamu and Sasaki Takuya (eds), Nichibei Kankei Shiryoshu 1945–97 (A Collection of Documents on US-Japanese Relations, 1945–1997), Tokyo, Tokyo University Press, 1999, pp. 234–5. Yamazumi, ‘State Control’, pp. 201–202. Kobayashi Tetsuya, ‘From Educational Borrowing to Educational Sharing: The Japanese Experience’, in Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, p. 105. Yamazumi, ‘State Control’, pp. 239–40. NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, p. 8, Shields, Japanese Schooling, p. 218 and Katsuta Shuichi and Nakauchi Toshio, Japanese Education, Tokyo, International Society for Educational Information, 1995, p. 33. Adams, Education and Modernization in Asia, p. 43. Ienaga filed the second lawsuit in June 1967 and the third in January 1984. Kobayashi, ‘From Educational’, pp. 104 and 110. It is said that the regulation of school textbooks became less rigid, following Judge Sugimoto Ryokichi’s decision in 1970, which supported Ienaga’s claim and confirmed the freedom of education and the autonomy of teaching profession. It was also a decade when the opposition parties increased the number of parliamentary seats. See Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, pp. 231–2. Yamazumi, ‘State Control’, p. 241. Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, the rear table p. 70. In 1985, the MOE demanded that schools use Hinomaru (the sun flag) and Kimigayo (the song ‘Your Reign’) at enrolment and graduation ceremonies. Originally, the Course of Study was meant to encourage the independence of individual teachers in planning and implementing lessons, and it was to be used as a ‘guideline’ and not a requirement imposed by the MOE. However, the new Course of Study issued in 1955 was more prescriptive in nature and no longer a guideline. Okano Kaori and Tsuchiya Motonori, Education in Contemporary Japan: Inequality and Diversity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1999, pp. 35 and 39. The new Course of Study was announced for elementary schools and junior high schools in 1998 and put in use in 2002. For senior high schools, the new Course of Study was announced in 1999 and put in place from 2003 onwards. Under the current textbook screening standards, the issues which are not covered by the Course of Study can be taken up in textbooks, as long as they are along the lines with its objectives and related contents. The following abbreviations are used in this and following notes: Course of Study (COS); Lower Secondary Schools (JH), i.e. junior high school; and Upper Secondary School (SH), i.e. senior high school. MOE, COS, SH, 1976, p. 21, and 1983, p. 10. See Ministry of Education, Educational and Cultural Exchange Division, Unesco and International Affairs Department, Science and International Affairs Bureau, Course of Study for Lower Secondary Schools in Japan, Tokyo, Government of Japan, 1976 and 1983, and Course of Study for Upper Secondary Schools in Japan, 1976 and 1983. MOE, COS, JH, 1976, p. 1 and 1983, p. 1, and MOE, COS, SH, 1976, p. 1 and 1983, p. 1. As for the details of administrative procedures for curriculum

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52

53 54 55 56 57

58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87

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preparation at national, local and school levels, see Tokyo Metropolitan Government (ed.), Education in Tokyo, pp. 107–109 and NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, p. 2. The MOE writes only textbooks for vocational education which are used in high schools, and those for special education. Tokyo Metropolitan Government (ed.), Education in Tokyo, pp. 108–109. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, pp. 9 and 23. Murdo, ‘Textbook Controversies in Japan’, p. 247. See Ministry of Education, Chugakko Shidosho: Shakai-hen, Tokyo, 1978, pp. 8, 13, 61, 63, and 109–10 (COS, JH, 1978, original Japanese version). See Ministry of Education, Chugakko Shidosho: Shakai-hen, Tokyo, 1970, p. 265 (COS, JH, 1970, original Japanese version). See Ministry of Education, Kotogakko Gakushu Shido Yoryo Kaisetsu: Shakai-hen, Tokyo, 1979, pp. 3, 51, 69, 72–4 and 83 (COS, SH, 1979, original Japanese version), and MOE, COS, SH, 1983, pp. 27–9. MOE, COS, SH, 1983, p. 27. MOE, COS, JH, 1978, pp. 68–9 and 1983, p. 19. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 52 and 1983, p. 25. Ibid., 1979, pp. 85–6 and 1983, p. 29. MOE, COS, JH, 1983, pp. 20–9. MOE, COS, SH, 1983, pp. 26–7. Ibid., 1983, pp. 29–30. MOE, COS, JH, 1978, pp. 90–5 and 1983, pp. 25–6. Ibid., 1978, p. 98. Ibid., 1978, pp. 93–5 and 98, and 1983, p. 27. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 66. Ibid., 1979, p. 99 and 1983, p. 30. Ibid., 1979, p. 101. Ibid., 1979, pp. 101 and 108. MOE, COS, JH, 1983, p. 28. Ibid., 1978, pp. 104–105. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, pp. 65–6. MOE, COS, JH, 1978, p. 113. Ibid., 1983, p. 28. Ibid, 1983, p. 27. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 66. Ibid., 1979, p. 104. MOE, COS, JH, 1978, p. 105. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 67 and 1983, p. 27. Ibid., 1979, p. 104 and 1983, p. 30. MOE, COS, JH, 1983, pp. 28–9 and MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 68. MOE, COS, SH, 1979, p. 106. Ibid., 1979, p. 105. Ibid., 1979, p. 75. According to a survey on the use of textbooks, 90% of primary and secondary school teachers take up more than 80% of the contents of textbooks. Four fifths of teachers think that textbooks continue to be the main teaching materials in the classroom despite the likelihood that a variety of new media will provide information in the future. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no

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88 89 90

91 92

93

94 95 96 97

98

99 100

101 102 103

104

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Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, p. 35. See also pp. 3 and 24 and Murdo, ‘Textbook Controversies in Japan’, p. 247. Now textbooks are revised roughly every four years. Caroline Rose, Interpreting History in Sino-Japanese Relations: A Case Study in Political Decision-Making, London, Routledge, 1998, pp. 65–6. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, p. 10 and Ministry of Education, Monbusho: Education, Science and Culture in Japan, Tokyo, 1974, pp. 6–7. NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, pp. 6–7 and Rose, Interpreting History, p. 205. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, p. 12. Apart from textbook examiners (Chosa-kan), there are textbook inspectors (Chosa-in). Each year, hundreds of inspectors (university lecturers and elementary and secondary school teachers) are appointed confidentially by the Ministry. They analyse schoolbooks already in use and report their findings to the Ministry. In accordance with the proposal made by the TARC in July 2002, the screening standards were revised to allow for ‘themes to be explored’, even if they are not included in the Course of Study, with effect from 2003 for compulsory subjects. See the MEXT’s website: http://www.mext.go.jp/ a_menu/shotou/kyoukasho/gaiyou/04060901/004.htm (in Japanese). NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, p. 7. D-96-HC, BUD, 30.6.82, p. 22. MOE, Monbusho, p. 7 and Tokyo Metropolitan Government (ed.), Education in Tokyo, p. 109. About the organization and functions of local education boards, see MOE, Monbusho, pp. 49–50. The law enacted in 1956 brought closer the central government and local education authorities and changed the principles established at the time of education reform after the Second World War, such as the independence of education administration from general administration. One of the major changes is that the public are no longer able to elect local board education members. For other changes brought by this law, see Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, pp. 209–10. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, p. 29. However, because of freedom-of-information ordinances which have been enacted in many prefectures in recent years, the disclosure/non-disclosure of these selection council memberships as well as local textbook inspectors is likely to trigger heated debates around the country. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta, ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, p. 13. Murdo, ‘Textbook Controversies in Japan’, pp. 235 and 249–50. Murdo comments that the US textbook selection process allows more participation by parents and school boards than the Japanese system. Yamazumi, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi, pp. 220–1. Shields, Japanese Schooling, pp. 220–1. For example, topics appeared in the series are as follows: ‘the influence of textbooks on the development of students’ personality’, ‘teachers who rely on textbooks’, 22 January, p. 7, ‘Mr. Takahashi’s (Japan Communist Party) views on history education’, 15 July, p. 7, ‘history education that supports popular struggles in local areas’, 22 July, p. 7, ‘the MOE which approved the inappropriate’, 12 August, p. 7. Morikawa Kinju, Kyokasho to Saiban, (Textbooks and Lawsuits), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1990, pp. 156–7.

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105 In 1981, it was disclosed that the MOE instructed to delete the Preamble of the Constitution, to affirm the constitutionality of the Japan’s Self-Defense Forces and to remove the names of private corporations that were responsible for pollution. The MOE also ordered not to mention the following issues in high school textbooks for contemporary society: the Lockheed Bribery scandal and the secondment of top officials to private companies after their retirement. See Showashi Kenkyukai (ed.), Showashi Jiten 1923–1983 (Encyclopaedia of the Showa Period), Tokyo, Kodansha, 1984, p. 819.

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5

The Japanese History Textbook Disputes in the 1980s (Part I) n overall picture of Japanese history education has been presented in the previous chapter. The focus now shifts to the case study on the disputes over Japanese history textbooks, which emerged between China and South Korea, and Japan in 1982 and 1986. The current and following chapters will account for the controversies, the public reactions and regional/cross-regional repercussions which followed, while providing reference points for the framework of analysis. The 1982 and 1986 disputes are important in four ways for this study as explained in Chapter 1. First, the disputes exposed the particular cases in which the government indirectly intervened in the content of teaching, highlighting textbook certification by the Japanese Ministry of Education (MOE). The rows, which brought to light the latent nature of textbook screening in terms of deciding the content of teaching, provide the framework with important reference points for Phase I (the initial stage of government influence) and Phase II (the activities under government influence). For, this routine practice, besides the national curriculum guidelines which the MOE specified, in a precise manner defined a range of historical events that students study and to a considerable extent determined the nature of the subject. In addition, the MOE’s certification in 1982 and 1986 concerned the historical accounts leaning towards the opposite ends of the political spectrum, the first one towards the left and the second towards the right. Moreover, since government influence was exerted on a particular publisher in 1986, power relations between the government and private authors were made very plain. The contrasts between the two cases are thus most useful. The first two sections of the chapter will survey the 1982 and 1986 disputes in turn, and the third section will analyse the important aspects of the textbook issue, while referring to the framework. Second, the disputes shed light on the ‘consequences’ of history education, forcing the Japanese government and people to react to foreign criticisms over the history textbooks. Third, the controversies showed that foreign observers were deeply concerned with the implications of history education, in particular the behaviour of the young Japanese in the future, directly

A

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involving the two foreign governments and attracting the attention of a number of other countries. The second and third points, which are relevant to the formation of public dispositions (Phase III) and the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’), will be analysed in Chapter 6. Fourth, the highly charged diplomatic disputes in the 1980s can be regarded as the very first catalyst for bilateral research organized by individual historians and study groups in Japan and its neighbours in later years; in this sense, they are of additional importance in terms of the ‘Wider Context’. In fact, such joint study proposals were made by the Seoul government at the time of the 1980s’ disputes, and these points will be touched upon in this chapter. Those joint research efforts across national borders, which gradually gained momentum from the 1990s onwards, will be looked at in Chapter 7. 5.1 THE TEXTBOOK DISPUTE IN 1982

The New York Times branded the 1982 dispute as ‘the worst diplomatic quarrels’ in Japan’s relations with China and South Korea in a long time.1 It was triggered by the Japanese media, namely television programmes aired on the evening of 25 June and newspapers of the next day. According to their reports, the Education Ministry rewrote historical accounts in schoolbooks in the process of authorizing them. Despite the news media’s initial alleged ‘misreport’, the crucial fact is that the MOE did give textbook authors either instructions (compulsory) or recommendations (non-compulsory) so that the term ‘aggression’, which would have been used otherwise to describe Japan’s behaviour on the Chinese continent before and during the Second World War, might be avoided.2 The official Chinese news agency Xinhua’s initial coverage (26 June) was cautious: The distortion of history to prettify Japanese aggression against China in high and primary school textbooks censored by the Japanese Education Ministry has aroused wide concern among the mass media here [in Tokyo].3

This was followed by more explicit criticism in the Communist Party newspaper Renmin Ribao (People’s Daily) on 30 June.4 (Major chronological developments are summarized in Table 5.1.) At this stage, however, the MOE hardly anticipated that the results of textbook certification would develop into a full-fledged diplomatic row. In fact, for about a month, the Japanese government’s response was non-existent, despite the fact that the media in both China and South Korea were giving intensive coverage to the news.5 (See Appendix 5.1.) In the meantime, outspoken Cabinet members’

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comments sparked an additional controversy at home and abroad.6 At the negotiations with the Japan Teachers’ Union in July, Education Minister Ogawa Heiji simply asserted that textbook screening was fair and impartial and that it was an internal affair.7 Diplomatic exchanges The focus of Chinese and South Korean criticism shifted onto Japan’s responsibility for its colonial rule and aggression in the AsiaPacific. Yet the starting (and ever-consistent) point of both governments’ protests was that the Education Ministry, and ultimately the Japanese government, was responsible for the glossing-over of historical facts in schoolbooks and that wrong accounts had to be corrected. As this and the following diplomatic exchanges clearly show, the very focus of the dispute was on the content of teaching (i.e. the representation and interpretation of historical facts) over which the government exercised influence. The Tokyo government slowly responded to the situation this dispute created, first with a mixture of stopgap measures and wait-and-see attitudes, and finally by hammering out domestic procedures aimed at settling the dispute.8 In its first protest, the Chinese Foreign Ministry claimed that the textbook screening in question was not conducted in accordance with the spirit of the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement of 1972 (26 July).9 The main points of the Japanese government’s reply (28 July) were as follows: • The Japanese government’s view on the past war, as clearly stated in the preamble of the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, has not changed; • It is that Japan had inflicted serious damage on Chinese people during the war, and it is keenly aware of its responsibility for the damage and deeply reproaches itself; and • This view should be reflected in Japanese education, and the Japanese government will humbly listen to the Chinese government’s claim.10

However, Beijing unequivocally referred to the controversial contents in the textbooks as ‘errors’ and labelled as ‘preposterous’ the deletion of accounts of the heinous deeds during the occupation of China.11 Both governments’ views were almost irreconcilable at this stage. The Chinese message conveyed to the Japanese side was clear: In censoring the textbooks for primary and secondary schools, the Japanese Ministry of Education tampered with the history of the Japanese militarist aggression against China by changing ‘invasion of north China’ to ‘advance into north China’ .... What is more, it even attributed the Nanjing atrocities during the war to ‘the stubborn resist-

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Table 5.1 Government Responses during the 1982 Dispute Japan

China and South Korea

Other countries

25 June * TV news programmes reveal the distortion of historical accounts in textbooks 26 June * Newspapers also report the distortion * Not the Japanese government’s actions

26 June The Chinese Xinhua News Agency reports the distortion of accounts in Japanese history textbooks 30 June The Chinese newspaper People’s Daily reports controversial Japanese textbook changes

23 July An inquiry about history texts in the Diet evokes no serious response from the government 27 July Japan seeks ‘understanding’ of the textbook screening system

18 July onwards Chinese and South Korean newspapers highlight Japanese schoolbook revisions 26 July China makes the first official protest

28 July A Japanese minister in Beijing explains Japan’s stance to the Chinese Foreign Ministry

28 July South Korea makes a formal inquiry into Japanese history textbooks

29 July The MOE explains the screening system to the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo

29 July China expresses dissatisfaction with the MOE’s explanation

25 July North Korea makes the first protest in its communist party paper

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(Continued) Japan


Other countries

29 July The Chief Cabinet Secretary responds to Chinese criticism 30 July A Japanese minister in Seoul explains Japan’s stance to the South Korean Foreign Ministry

31 July 1 August Taiwan makes the first China cancels the protest through a liaison Japanese Education office Minister’s visit to China 2 August The MOE explains the 3 August North Korea criticizes screening system to the South Korea makes the Japan’s revisions as ‘a South Korean Embassy in first official protest shameful distortion of Tokyo the historical facts’ 5 August China makes the second official protest

8 August PM Suzuki clarifies his view on the textbook issue for the first time 10 and 12 August Officials of the MOE and of the MOFA meet their Chinese counterparts in Beijing 12 August The Foreign Minister mentions the correction of texts 13 August Cabinet ministers announce a two-step approach

7 August South Korea refuses to receive a Japanese mission 9 August Vietnam’s Communist Party paper criticizes 10 August Japan’s attempt to militaChina presses Japan to rize the country and its correct schoolbooks textbook revisions

12 August South Korea makes the second official protest

12 August North Korea criticizes Japan’s attitude towards the textbook issue in the party paper

15 August South Korea refuses to accept a Japanese mission to Seoul

16 August Taiwan’s National Assembly passes a resolution calling for Japan to send a mission and clarify its responsibility for the revisions

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(Continued) Japan


Other countries

21 August The Chief Cabinet Secretary confirms the government’s intention to correct texts 23 August PM Suzuki makes a statement 22 - 24 August An LDP delegation visits Seoul 26 August The Miyazawa Statement: The Japanese government pledges to amend textbook screening standards, but a new set of history textbooks will not be available until 1985

26 August 27 August The Soviet Union South Korea accepts the accuses Japan of rewriting Japanese government’s history textbooks pledge as an affirmative step, but says it is far short of its expectations 28 August China rejects the Miyazawa Statement

28 August North Korea continues to accuse Japan after its pledge to make corrections 31 August The Thai House Education Committee holds a meeting to examine Japanese schoolbooks for history courses

1 September South Korea calls again for Japan’s swift amendment of the schoolbooks

1 September The Thai Foreign Ministry decides to refrain from staging any protest over the Japanese textbook revisions North Korea says Japan must correct schoolbooks

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123

(Continued) Japan 6 September The government announces renewed arrangements with a concrete timetable and detailed guidelines

China and South Korea 8 September China acknowledges Japan’s renewed plan as a step forward

9 September 9 September The government hands a Both China and South memorandum to Taiwan Korea accept Japan’s renewed arrangements 10 September The MOFA says ‘the problem has been temporarily solved’ 14 September The Education Minister refers the screening of history textbooks to the Textbook Authorization Research Council (TARC) 22 September The Chief Cabinet Secretary announces a diplomatic solution to the dispute 26 September The Prime Minister visits Beijing for the tenth anniversary of the normalization of SinoJapanese relations

16 November The TARC gives advice on schoolbook screening criteria 24 November The MOE amends the screening criteria

26 September The Chinese Premier confirms the settlement of the textbook dispute at a meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister 27 September South Korea sends a list of inaccurate accounts in Japanese history textbooks to Japan 2 October The South Korean Foreign Minister demands Japan to consider the list of 39 corrections sent earlier and proposes joint research between the two countries

Other countries 8 September Vietnam renews its criticism about Japanese militarists

10 September Vietnam continues to accuse Japan of distorting history

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ance of the Chinese troops, which inflicted heavy losses on the Japanese army, who were enraged and, as a result, killed many Chinese soldiers and civilians’. This is an obvious distortion of the historical facts and is therefore unacceptable.12

Although Seoul’s initial response appeared rather restrained,13 it was disclosed that its Education Ministry instructed Korean historians to examine ten Japanese textbooks closely, and that countermeasures would be taken after the investigation.14 A Foreign Ministry source also indicated that South Korea would offer detailed programmes to ‘help’ Japan to rectify its historical accounts and to improve mutual understanding between the two peoples.15 Its officials stressed that ‘the ultimate goal … was to have Japan correct its errors’ in the schoolbooks.16 On the other hand, comments made by the Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary, Miyazawa Kiichi, indicated that the Chinese and the Japanese government stances were still far apart: • Textbooks are written by private authors and publishers; and • A Chinese demand to make corrections in Japanese textbooks cannot be accepted.17

The MOE’s communication with South Korea (30 July) does not seem to indicate any progress either. • We are aware of the South Korean government’s keen interest in this issue. (An MOE official appreciated the Seoul government’s restrained manner.) • Friendly South Korean-Japanese relations should not be undermined by this issue. • The MOE makes efforts so that textbook contents may be appropriate, and it will pay attention to South Korean interests and humbly listen to its domestic debate. • The Japanese government’s involvement in textbook screening is limited to the extent that it gives advice. The final decision on accounts is left to private authors and publishers. • Textbook screening takes into account the remorse of the past relations and the spirit of bilateral friendship. This policy will remain intact in school education and textbook screening. (Twenty-one schoolbooks including those for history courses were handed to a South Korean minister.)18

From these diplomatic exchanges at the initial stage, it is clear that the Japanese government’s understanding of the dispute was quite different from that of its Chinese and South Korean counterparts. A few days later, Seoul’s first formal protest was conveyed to

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Japanese Ambassador Maeda Toshikazu in the form of a memorandum (3 August). The Main Points of the South Korean Memorandum • It is very regrettable that neither the Japanese government’s response of 30 July nor the Japanese Ministry of Education’s explanation offered any concrete suggestion about the correction of the Japanese textbooks, which the South Korean government demanded. • The Japanese government’s attitude is further agitating Korean public opinion and feeling, and it is seriously concerned that the situation, if continued, would adversely affect friendly South Korean-Japanese relations. • The South Korean government strongly demands that the Japanese government take swift and concrete corrective measures.19

At last, Japanese government officials began to realize the extent of foreign antagonism which seemed to flare up everywhere.20 In Taiwan, Hong Kong, North Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam and elsewhere, either the government, the press or civilian groups voiced their condemnation of the controversial textbooks. After the official South Korean protest, Prime Minister Suzuki, for the first time, expressed his concern over the dispute — but this was mixed with surprise — given Japan’s postwar efforts to become a peace-loving country.21 The second Chinese protest reiterated their previous one (5 August).22 In early August, the Japanese government attempted to dispatch a special working-level mission to China and South Korea. But Seoul rejected it on the grounds that Tokyo’s attempt at soliciting understanding, without any indication of immediate corrections, would be unproductive.23 Yet, if this issue remained unsettled, antiJapanese feeling threatened to sweep both neighbours, and even Prime Minister Suzuki’s visit to China was in jeopardy along with talks with South Korea over loan issues. The South Korean parliament passed a resolution urging Japan to make swift corrections.24 Its government source hinted that diplomatic steps, such as the recall of the ambassador, the reduction of embassy staff and the withdrawal of the embassy, were possible unless Tokyo responded satisfactorily to Seoul’s demand.25 In the meantime, the South Korean Education Minister, Rhee Kyu-do, announced a modification of the history curriculum for junior and senior high schools for the next academic year, with a view to teaching students more about Japan’s invasion (6 August).26 Prime Minister Suzuki finally decided to accept Chinese and South Korean demands in principle and agreed to the amendment of the controversial accounts in some form (7 August). However, his very

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first official comment since the onset of the dispute was hardly concrete and substantive in terms of improving historical accounts, although taking into consideration the feelings of Japan’s war victims in neighbouring countries (8 August).27 A fuller statement was made by Japanese Foreign Minister Sakurauchi Yoshio (12 August), which seems to have been prepared for announcement prior to Liberation Day of 15 August in South Korea where antiJapanese feelings had been growing.28 In parallel, Cabinet members including the Prime Minister hammered out a two-step approach (13 August) based on an earlier Beijing mission’s report.29 The two-step approach meant that: (1) the Japanese government would clarify its responsibility for the war as stipulated in the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement and express its remorse over past conduct in the Prime Minister’s statement and (2) it would persuade China and South Korea to leave the correction of the textbooks to Japan.30 The approach was an attempt at separating the issue of diplomatic relations from the issue of history education. Furthermore, two members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) flew to Seoul in a last-minute attempt to assuage public anger (22 August), as university students were about to return from their summer vacations.31 It was essential for the Japanese government, regardless of the effectiveness of the mission, to be seen as cooperating with South Korean authorities, which were seeking to stem the momentum of direct public action.32 Dialogue between both countries’ parliamentarians was also held in order to repair strained bilateral relations, yet only to reaffirm the South Korean official position to the LDP delegates.33 About the same time, the Prime Minister clearly indicated that the problem involved historical facts concerning Japan and its neighbouring countries, the presentation of these facts in school education and Japan’s external relations and contribution to the international community (23 August).34 However, his statement included a very controversial point which undermined the very purpose of it: … judgement on its prewar conduct should wait until historians of the future generation make their judgement. But it is a fact that the war is internationally criticized and acknowledged as ‘aggression’, and the Japanese government should acknowledge this fact fully.35

In this way, the Japanese government seems to have avoided not only making its own judgement on one aspect of national history but also taking a critical stance towards it. The Japanese government finally announced some corrective measures in the form of the Miyazawa Statement (26 August).

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Summary 5.1 The Miyazawa Statement • The Japanese government and people, keenly aware of the sufferings and damage which Japan inflicted on the peoples of Asian countries including South Korea and China, have followed the path of a peace-loving nation, determined not to reiterate the past deeds. • There is no change in the understanding of the South Korean-Japanese Joint Communiqué of 1965 and the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement of 1972. The spirit of these statements should be reflected in school education and in textbook screening in Japan. • The Japanese government will listen to overseas criticisms about Japanese textbooks and it will be responsible for correcting textbooks which were criticized by South Korea, China and so on. • Japan will endeavour to promote mutual understanding and friendly and cooperative relations with neighbouring countries and to contribute to peace and stability in Asia and the world.36

The Chief Cabinet Secretary expressed his confidence in it, commenting that the statement, coupled with the MOE’s explanation, would remove any ambiguity over the government stance.37 Towards a settlement of the dispute Beijing’s response was a virtual rejection of the Miyazawa Statement. By contrast, Seoul accepted it in principle,38 although dissatisfied with the timing of the corrections. According to diplomatic sources, Seoul was more inclined to put relations with Tokyo back on track and continue efforts to settle the textbook row in order to avoid exciting Korean public opinion further.39 Summary 5.2 The Main Points of the South Korean Government’s Statement • The South Korean government considers that the promise made by the Japanese government to correct accounts in Japanese textbooks is an affirmative response to its repeated demands and to Korean public opinion on this matter. • The timing of the corrections falls far short of expectations, especially that controversial accounts in the approved textbooks will not be corrected until 1985. However, the South Korean government notes the fact that the Japanese government has promised to take interim steps in classroom instructions so that the issues and criticisms raised by the Korean public may be reflected. • The government will continue diplomatic efforts to see to it that the Japanese government’s promise will be put into practice at an early date. • The government believes that a correct understanding of the history of KoreanJapanese relations is fundamental to the establishment of friendly and cooperative bilateral relations on the principles of reciprocity, equality and mutual respect.40

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However, this official view was far from the Korean public opinion which demanded an immediate settlement of the dispute.41 In early September, First Assistant Foreign Minister Gong Ro-myung disclosed that South Korea would request specific corrections concerning the ‘comfort women’, the suppression of Korean independence movements and the ban on the Korean language.42 In fact, the Seoul government was drafting a list of amendments based on the research conducted by the Korean National History Compilation Committee (the list was sent to Tokyo on 27 September); the study pointed out 167 inaccurate accounts in Japanese textbooks covering ancient to modern history.43 According to a South Korean Foreign Ministry official, Seoul requested the modification of thirty-nine items. In response to the South Korean list, Education Minister Ogawa stated that the Japanese government would make its own decisions about schoolbooks.44 Eventually, the MOE conceded that it would amend the accounts of four out of the thirteen events on the list which were designated for immediate correction.45 Equally importantly, South Korea also proposed joint research between the two countries in order to rectify biased views. One of the plans disclosed by South Korea was to set up a research centre for examining foreign textbooks. In addition, Education Minister Rhee hinted at the setting up of a joint Korea-Japan history research committee. The Minister, mentioning bilateral textbook arrangements between West Germany and Poland before the normalization of their diplomatic relations, regretted that his predecessors did not pay attention to this aspect.46 For its part, the Chinese government’s strong dissatisfaction with the Miyazawa Statement was immediately conveyed at a meeting between Vice-Foreign Minister Wu Xueqian and Japanese Ambassador Katori Yasue (28 August). Summary 5.3 The Main Points of the Chinese Government’s Reply to the Miyazawa Statement (excerpts) … the Chinese government maintains that though the Japanese government said it would listen fully to criticisms and be responsible for correcting the relevant passages in the textbooks, yet it did not put forward any satisfying clear-cut and concrete measures to make corrections. The Japanese government’s attitude falls far short of the demands of the Chinese side. It is rather disappointing. The Chinese people cannot agree and the Chinese people also cannot accept it. The Chinese side has repeatedly pointed out that whether or not to recognize the history of Japanese militarist aggression against China is a major question of principle … The Chinese government once again urges the Japanese government to take concrete, effective measures and correct as quickly as possible the mistakes in screening the textbooks by the Ministry of Education so as to reach a satisfying

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solution of the matter. That would be conducive to the development of SinoJapanese relations.47

In response to the Chinese rejection of the Miyazawa Statement and the renewed South Korean push for immediate corrections, the Japanese government announced a reworked implementation plan which included a timetable for enacting changes and guidelines for informing all schools of the corrections (6 September). Two days later, Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Wu announced the following reply with some reservations: Though there are still some ambiguous, unsatisfactory points about the concrete measures proposed by the Japanese side this time to correct the mistakes, it is a step forward compared with previous explanations … We will judge whether the Japanese side conscientiously correct the mistakes in the textbooks by its concrete actions and their effects. We reserve our right to comment on this matter. We hope the Japanese government will continue its efforts, respect historical facts and keep its word in the interests of the continued development of Sino-Japanese relations.48

The Japanese government’s new arrangements were finally accepted by both the Chinese and South Korean governments on 9 September. For the first time, Vice-Foreign Minister Wu signalled an end to the controversy, though ‘a temporary close’.49 On the same day, the Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary stated that a diplomatic end to the dispute was achieved.50 Domestic arrangements in Japan On 14 September, the MOE initiated the first meeting of the Textbook Authorization Research Council (TARC) in order to examine the existing screening standards concerning history textbooks. Eventually, the scope of consultation to the TARC was narrowed down to the following three points: • History textbooks only: If the implications of the textbook issue are considered, junior high school textbooks for civics studies, geography and the Japanese language will also have to be examined along with history. Therefore, only history textbooks will be examined; • Asian countries only: Accounts concerning not only China and South Korea but also other Asian countries will be reviewed. National feelings of other Asian countries will be hurt if a range of accounts to be examined is limited to the two countries. But a review of accounts concerning all countries in the world is too far-reaching. Therefore, a review will include

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historical accounts on Asian neighbours on which Japan’s war conduct directly inflicted damage; and • Modern and contemporary periods only: especially accounts dealing with modern and contemporary periods will be examined.51

Although these points appeared to suggest that fairly concrete measures would result, the Council’s final proposal to the MOE (16 November) failed to provide any specific examples.52 Furthermore, the MOE’s final statement (24 November) fell far short of clarifying amendments to be made in the future.53 The statement was virtually a review of the dispute. The only point in the statement relating to the content of schoolbooks, i.e. the new screening standard, was as follows: • Textbook screening with a new standard will lead to more appropriate descriptions in textbooks in promoting further friendship and goodwill between Japan and neighbouring Asian countries; and • It is hoped that schools will also take into consideration the aim of this new screening standard and will foster a spirit of international understanding and international cooperation.54

With this statement, the MOE completed its domestic arrangements relating to the 1982 dispute. As a result of all these intergovernmental exchanges, the Japanese textbook screening standards were modified under foreign pressure for the first time since the introduction of the new education system after the war. To be precise, a new clause stipulating a spirit of international understanding and international cooperation was added to those already existing. It was certainly different from the old criteria in that it took foreign relations into consideration.55 At least an institutional foothold was established, and a South Korean Foreign Ministry source evaluated the new screening standard in a positive manner.56 However, the spirit of international understanding and international cooperation was not entirely new in Japanese education in that it was already included in the Course of Study for senior high school ‘World History’. And individual cases of corrections were left out in all official statements. None of the resulting arrangements were intended to be binding; individual changes were left to the discretion of textbook authors and teachers at school.57 Ironically, this autonomy was what Japanese educationalists had long sought. Very few government officials seriously questioned the background factors of the dispute; neither did they clarify at what point the MOE must stop interfering with the teaching of history.58 The dominant mood in the Ministry was that, once the controversy was over, it could make internal arrangements. Indeed, the MOE seemed to go ‘back to normal’ after the diplomatic storm.59

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5.2 THE TEXTBOOK DISPUTE IN 1986

After the first dispute, most highlighted words such as ‘invasion’ were approved by the MOE without any comments in textbook authorization. However, the South Korean Education Ministry expressed strong dissatisfaction with the results of the 1983 screening and indicated that it was considering a further step.60 The next year, Xinhua News Agency reported that, while there had been improvements, the certified text remained unsatisfactory.61 The Japanese Foreign Ministry (MOFA) itself noted Chinese criticisms of the 1984 screening.62 It was reported that the MOE obviously did not touch particular words which had drawn attention in 1982, but, on the whole, examined the text more strictly than before.63 As expected by some observers, a second textbook dispute arose. When it was revealed that a new Japanese history schoolbook had been approved despite the inclusion of a number of explanations contrary to historical facts, the initial reaction in China as well as in South Korea was that ‘the Japanese have done it again’. Their accusations were essentially the same as those made in 1982, though their protests were relatively low-key. This seems to be partly because the diplomatic framework for handling this issue was laid out at the time of the first dispute. This time, the focus was on the domestic arrangements for the correction of one particular high school history textbook, Shimpen Nihonshi (New Edition: Japanese History). It was compiled by a private group called ‘Nihon o Mamoru Kokumin Kaigi’ (the National Conference for the Defence of Japan, hereafter the National Conference),64 and the Japanese government was forced to deal directly with this private group. In this sense, the second dispute again demonstrated that the government pressured private authors to modify their original accounts; but this time it was with the group on the political right, whereas it was with left-leaning authors in the case of the first dispute. In addition, since government influence was exerted over one particular group, power relations between the government and the private authors were very plain. To an extent, the 1986 dispute was a result of the first controversy, because the National Conference started a scheme to compile their own history textbook in the wake of the 1982 dispute. At their meeting in Tokyo in late October in 1982, the group agreed that the writing of schoolbooks was too important a project to be entrusted to left-oriented scholars, as had been the case in the past. They decided themselves to take on the task, producing textbooks for Japanese people as they saw fit, instead of simply complaining about the teaching materials written by other academics.65 In March 1984, the group asked a former Chief Textbook Examiner of the MOE to supervise and edit a Japanese history textbook for high schools, and their project was launched shortly thereafter.66

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When the Second Division of the TARC (in charge of social studies) examined the first draft of the text in question in late January 1986, the decision to approve was split, and only ‘a conditional pass’ was given at this stage. Yet the arrangement for reexamination itself was exceptional. When the authors and editors of the schoolbook received the results of the examination (20 March), there were a total of 420 either compulsory or non-compulsory corrections to be made. After a lengthy discussion which took place between the MOE and the authors, the Social Studies Division approved the changes made in the final draft (30 May). Individual MOE textbook examiners were anxious about how neighbouring countries would react to the approval of the textbook. Their concerns proved right. A leading Korean newspaper’s editorial (30 May) commented that Japan should not forget the past and prevent its arrogance from developing once again into imperialism.67 One after another Chinese and Korean newspaper articles appeared, denouncing the text compiled by the overtly nationalist group (The Korea Herald, from 1 June onwards and China Daily, from 5 June onwards). The South Korean Foreign Ministry announced that it was launching an investigation into the accounts relating to Korea in the textbook (6 June). It also stated that it would ‘carefully watch’ Japan’s reaction (7 June).68 However, Seoul did not lodge any official protest this time. Its diplomats confined their strong expressions of anger to private channels;69 in the meantime, its senior officials’ comments were given extensive press coverage.70 The South Korean Education Ministry reiterated its concerns over long-standing points of controversy such as Japanese colonialists’ recruitment of Koreans for forced labour, the imposition of Japanese names, the compulsory worship of Shinto and the expropriation of Korean farmland, none of which were mentioned in the schoolbook.71 For their part, the Chinese authorities lodged an official protest (4 June), though their reactions were more restrained than in 1982, and the Chinese press remained surprisingly quiet over the issue.72 Raising questions about the descriptions of the Nanjing Massacre and other incidents, Ma Yuzhen (a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman) said at a weekly news briefing: Both in the past and at present, we have always been, and will continue to be in the future, opposed to any statements and actions that distort historical facts and prettify the war of aggression.73

In their second protest, the Chinese Foreign Ministry took a harder line and demanded that Japan swiftly rectify the proposed high school textbook with regard to explanations about the SinoJapanese War (1937–45) (7 June).74 According to the China Daily, it

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Table 5.2 Government Responses during the 1986 Dispute Japan 30 May The MOE approves a controversial history textbook


Other countries

4 June The Chinese Foreign Ministry expresses its discontent with the controversial schoolbook 6 June A South Korean Foreign Ministry official says that they are examining the textbook

10 June The Education Minister at a press interview: the final results of the screening should be awaited The MOE explains to China the screening system

7 June China makes the second official protest The South Korean Foreign Ministry says that it will watch the situation carefully

18 June The Prime Minister during his campaign tour: views expressed by some countries should be taken seriously

7 July The MOE gives the schoolbook the final approval Japan informs South Korea final revisions

7 July A South Korean Ministry official says that the final revisions are still incomplete 7 July China acknowledges the Japanese government’s efforts, while still criticizing history education in Japan

Around 10 July North Korea reproaches Japan about the controversial textbook Taiwan criticizes the schoolbook

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(Continued) Japan

China and South Korea 10 July South Korea conveys to Japan that further corrections are necessary

Other countries

China says that it is examining the approved schoolbook in question and that it is far from satisfactory

17 July The Chief Cabinet Secretary makes a 16 July comment on the dispute The Chinese Foreign Ministry says that it is 25 July not satisfied with the A new Education approval of the text Minister’s comment on despite many the textbook dispute corrections invites further foreign criticism 26 July The South Korean Foreign Ministry officially demands that Japan explain the Japanese Education Minister’s 30 July comment on history The government conveys textbooks official regrets on the Education Minister’s 28 July comment to South Korea China criticizes the Japanese Education 6 September Minister’s comment The Education Minister’s comment on the 6 September annexation of Korea is South Korea makes an disclosed official inquiry about the Education Minister’s 8 September comment in a journal The Prime Minister dismisses the Education Minister

31 July North Korea criticizes the history textbook and accuses the Japanese Education Minister of his remarks on the textbook issue.

9 September North Korea again criticizes the Education Minister’s comment

interpreted what Japan had done in the early twentieth century as necessary in order to ‘liberate Asia from the rule of European and American powers and to build a Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere’.75

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In response to this Chinese protest, Japan’s Education Minister Kaifu Toshiki stated that the MOE had examined teaching materials in view of friendly neighbourly relations and that the final results of the screeningto be announced in early July should be awaited (10 June).76 However, since its basic stamce on the textbook issue had not changed since the previous dispute, the Japanese government defensively repeated to China the same explanation about the authorization system and the new screening standard.77 During the course of these exchanges, Prime Minister Nakasone Yasuhiro decisively intervened in the dispute. He told the MOE to reexamine the controversial textbook on at least two occasions, following Chinese demands that Japan observe the Miyazawa Statement. Consequently, the MOE instructed the National Conference to make corrections four times after the official approval was given (30 May), until the final corrections were accepted (5 July).78 In fact, the leadership shown by the Prime Minister clearly shows top-down decisions and government intervention in the writing of schoolbooks. (See below ‘The Japanese Government’s Domestic Arrangements during the 1986 Dispute’.) On the whole, the Japanese government coped more deftly with the row under Nakasone’s leadership than previously. The MOE was also more cooperative, although only after coming under foreign pressure. Thus, Japan appeared to be more responsive to overseas criticisms, despite the fact that little substantive discussion was held over the cause of the dispute. The Japanese Government’s Domestic Arrangements during the 1986 Dispute • 6 June – PM Nakasone instructs EM Kaifu to handle the issue carefully based on the Miyazawa Statement. • Between 8 June and 10 June – The MOE asks the authors of the textbook to make six corrections (e.g. to change the explanation of An Jung-gun from ‘a ruffian’ to ‘a leader’ and to restore the word ‘massacre’ to the account of the Nanjing Atrocities). – The MOE solicits the textbook authors to pretend that these corrections had been instructed before the official approval on 30 May and to keep this matter secret. • 13 June – The Prime Minister again instructs the Education Minister to consider the matter carefully. • 18 June – The Prime Minister instructs Chief Cabinet Secretary Gotoda to handle the situation.

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– The MOE makes the second request for corrections of the accounts related to China and Korea. • 27 June – The MOE makes the third request for corrections covering about thirty headlines and eighty points. – It indicates clear examples pointed out by the Chinese newspaper People’s Daily and the South Korean Education Ministry (e.g. as to China, the Manchurian Incident, the Sino-Japanese War, the Nanjing Massacre; as to South Korea, the March First Demonstration against Japanese rule, the killings of Korean residents in Japan after the Great Earthquake in the Kanto Area, and the Kokato Incident). • 2 July – The MOE asks the twenty members of the Social Studies Division of the TARC to approve the corrections. • 3 July – The Chairman of the Steering Committee of the National Conference agrees to about thirty corrections such as the account of changing foreigners’ indigenous names to Japanese names. – The MOE makes the fourth demand for corrections, including the issue of the emperor. • 4 July – A negotiation over remaining arrangements is held between the MOE and the editor of the schoolbook (a former Chief Textbook Examiner of the MOE) who, for the first time, appears in public on this issue. As a result, the negotiation is completed. • 7 July – The MOE reports the final corrections to the TARC and seeks its approval. – The MOE gives a final approval to the textbook.

However, the Foreign Ministry remained suspicious of the partial amendment to the text which still retained a nationalistic tone despite extraordinary measures taken by the MOE. The MOFA suspected that the problems surrounding the textbook issue would recur in the future.79 In fact, some quarters in the Ministry voiced worries that the situation would be far worse than the 1982 case, if the approved text was found not to be in accordance with the Miyazawa Statement. The MOFA sent an informal caveat to the MOE, stating that Japan had to avoid being questioned about its foreign policy stance.80 Despite its alleged ‘wait and see attitude’, the Foreign Ministry reportedly asked or pressed the nationalistic group to withdraw the textbook in late June in order not to undermine Japan’s diplomatic efforts in the postwar period.81 Along with Prime Minister’s leadership, the Foreign Ministry evidently put pressure on the group in anticipation of foreign reactions.

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After the final approval of the controversial textbook (7 July), a government source revealed that both Foreign and Education Ministers and the Chief Cabinet Secretary agreed to proceed to the rejection of the schoolbook if the group did not follow the MOE’s instructions.82 The Prime Minister also conceded that corrections were being made to comply with the views of Cabinet Ministers including himself. He also explained that, in the case of textbooks dealing with sensitive aspects of international relations, the Japanese government had to abide by its promise to respect the spirit of the joint statements with China and South Korea as stipulated in the Miyazawa Statement.83 The Japanese government’s contact with China and South Korea, after the extraordinary postponement of approval, revealed that its continental neighbours remained unhappy. When Japanese Ambassador to South Korea Mikanagi Kiyohisa informed the Seoul government of the final results (7 July), its Foreign Ministry replied that the revisions were not complete, although acknowledging Tokyo’s efforts. According to a South Korean official, the textbook in question made no mention of Japanese colonial policies aimed to erase the features of traditional Korean culture.84 It must be noted that South Korean Ambassador to Japan, Rhee Kyu-do (former Education Minister at the time of the first dispute), once again called for the establishment of a research centre on history education in order to promote mutual understanding and exchange between South Korean and Japanese textbook authors, and to prevent a dispute of the same kind from arising again.85 Beijing also regarded the final version of the text as inadequate.86 According to a Foreign Ministry spokesman, it lacked the recognition of the basic facts about Japanese militarists’ actions in neighbouring countries and of their responsibility for these deeds.87 Vice-Foreign Minister Liu Shuqing conveyed to the Japanese Ambassador to China, Nakae Yosuke, that the textbook did not have ‘a sound keynote’.88 By this time, presumably in order to avoid further diplomatic embarrassment and international attention, the Japanese Foreign Ministry attempted to close the book on this issue.89 Chief Cabinet Secretary Gotoda Masaharu commented that the screening of schoolbooks was a domestic matter and that the MOE had made sincere efforts to observe the 1982 statement (17 July).90 In the meantime, the second row practically disappeared from the news agenda despite no clear indication from either Beijing or Seoul that it had been resolved. After a new Japanese Education Minister’s comment (25 July) rekindled the dispute, both Seoul and Tokyo governments announced the cancellation of the Japanese emperor’s visit to South Korea (20 August).91 His statement in a monthly journal invited yet another wave of South Korean and Chinese protests; soon after, he

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was dismissed by the Prime Minister (8 September).92 In the end, the second textbook row was left unresolved. Despite the seemingly sophisticated handling of the dispute, Japanese officials failed to address the fundamental question of why the MOE had approved the controversial text in the first place. This problem could not be solved by dismissing one Education Minister or by making amendments to one particular textbook. 5.3 THE ANALYSIS OF THE TEXTBOOK ISSUE (PART I)

Having surveyed the 1982 and 1986 disputes, this study now moves on to scrutinize the important aspects of the textbook issue, taking into account the conceptual framework developed in Chapters 2 and 3. As briefly explained in the introduction to this chapter, the disputes unmasked the very nature of schoolbook authorization in terms of interfering with the final content of teaching. Below, this section will focus on the reference points the case study offers for Phase I (the initial stage of government influence) and Phase II (the activities under government influence). Analysis I: The initial stage of government influence (Phase I) Phase I purports to indicate a stage where the government makes the very first move to influence the public. It is concerned with government measures which can be taken towards intermediaries between the government and the public. In the case study, the intermediary actors and institutions were historians and schools, and the MOE did give textbook authors either compulsory instructions or noncompulsory recommendations so that certain accounts, which authors presented in their original draft, might be toned down or avoided. In effect, it seems to have been difficult to distinguish between the two types of the comments in some cases, according to the authors’ complaints.93 And it is almost impossible to investigate to what extent and in what ways the MOE actually interfered with the final wording of texts in each case, let alone government intentions, until the detailed communication between authors and examiners of the MOE is disclosed.94 Yet this is how the textbook screening system worked behind closed doors in the 1980s, and how government influence could be exercised in this certification system. In sharp contrast to the Japanese government’s initial assertions that a final decision on the accounts in textbooks was left to private authors and that its involvement was limited to offering advice, both the Chinese and South Korean governments protested that the MOE, and ultimately the Japanese government, was responsible for the glossing-over of historical facts in schoolbooks. Beijing maintained that the MOE ‘censored’ the teaching materials for primary and secondary schools and ‘tampered with’ the history of Sino-

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Japanese relations. While this study has put ‘information’ at the centre of the argument of power over opinion, government influence reached into the details of information, i.e. specific terms and phrases which describe and explain historical events in the process of authorization, on top of the general curriculum guidelines the Ministry specified. Interestingly, while the 1982 and 1986 disputes offered the opportunity to broach the crucial connection between power relations and the writing of history, Beijing and Seoul did not criticize the textbook authorization system itself and stayed away from the issue of freedom of speech and expression during both controversies. Of course, for both countries, the central concern was to put the historical record right. Therefore, while the Japanese media and courts generated much debate about the relationships between historians, teachers and the MOE, China and South Korea did not probe the practice of quasi-censorship, even in the context of the limited educational environment. Still, the irony of the episodes was that China and South Korea (and other Asian countries), which exercised tight control over public opinion in their own societies, took up the very issue against Japan, where freedom of speech was a meaningful reality.95 It was in the 1986 dispute that government influence was exerted in a very tangible manner, when the Japanese government was forced to deal directly with the particular private group that sought to publish the controversial schoolbook. During the course of diplomatic exchanges, Cabinet Ministers (including Prime Minister Nakasone) made top-down decisions, and government officials decisively intervened in the process of certification. After the final approval of the textbook in question, the MOE explained that the Education Minister was entitled, on the basis of raison d’état, to take measures outside regular procedures in a special situation involving foreign governments.96 In this setting, power relations between the government and the private authors/historians were very evident. This study has also contended that the government is not solely constituted of elected officials and that civil servants and ad hoc advisers can also exercise influence inside the government apparatus. In Japanese schoolbook authorization, it is the MOE’s bureaucrats (i.e. textbook examiners) who actually checked texts and gave authors specific comments. As explained in the previous chapter, a number of textbook inspectors appointed by the Ministry such as school teachers and academics were also involved in the whole process of certification, without being held politically accountable.97 In fact, opposition parties repeatedly questioned the role of textbook examiners at Diet committees, claiming that they had connections with private groups with particular views of national history. There is at least the possibility that the MOE was

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under the influence of outside groups and that their particular views may have crept into the decisions of authorization.98 In sum, this study has argued that there is a possibility that some kind of government preferences and expectations inadvertently come into play at the time of implementing policies or within a normal range of practices but in an unspecified manner. The point is that it is not entirely a matter of policy preferences. As the case study has indicated, irrespective of government policy, the actual consequences of seemingly innocuous procedures operating inside the political system must be examined closely. Analysis II: The activities under government influence (Phase II) The second phase analyses the ways in which government influence could reach the future public through intermediaries such as historians, schools and teachers. Below, this study will survey the activities of writing history, education and history education in relation to the textbook issue. Analysis II-a: Writing history The textbook issue unquestionably highlighted the problem of representing and interpreting historical events from both postmodernist and empiricist perspectives. In the postmodernist point of view, the narration of history can allow considerable latitude in interpreting and analysing past events. However, China and South Korea, understandably, did not support this view. The ever-consistent point of their condemnation was that historical records were distorted in Japanese schoolbooks and that wrong accounts had to be corrected. Their attitudes typically represent the modernist position that there exist truths that need discovering, sanctioning the validity of evidence. For both countries, the evidence was more than a linguistic construct; rather it took the form of self-speaking materials, traces, visual records and people’s voices. From Chinese and South Korean perspectives, the major incidents in focus such as Japan’s invasion were almost self-evident; they saw little need to reexamine and reinterpret them. At least at the diplomatic level, it was sufficient for both governments to limit discussion to the issues of historical objectivity and justice for the victims. For instance, the People’s Daily said: They [the Japanese militarists] cannot dispel the painful memories of their aggression, killing, torture and plunder from the minds of the Chinese and Southeast Asian people … They can never succeed in blotting out the historical facts engraved in the minds of the people.99

In 1986, the same paper readdressed the need to expose what a handful of Japanese militarists had done, prompting more thorough

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historical investigations. As South Korean press commentators argued, the crux of the matter was whether Japan thought that it could get away with this kind of expurgatory practice in defiance of so many eyewitnesses both at home and abroad.100 In this sense, the postmodernist challenge to the premise of modernist historiography, i.e. the search of facts and truth claims, is completely denied. Whereas the line of demarcation between reality and fiction becomes more arbitrary in the postmodernist discourse, facts were the final resort for those who accused Japan. Chinese and South Korean protests also raised a point about the difference of vantage points, i.e. Japan being the aggressor and other Asian countries the victims. For example, the People’s Daily summed up the political anger growing in Chinese society as follows: This [distortion] is trying … to bring great humiliation upon the Chinese people … In the eye[s] of these people [some Japanese officials], China’s territory and sovereignty and the independence and dignity of the Chinese people are nothing at all. Can such a hostile and insulting stand towards China and the Chinese people … be dismissed as an internal affair?101

Another comment made through Xinhua News Agency at the stage of the dispute in 1982 suggests the difference in the interpretation of the major incident: What is more, it [the MOE] even attributed the Nanjing atrocities during the war to ‘the stubborn resistance of the Chinese troops, which inflicted heavy losses on the Japanese army, who were enraged and, as a result, killed many Chinese soldiers and civilians’.102

The China Daily also pointed out that the controversial textbook interpreted what Japan had done in the early twentieth century as something necessary in order to ‘liberate Asia from the rule of European and American powers and to build a Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere’.103 Similarly, for the Koreans, the textbook issue was in a sense ‘a history war’; it was a war over the recognition and interpretation of the crucial historical records between the former colony and its ruler.104 For them, it was more important to make the Japanese fundamentally change their viewpoints than to amend particular words.105 Shing Yong-ha (Professor at Seoul National University) stressed that the textbook issue was not simply about the change of certain phrases but about the conversion of a value system,106 which is inherently germane to the argument of vantage points. Citing three symbolic examples, he contrasted negative and positive meanings/values which may be inferred from them: Japan’s invasion/

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advance; dispossession/acquisition of Korea’s powers to handle domestic and foreign affairs; and a riot/an independence movement. In his view, the real influence of the teaching of history on students is the development of a certain set of values in their thinking.107 In 1986, Seoul reiterated long-standing points of controversy such as the Japanese colonialists’ recruitment of Koreans for forced labour, the imposition of Japanese names, the compulsory worship of Shinto and the expropriation of Korean farmland, none of which were mentioned in the controversial schoolbook. On the other hand, expounding the postmodernist/modernist discourse of impartiality and objectivity, the MOE and opposition parties in fact embarked on meticulous inquiries into the contents of history textbooks literally word by word and scrutinized the assumptions underlying the authorization criteria at the Diet committees in 1982. The Ministry explained the three broad guidelines: ‘balanced’ wording, fair and objective accounts and value-free judgement.108 With regard to the issue of value-free/value judgments, the Education Minister himself elaborated the point as follows: I understand the word ‘advance’ is a value-free and objective word … The word does not particularly have any good connotation. … the Opium War was an unjustifiable war. This was apparently a war of aggression. When asked whether it is wrong to describe this war as ‘advance’, I do not think so. Because we are talking about history textbooks, we use a word which does not have any evaluative meaning. If one thinks of this event objectively, Britain placed its troops in China at that time of the Ching Dynasty, and the word ‘advance’ is used. It cannot be said that this is wrong. … the headline ‘Japanese invasion into China’ was changed to ‘the Manchuria Incident and the Shanghai Incident’. It was only replaced with more objective and value-free words …109

In this regard, members of opposition parties argued as follows: JCP: Previously, the Education Ministry clearly said the word ‘invasion’ strongly impresses bad images on people’s minds … This is the core of the problem … JSP: [As to Korean independence movements], the change from ‘meetings and demonstrations’ to ‘riots and demonstrations’ shows that some value was attached to the latter [italics added]. The Education Ministry says that it replaced ‘invasion’ with ‘advance’ in order to remove a value judgement. But this case shows the reverse case.110

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If all the brutalities and calamities caused by human activities allow for value-free narration, they may be depicted as purely physical phenomena.111 Yet it is surely morally debatable to explain events which affected or took the lives of so many people, without making any value judgement.112 Even in the case of natural disasters, if human factors are involved (e.g. the failure of a forecasting system), some sort of judgement is inevitable.113 Indeed, value-free judgement is probably impossible; to make certain judgement value-free itself is value judgement. In combination with the argument over impartiality and objectivity, the postmodernist analysis of power relations is also relevant to the textbook issue. Power relations cannot be precisely identified in terms of who are involved in what ways in its final analysis, as this study attempts to expose such relations between the government, historians and the public in the educational environment. Yet the postmodernist assumption that historical presentations in general share the status of authority with the source of power enshrined in narratives in literary form has to an extent merit in the case of schoolbooks, since knowledge conveyed at school normally takes the form of relatively authoritative presentation vis-à-vis students. In this particular setting, it is arguable that the transmission of historical knowledge between historians’ work and the readers (i.e. students) is in itself the exercise of power. If postmodernists argue that no one can prove the authenticity of one’s truth claim, the relativism and plurality thus permitted in historical studies potentially blurs the distinction between genuine historical research and blatant propaganda. The consequent ambiguity may offer potentially unlimited opportunities for the holder of power to manipulate history of any kind. The textbook issue in fact called into question the range of relativism which is acceptable. In the wake of the 1982 dispute, the nationalistic group decided themselves to compile their own history textbook for Japanese people, which eventually led to the 1986 dispute. But, according to even the broadly defined curriculum guidelines and screening criteria, the MOE could not possibly approve their accounts in their original form. Otherwise, it would have meant that any version of history would be eligible in schools. The MOE did draw the line between what is acceptable and not. This clearly indicates that there are normative limits to the relativism and plurality of historical presentations and interpretations.114 On the whole, the textbook issue indicates that an analysis of historiography cannot be confined to the literary world but demands the examination of historians’ actual working environment. If historians of the succeeding generation investigate and make judgements on what took place between states, the decisions to disclose diplomatic documents and other relevant sources are in

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most cases made by the government. Thus, the problem not only rests with historiography but also has to be traced back to those in power. Although the textbook issue does not unveil the whole picture of the development of historiography in Japan, the background of history education in the country at least reveals that the Japanese government has been well aware of the importance of ‘history’ as a means to achieving political ends since the establishment of the education system. If the use and misuse of the past itself makes up the chapters of human history, the textbook issue is only one episode of that history. As the Japanese education authorities in practice showed traces of both postmodernist and empiricist thinking, the case study suggests that those in power may adopt any methods of historical research which suit their political assumptions and needs, consciously or unconsciously. Analysis II-b: Education In the discussion of education, this study has focused on political interference with the pursuit of knowledge and understanding, which comes down to the actual content of teaching in practical terms. Historically, political intervention in education is not unusual in the process of modern state formation, and Japan is not an exception. The establishment of an education system was not only imperative to train prospective key personnel in bureaucracy and government but also intrinsically interwoven with the formation of values, beliefs and attitudes of Japanese people. For example, prewar/wartime primary education played a central role in maintaining traditional values, fostering reverence for the emperor and promoting national solidarity. After the Second World War, the US occupying forces also set out to reform the education system imbued with militarism and ultranationalism and to ‘plant’ democratic institutions in the new Japan. The previous chapter has explained these historical aspects. In the contemporary context, our framework has analysed the role of education in terms of political socialization, indoctrination, the establishment and maintenance of hegemony and the evaluation of political and socio-economic situations. The dimension highlighted in the diplomatic disputes was particularly the explanations, interpretations and assessments made of a given state of affairs at home and abroad in the past. No doubt, there are scholars, journalists and critics who report findings of public affairs and interpret political and socio-economic realities in each society. The fact that loomed large in the textbook issue is that educational institutions which the government administers do this job for the succeeding generation in the most comprehensive and organized fashion. And the disputes further unmasked the fact that the Japanese education authorities were not so tolerant of deviation from the official lines.

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On the broader issue of political socialization, the textbook disputes offer two avenues of argument. One relates primarily to the domestic audience. It centres round the state — national identity, patriotism, the national flag and anthem, etc.115 It seems to be one of the pillars sustaining what the Education Ministry and other proponents called ‘educational considerations’. (Chapter 6 will also touch upon this point with reference to the concept of political culture.) Addressing the implications of a tainted national history for national character, the MOE recurrently insisted on the importance of keeping students from harbouring suspicions of the prewar generations who fought the war for the country. Although not stating that Japan’s past should be glorified, an Education Minister commented as follows: I think that, if [historical accounts in] textbooks give young people an impression that Japan invaded other countries and did the most evil things ever possible, these textbooks are not appropriate in terms of properly bringing up youngsters who are going to be responsible for Japan in the future.116

The comment seems to represent the characteristically inwardlooking, if not insular, thinking prevalent in the education authorities — the type of thinking which does not go beyond the boundaries of the country.117 But the MOE was not alone in Japanese political circles, and other parliamentarians echoed the point.118 Resonant with this line of thinking, the LDP led by Prime Minister Nakasone periodically reiterated ‘how school textbooks should be guided by a “social mission” of instilling “moral fibre” and pride in Japan’.119 His education reform proposal in the 1980s also centred round patriotism or what he called ‘correct nationalism’.120 The other avenue of argument about political socialization has farreaching implications for Japan’s foreign policy, in particular, security dialogue in US-Japanese relations. Reminiscent of the early 1950s when Japan pointed to education as one of the constraints on its defence efforts in the new Cold War environment, the issues of education and defence became intertwined in the 1980s. Both Beijing and Seoul raised the point with reference to the rise of Japanese militarism. (The point will also be analysed in conjunction with the concept of political culture in Chapter 6.) During the 1982 dispute, political observers in South Korea unequivocally argued that the US pressure to shift their defence burden in East Asia to Japan and its eventual rearmament could result in the militarization of education.121 Some commentators note that Japanese political and business circles’ criticisms of textbooks for history and other social studies at that time emerged against the background of the US global strategy that relied on South Korean and Japanese support.122

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Signs of the entanglement of education and defence issues were already noticeable in the Defence White Paper of 1981, which touched upon the importance of educational efforts so as to foster the sentiment and consciousness of loving and defending the country as Japanese nationals. This reinforced points in the previous annual defence reports about the need to raise the awareness of ‘the state’ at school, because the defence agency was concerned with the younger generation’s decreasing interest in security issues, especially the Self-Defense Forces.123 As if in response to this political climate, the MOE tended to conduct stricter textbook screening. If this were not the case, at least some quarters in the ruling party were keen to nurture a patriotic spirit among the young Japanese who had grown up ‘soft’ in the postwar peacetime. Though not suggesting the old kind of militarism, they emphasized the need for young citizens to adjust their perceptions about the country and the world through historical studies. This reflected either the general recognition of the need to sharpen a sense of the state among the young generation or the increasing US pressure to share the defence burden, or a combination of both.124 Notwithstanding, the diplomatic disputes in the 1980s did not bring to the fore any obvious cases of indoctrination. Certainly, it is difficult to point out such cases as observed in the wartime years when education policies were fully incorporated into Japan’s war efforts. The practice of textbook authorization in the 1980s was far from injecting a national spirit or particular ideologies. Its method of influence was far subtler, and political compliance permeated ‘mainly through omission rather than commission’ if it were the case.125 But this very subtle nature may have made even more difficult to make a departure from a view of Japan and its past which still confers a degree of nobility on the state and the soldiers who fought for it. Seen in this way, educational influence on the formation of prospective public opinion is potentially formidable, given the fact that educational institutions are often in the hands of governments. Needless to say, such influence cannot be asserted in a wholesale manner without bringing into perspective the relationship between educational institutions and public authorities, and the socioeconomic and political forces operating in each society. Analysis II-c: History education The final variable in Phase II is history education, and the crux of the matter here is the structure and design of history courses and the treatment of specific events. Even if one accepts that the essence of historical studies is commitment to truth, the teaching of history at pre-university levels is essentially the provision of a vicarious experience. It is fundamentally different either from history observed or

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experienced as real-time happenings or from historians’ learned debates. Perhaps Japanese authorities in the pre-1945 period had little hesitation in distinguishing between ‘academic history’ and ‘classroom history’ or even did not bother with the distinction. The previous chapter has already explained their unequivocally utilitarian views of history education. At the most basic level, limits must be set on the geographical and temporal coverage in the curriculum. A balance, between national and world history, and between historical periods, must be struck somewhere. When the Education Ministry referred the existing screening standards for history textbooks to its advisory body (the TARC) during the 1982 dispute, the scope of possible revision was clearly circumscribed in geographical and temporal terms, with only the historical accounts relating to Japanese-Asian relations in the modern and contemporary periods being designated for examination. On the other hand, the selection and interpretation of facts was subjected to close scrutiny during both 1982 and 1986 disputes. As the controversies showed clearly, the seeds of conflict over specific past incidents are countless. As the cases of Japan’s annexation of Korea and the subsequent independence movements exemplified, the narration and evaluation of events relating directly to the origins of current political systems and territories is bound to be discordant. The Chinese and South Korean news media’s criticisms over textbook accounts also illuminated the difference of vantage points between states once opposed in war. While it is not surprising that the history curriculum in general displays nationalist inclinations, the disputes clearly showed that the teaching of history in Japan was tailored first and foremost for the domestic audience. Furthermore, there were issues concerning not only the perspectives of civilians en masse but also individual viewpoints in different situations — such as forced labour, sex slavery, medical experiments and forced religious worship. The curriculum which treated historical events on conventional national criteria thus faced major challenges in many different issue-areas — human rights, postwar compensation and religious/cultural freedom, to name a few. While looking into familiar themes of war stories in classroom history such as the participation and sacrifice of civilians and the defence of homelands,126 we have considered the rationale behind this type of history education. History courses are potentially an ‘ideal’ subject for reviving memories and experiences of the past generation, crystallizing and territorializing collective identity, generating a sense of nationhood and invoking a patriotic spirit. In fact, such logic seems to underlie a leading Japanese politician’s comment:

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Previously, some textbooks mentioned love of one’s country, i.e. patriotism, but now no textbooks mention it … Despite the fact that the course of study for junior high schools stipulates the instruction of patriotism, new textbooks do not mention it. Some view that to mention the love of one’s country is reactionary, and it leads to militarism, which is very one-sided. It is natural that one loves a country where one was born, and it is important to teach students their country’s history, the situation in which the country is placed and valuable things which they and their offspring are going to inherit in this country.127

Of course, mere references to patriotism in schoolbooks would not be conducive to the promotion of such a mind set, as an Education Minister once remarked.128 Still, the above comment marked the inception of increasing pressure for the revision of social studies textbooks in 1980. In the following years, Japanese political circles continued to complain about insufficient teaching of ‘the state’ and ‘producing people with no nationality’.129 The framework employed here also suggests that history courses may be geared to canvassing broad public support of any national government in order to protect the long-term national interest. As mentioned in the argument relating to political socialization, at least some quarters in the ruling party were keen to alleviate a ‘security allergy’ among the young Japanese, who were brought up not to take up arms ever again throughout the postwar period because of the trauma of 1945 and the constitution adopted subsequently, and to cultivate a broad base for a US-Japanese security dialogue in the future. In this sense, it is arguable that conservative politicians’ interest in history education reflected the very political need to accommodate in the long run the increasing US pressure to share the defence burden, by manipulating the image of wartime Japan in the minds of its nationals which almost spontaneously connects the ultranationalist military at that time with anything related to conflicts and armed forces.130 At the same time, this study has argued that ‘classroom history’ potentially assists specific government policies in the pipeline. In this respect, the diplomatic disputes drew attention to the general inclination of Japanese decision-makers to pursue ‘some deliberate fine tuning of the leadership’s position on a number of delicate issues’, i.e. the revision of the Constitution (including the so-called ‘no war’ clause), the role of the Self-Defense Forces (which cannot be deployed in overseas conflicts), official visits to the Yasukuni Shrine (a Japanese equivalent of the Bitburg military cemetery in Germany, but class-A war criminals are commemorated with other war dead), the national flag and anthem (associated with Japan’s militarist past and emperor system), etc.131

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Seen in this light, one can argue that history education in Japanese schools has to a considerable extent an official nature. The framework allows us to explore it in terms of the dual process of historical knowledge, i.e. the presentation of an official version of history to both domestic communities and foreign countries. Of course, the textbook disputes were diplomatic quarrels arising from a clash between a Japanese version of the history of the 1930s and 1940s and that of other Asian countries. On the other hand, the intrastate aspect of history education was brought into perspective when the Okinawans reprimanded the Tokyo government for deleting the accounts of forced collective suicides during the Pacific War. A coalition of nine labour, teachers, women and youth organizations launched a protest campaign, urging the government to describe accurately the battle of Okinawa.132 Their prefectural assembly’s resolution also called for the restoration of deleted explanations of the battle.133 The indigenous people in Hokkaido, the Ainu, also rebuked the government for excising accounts of the deprivation of their rights to hunt, fish and use forests and their forced cultural assimilation.134 These domestic issues were also debated in Diet committees on many occasions.135 The problems surrounding the official version of national history were thus very much in evidence in the textbook issue in the 1980s. CONCLUSION

This chapter has explained the two diplomatic disputes over Japanese schoolbooks in which principally China and South Korea criticized the narratives of Japan’s colonial rule and aggression in the Asia-Pacific. The controversies exposed the specific cases of government influence over history education in the Japanese educational environment. In the end, the Tokyo government agreed to modify its historical accounts in view of both countries’ consistent demands to make corrections, although the two disputes did not put an end to the textbook issue. The chapter has proceeded to analyse the connections between the disputes and the first two phases of the analytical framework, covering the aspect of ‘process’ in history education (i.e. the dissemination of historical knowledge). The case study has revealed the ways in which power relations work at the very first stage of the formation of public opinion (Phase I). In other words, the schoolbook authorization system offers an arbitrary space which allows government preferences and expectations to enter, while historians, textbook authors and schools act as intermediaries to transmit historical representations and interpretations to the audience, pupils. In Phase II, the chapter has analysed the ways in which government influence reaches the future public through the educational

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environment. In relation to writing history, indicating the relevance of both postmodernist and empiricist approaches to the two disputes, the case study has shown that an analysis of historiography demands the examination of historians’ actual working environment. In the discussion of education, this study has mainly considered the role of education in terms of the concepts of political socialization, indoctrination, hegemony and particularly the evaluation of political and socio-economic situations. The controversies also indicated that political socialization has both domestic and external implications. With respect to history education, this research has focused on the design and structure of history courses and the presentation of specific events, with the latter in particular being the focus of the diplomatic conflicts. The case study has also explained how history education in schools may be used to promote broad public support of the government, as well as specific policies with reference to Japan’s security dialogue with the United States. The textbook disputes have also thrown light on the dual implications of national history for foreign countries and domestic communities, by looking at not just the protests launched by Beijing and Seoul but also the dissenting voices of the Okinawans and the Ainu. The following chapter will look at the public reactions and regional/cross-regional repercussions the disputes caused and scrutinize the relevance of the remaining part of the framework to the textbook issue. NOTES 1 2

NYT, 27.8.82. AS, 26.6.82, p. 1. With regard to the controversial ‘misinformation’, it seems that the Japanese media’s original coverage of the textbook screening in 1982 did not accurately reflect the ways in which it proceeded that year. Some accounts, but not all of them, were rewritten in the process of authorization according to the MOE’s compulsory instructions; other changes were made based on its recommendations (not compulsory). Yet, after the Ministry’s explanation about the certification of that year, the Japanese government virtually dismissed the issue of ‘misinformation’. The reason seems to be that both Beijing and Seoul began to question Tokyo’s foreign policy stance and that overseas anti-Japanese sentiments were growing in many Asian countries. Furthermore, this study adds the following points: (1) the South Korean press pointed out inaccurate accounts in Japanese schoolbooks in 1981, and this was debated at the ED Committee in October of that year; (2) the Korean National History Compilation Committee itself examined Japanese texts in 1982 (see Note 14 below); and (3) regardless of the process of screening, its results were not agreeable to either China or South Korea. See D-95-HC, ED, 27.10.81, pp. 3–6; D-96-HC, ED, 29.7.82, pp. 4, 7 and 12; D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, pp. 3–6; D-96-HR, ED, 4.8.82, p. 2; D-96-HR, FA, 9.8.82, p. 2; D-96HC, SEC, 10.8.82, p. 12; D-96-HR, AUD, 10.8.82, pp. 4–5; D-96-HC, FA, 19.8.82, p. 23; and D-96-HR, AUD, 21.9.82, pp. 13–4 and 20.

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Japanese History Textbook Disputes in 1980s (Part I) 3 4 5

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XHNA, 28.6.82, p. 18. Asian Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Chugoku Geppo (China Monthly), July 1982, p. 9. According to the official English-language newspaper China Daily, all leading newspapers in Beijing carried commentaries criticizing the MOE. These newspapers were the official Communist Party newspaper Renmin Ribao (People’s Daily), the Guangming Ribao (Enlightenment Daily), the Jiefangjun Ribao (Liberation Army Daily), the Gongren Ribao (Workers’ Daily) and the Zhongguo Qingnian Bao (China Youth Daily). CD, 27.7.82, p. 3. In early August, the People’s Daily launched a more aggressive campaign. In 1982, the official Xinhua News Agency filed 212 reports on the textbook issue from 28 June to 30 September when the issue was most intensely debated. The China Daily carried 118 articles from 1 July to 30 September. As for an overview of Chinese press coverage of the textbook issue, see AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, July 1982, pp. 9–10, August 1982, pp. 9–14, September 1982, pp. 21–2, June 1986, pp. 6–7 and July 1986, p. 7. In the case of The Korea Herald, the number of articles (including letters to the editor) amounted to 278 from 20 July to 29 September. In the case of The Korea Times, 232 articles (including letters to the editor) dealt with the issue from 18 July to 29 September. See AS, E.27.7.82, p. 2. Despite the claim of an internal affair made by some Japanese politicians, International Society for Educational Information or ISEI (established in 1958 and affiliated to the Japanese Foreign Ministry) gathers foreign schoolbooks and examines accounts of Japan in these texts in order to provide foreign countries with accurate information about the country. See Caroline Rose, ‘The Textbook Issue: Domestic Sources of Japan’s Foreign Policy’, Japan Forum, vol. 11, no. 2, 1999, pp. 211–12. XHNA, 28.7.82, pp. 4–5 and KT, 28.7.82, p. 1. The Sino-Japanese Joint Statement said: ‘The Japanese side is keenly conscious of the responsibility of the serious damage that Japan caused in the past to the Chinese people through war, and deeply reproaches itself’. Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Nitchu Kankei Shiryoshu (A Collection of Documents on Sino-Japanese Relations), Tokyo, 1982, p. 195. For postwar Sino-Japanese relations, see Tanaka Akihiko, Nitchu Kankei 1945–1990 (Sino-Japanese Relations 1945–1990), Tokyo, Tokyo University Press, 1991. AS, M.29.7.82, p. 1. KT, 27.7.82, p. 1. XHNA, 28.7.82, pp. 4–5. In fact, South Korean Education Ministry officials commented, before their investigation of the Japanese schoolbooks, that Seoul would not demand Tokyo to make corrections even if they found the texts problematic. KH, 23.7.82, p. 8 KH, 23.7.82, p. 8. The South Korean Education Ministry said after the examination that it would be desirable that academics or private organizations make arrangements for corrections. On 5 August 1982, the Korean National History Compilation Committee (KNHCC) said that sixteen Japanese schoolbooks to be used from April 1983 contained distortions or wrong accounts of twenty-four historical facts relating to Korea, fifteen out of which concerning

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modern history. The KNHCC closely examined nine out of the twelve textbooks of ‘Japanese History’, 5 out of the 14 texts of ‘World History’ and two out of the twenty-one ‘Modern Society’ textbooks. KH, 6.8.82, p. 3. KT, 1.8.82, p. 1. KT, 29.7.82, p. 1. AS, E.30.7.82, p. 1. AS, M.31.7.82, p. 3. The Korea Herald criticized in an editorial that the Japanese government treated China and South Korea differently in dealing with the textbook dispute, pointing out that Japanese diplomats immediately expressed their regret when Beijing made a protest, while Seoul was yet to receive a similar message from Tokyo. The editorial said that ‘[k]owtowing to the big and bullying before the small are the part and parcel of Japanese duplicity derived from its inferiority complex’. KH, 31.7.82, p. 2. KH, 4.8.82, p. 1. Kenneth B. Pyle, ‘Japan Besieged: The Textbook Controversy’, Journal of Japanese Studies, vol. 9, no. 2, 1983, pp. 297–300. AS, M.5.8.82, p. 1. A meeting was held between Vice-Foreign Minister Wu Xueqian and Japanese Ambassador to China Katori Yasue. XHNA, 5.8.82, pp. 4–5. KH, 7.8.82, p. 1 and KT, 7.8.82, p. 1. For the MOE’s explanation on historical accounts, see AS, M.10.8.82, p. 1. AS, M.8.8.82, p. 1. KH, 5.8.82, p. 1. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies) (ed.), Ajia Chuto no Doko Nempo (Annual Report of the Developments in Asia and the Middle East), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku (South Korea in 1982)’, 1983, pp. 39 and 43. AS, M.9.8.82, p. 1. AS, M.13.8.82, p. 1. AS, M.14.8.82, p. 1. See also KH, 31.7.82, p. 1 and XHNA, 10.7.86, p. 9. Before this mission, a member of the ED suggested a similar plan that an international aspect of the issue and a domestic aspect of it should be dealt with separately. See D-96-HC, ED, 30.7.82, p. 18, an NLIB member’s comment. These two members were Mitsuzuka Hiroshi (Chairman of the Textbook Problem Subcommittee) and Mori Yoshiro (Vice-Chairman of the Education System Research Council). AS, M.22.8.82, p. 2. AS, E.21.8.82, p. 2. AS, M.24.8.82, p. 1. Ibid. Policy Division, the Minister’s Secretariat of the Ministry of Education of Japan (ed.), Monbusho Nempo (Annual Report of the Education Ministry), no. 110, 1982, p. 141–2 and KH, 28.8.82, pp. 3 and 6. The rest of the statement dealt with administrative arrangements to be made, i.e. consultation with the TARC and a timetable for implementing corrective measures in classrooms. AS, E.26.8.82, p. 1. AS, E.27.8.82, p. 1 and KT, 31.8.82, p. 1. KT, 28.8.82, p. 1. KH, 28.8.82, pp. 3 and 6. AS, M.28.8.82, p. 2.

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42 KT, 4.9.82, p. .1 43 KH, 14.9.82, p. 8. The original report was announced on 5 August 1982. See Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho, ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, p. 39. 44 AS, E.28.9.82, p. 1. 45 KH, 28.9.82, p. 8 and KT, 28.9.82, p. 1. The thirteen historical events in modern and contemporary times which were given priority are: (1) Japan’s invasion in South Korea, (2) the deprivation of sovereignty, (3) South Korean soldiers’ insurrections against Japan, (4) Ann Jung-ong’s deed (the assassination of the first Prime Minister of Japan Ito Hirobumi, 1841–1909), (5) the annexation of Korea, (6) Japan’s militaristic rule, (7) the expropriation of land, (8) the 1st of March Independence Movement, (9) the Kanto Great Earthquake, (10) the compulsory assimilation of Japanese culture (visits to shrines, the use of Japanese language and the change of names), (11) forced labour, (12) independence movements against Japan, (13) Japan’s long-term colonial rule. The other twenty-six events were preserved for further research, including Korean-Japanese relations in ancient times. AS, M.28.9.82, p. 1. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho, ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, p. 42. 46 See KH, 6.8.82, p. 5 and D-96-HR, FA, 9.8.82, p. 12, a DSP member’s comment. According to The Korea Herald, sources at the MOFA also hinted at a plan to set up a private joint committee for studying the content of Japanese high school textbooks on 31 July. See KH, 1.8.82, p. 1. However, it was in March 1991 that the first meeting of joint research between South Korean and Japanese historians was held in Tokyo. See ’7.2 Transnational Cooperation with South Korea and China’ in Chapter 7. 47 XHNA, 31.8.82, p. 5. 48 XHNA, 10.9.82, p. 3. 49 Ibid., pp. 3–4. 50 AS, M.1.9.82, p. 3 and M.10.9.82, p. 1. 51 AS, M.15.9.82, p. 2. 52 About a final proposal, see Policy Division, the MOE, Monbusho Nempo, no. 110, 1982, p. 120. 53 According to the Education Minister, his statement itself did not aim at complementing the content of textbooks which would be used before correction; it meant that school education as a whole should foster a spirit of international cooperation further. He evaded specific transitory corrective measures prior to the next partial amendment. AS, E.24.11.82, p. 14. There was also lingering resistance inside the MOE. Although some Dietmen suggested that corrections should be made with the immediate issuance of errata, the MOE strongly opposed this idea, insisting that the historical accounts in question were not ‘errors’. D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 11, an MOE’s bureaucrat’s comment, and p. 19, the Education Minister’s comment. 54 Policy Division, the MOE, Monbusho Nempo, p. 141. See also The Japanese Government, Kampo (Official Gazette), No.16745, 24 November, 1982, p. 9. 55 AS, M.15.9.82, p. 1. 56 Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho, ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, p. 42. 57 It was pointed out already by members of the Education Committee immediately after the Miyazawa Statement of August that the MOE’s implementation plan for corrections was not binding. D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, pp. 11 and 19, both JCP members’ comments. 58 The MOE was concerned with the potential impact of the diplomatic rows on

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Japanese education circles and the lawsuits over history textbooks which were brought against it. This is why the MOE, after much internal ministerial struggle, devised the complicated corrective measures which were barely explicable either to the foreign capitals concerned or to some domestic quarters which had fiercely resisted foreign intervention. See D-96-HC, FA, 19.8.82, p. 2, AS, M.20.8.82, p. 1 and D-98-HR, BUD, 18.2.83, p. 8, a JSP member’s comment. As to the second and the first textbook lawsuits, see the Ministry of Education of Japan, Monbu Jiho (Education Updates), May 1982, pp. 71–80 and May 1986, pp. 68–81 respectively. After the diplomatic settlement, the Textbook Authorization Division of the Elementary and Secondary Education Bureau of the MOE rekindled their counter argument against the criticisms over the screening results. See the Ministry of Education, Monbu Jiho, December 1982, pp. 83–8. The Division reinterpreted the government’s statements in its favour. AS, M.9.7.83, p. 3. Later, the South Korean Foreign Minister instructed to investigate Japanese history textbooks. The North Korean Workers’ Party newspaper Rodong Sinmun also reported the glorification of Japanese imperialism and invasion. See AS, M. 22.1.86, p. 3 and M.26.1.82, p. 3. AS, M.2.7.84, p. 3. The People’s Daily (5 July 1984), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, July 1984, p. 9. AS, M.14.6.84, p. 3 and M.1.7.84, p. 1. On the legal front, too, court decisions were made in the government’s favour between the 1982 and 1986 disputes. In January 1984, Ienaga Saburo filed the third textbook lawsuit, demanding that the government approve his accounts of the Nanjing Massacre, Unit 731, the collective suicide in Okinawa and the Koreans’ protest at Japan during the Sino-Japanese War. In March 1986, the Tokyo High Court turned down all of Professor Ienaga’s claims in the second instance of the first textbook lawsuit. This decision permitted the state to intervene in education where its intervention is considered necessary and rational. See Morikawa Kinju, Kyokasho to Saiban (Textbooks and Lawsuits), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1990, pp. 155–203. Later, this group and a religious organization, composed of various groups, ‘Nihon o Mamoru Kai’, were merged to form ‘Nippon Kaigi’ (the Japan Conference) in May 1997. The meeting was held on 30 October 1982. Kobori Keiichiro, Sekai Nippo, 4 June 1987. In its organ ‘Nihon no Ibuki (Japan’s Breathing)’ of 15 April 1984, the group announced that their priority would be to compile a Japanese history textbook for high schools for the time being. It was part of their campaign to create an ideological tide for the amendment of the Constitution. In fact, there is a resemblance between a pattern of this group’s emergence in the mid-1980s and that of other revisionist groups in the mid-1990s. AS, E, 10.7.86, p. 3. KH, 7.6.86, p. 1. FT, 17.7.86, p. 6 and NYT, 7.10.86, p. 13. With regard to the 1986 dispute, The Korea Herald had seventy-eight articles from 1 June to 23 September, including those dealing with the dismissal of the Education Minister. KH, 18.6.86, p. 8. With regard to the 1986 dispute, the China Daily carried twenty-six articles

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from 5 June to 24 September, including those dealing with the dismissal of the Education Minister. The weekly edition of Xinhua reported the dispute three times. CD, 5.6.86, p. 1. For Chinese criticisms, see the People’s Daily (10 and 22 June and 7 July 1986), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, June 1986, pp. 6–7 and July 1986, p. 7. CD, 10.6.86, p. 1. AS, E.10.6.86, p. 1. AS, M.12.6.86, p. 2. AS, M.1.7.86, p. 1. AS, M.22.6.86, p. 2. Ibid. According to a MOFA official and a member of the group, there was a meeting between an MOFA official and the president of the textbook publisher. See AS, E.4.7.86, p. 1. AS, M.2.7.86, p. 1. AS, M.19.6.86, p. 1. KH, 8.7.86, p. 1. KH, 15.8.86, pp. 1–2 and Kyodo News Service, 15.8.86. KH, 18.7.86, p. 3. XHNA, 24.7.86, p. 14. Ibid. AS, M.14.7.86, p. 2. The OECD’s education research report mentioned the MOE’s textbook screening and pointed out a danger of imposing standardized political values on students. AS, M.29.7.86, p. 3. AS, E.17.7.86, p. 2. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies) (ed.), ’1986 Nen no Kankoku (South Korea in 1986)’, 1987, p. 38. Ibid., p. 39. See also The People’s Daily (10 September), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, September 1986, p. 16. With regard to the MOE’s instructions and recommendations, some textbooks authors claimed that the Ministry’s alleged ‘recommendations’ (non-compulsory) were virtually instructions (compulsory) in practice. AS, M.31.7.82, p. 23. For some examples of examiners’ comments, see National League for Support of the School Textbook Screening Suits (NLSTS), ‘Truth in Textbooks, Freedom in Education and Peace for Children: The 27 Year Struggle of the Ienaga Textbook Lawsuits’, Tokyo, 1992, pp. 11–12. FT, 18.8.82, p. 10 and AP, 28.8.82. AS, M.8.7.86, p. 3. Refer to Mendl’s argument that the distinction between ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ was blurred, drawing on analogy between the influence of the military’s initiatives in Manchuria and China over government policy, and the possible influence of large Japanese corporations’ activities on government decisions. Wolf Mendl, Japan’s Asia Policy: Regional Security and Global Interests, London and New York, Routledge, 1995, p. 162. See D-94-HR, AUD, 21.7.81, p. 4, a JSP member’s comment and D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, p. 15, a JCP member’s comment. An Education Committee member commented that textbook examiners’ views of history needed to be checked

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History Education and International Relations on their appointment. However, it does not seem that the MOE seriously reviewed the appointment procedure, nor that the government investigated the ideological background of the bureaucrats who were involved in this routine. D-96-HR, ED, 6.8.82, p. 24, an NLIB member’s comment. See the Central Education Council’s proposal (30 June 1983) in Policy Division, the MOE (ed.), Monbusho Nempo, no. 111, 1983, p. 113 and the Ad-hoc Education Council’s proposal (23 January 1987), no. 114, 1986, p. 188. During the first textbook dispute, nine out of seventeen members who attended the Second Division (Social Studies) of the TARC said that the SinoJapanese War (1937–45) was an aggression. See AS, M.16.9.82, p. 22. XHNA, 24.7.82, pp. 14–15. KT, 12.8.82, p. 2. XHNA, 24.7.82, pp. 14–15. According to the Chinese periodical Ban Yue Tan (Fortnightly News), the Japanese textbook disputes ranked the eighth in top ten international news stories of the year. See AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, December 1982, p. 4. XHNA, 28.7.82, pp. 4–5. CD, 10.6.86, p. 1. KT, 25.8.82, p. 1, Yoo Han-yul (the Democratic Korea Party)’s phrase. Acting Prime Minister Kim Sang-hyup’ s view. KH, 21.8.82, p. 8. KH, 31.7.82, pp. 1 and 8 and KT, 31.7.82, p. 8. KH, 31.7.82, pp. 3 and 5, a paper presented at a public hearing at the Seoul Sejong Cultural Centre. D-96-HC, BUD, 30.6.82, p. 22. D-96-HC, ED, 29.7.82, p. 4, p. 12 and p. 15 respectively. The first comment by a JCP member, D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, p. 14 and the second comment by a JSP member, D-96-HR, ED, 6.8.82, p. 2. See also Ienaga Saburo, ‘The Glorification of War in Japanese Education’, International Security, vol. 18, no. 3, 19931994, p. 126. D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, pp. 13–14 and AS, M.28.7.82, p. 23. Richter has maintained that it is logically impossible to reduce human behaviour which is inherently normative to the genuinely descriptive language which is available to physical science. Melvin Richter (ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, p. 21. With regard to facts and values, Richter cites several authors. See ibid., pp. 22, 33–4, and 44– 5. With regard to the dual role of words, see Ernest Gellner, Thought and Change, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964, pp. 201–203. In the German context, Goldhagen stresses that: ‘To present mere clinical descriptions of the killing operations [the Holocaust and other massacres] is to misrepresent the phenomenology of killing, to eviscerate the emotional components of the acts, and to skew any understanding of them’. Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, London, Little, Brown and Company, 1996, p. 22. Galtung’s definition of violence adopts the same logic. When what is avoidable is not avoided, violence is present. See Johan Galtung, ‘Violence, Peace, and Peace Research’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 6, no. 3, 1969, pp. 168–9. See Joseph A. Camilleri and Jim Falk (eds), The End of Sovereignty?: The Politics of a Shrinking and Fragmenting World, Hans and Vermont, Edward Elgar, 1992, p. 224. The national curriculum for elementary and junior high schools of 1977

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116 117

118 119 120 121 122

123

124

125 126 127 128 129 130

157

designated the song Kimigayo (Your/the Emperor’s Reign) as the national anthem without any statutory foundation or public debates. In 1985, the MOE demanded that schools use Hinomaru (the sun flag) and Kimigayo at enrolment and graduation ceremonies. See Yamazumi Masami, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi (A Concise History of Japanese Education), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1987, the rear table p. 70 and NLSTS, ‘Truth in Textbooks’, p. 4. D-102-HR, BUD, 7.3.85, pp. 61–2, Education Minister Matsunaga’s comment. Abiko Tadahiko, ‘Shogaikoku tono “Kyoiku Masatsu” ni Kansuru Kisoteki Kenkyu: Nihon no Rekishi Kyokasho ni Miru Gaikoku Ninshiki (Basic Study on “Educational Friction” between Japan and Foreign Countries: An Analysis of Japan’s Recognition of Foreign Countries in Japanese High School History Textbooks)’, Nagoya Daigaku Kyoiku Gakubu Kiyo (Bulletin of the Faculty of Education, Nagoya University), 1987, vol. 33, pp. 91–8. See also Tanaka Hiroshi, ‘Kyokasho Mondai to Ajia: Nihon no Kyoiku ni Miru Kokusai Kankaku to Rekishi Kankaku (The Textbook Issue and Asia: International Awareness and Historical Awareness in Japanese Education)’, Chugoku Kenkyu Geppo (Chinese Research Monthly), no. 422, April 1983, pp. 11–19. See D-102-HC, AUD, 12.12.84, p. 30, a DSP member’s comment and D-102HR, ED, 24.4.85, p. 19, another DSP member’s comment. NYT, 11.2.84. GDN, 5.7.85. See Leonard James Schoppa, Education Reform in Japan: A Case of Immobilist Politics, London, Routledge, 1990. AP, 27.8.82. Morikawa, Kyokasho to Saiban, pp. 156–7. At the first round of the USJapanese security subcommittee talks on 30 August, the Deputy Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs mentioned the textbook issue, and a Japanese delegation said that it was difficult for Japan to play a greater role in defending its sea lanes and northeast Asia, on the grounds that Asian neighbours heightened vigilance against a resurgence of militarism in the country. The talks were held in Honolulu from 30 August to 2 September 1982. See AS, E.31.8.82, p. 1 and Tokyo (3.9.82), ST, 6.9.82, p. 3. The Defense Agency of Japan, Nippon no Boei (Defense of Japan), 1981, pp. 144–5. See also 1970, pp. 16–19; 1976, p. 61; 1978, pp. 172 and 181; 1981, pp. 164–9 and 260–2; 1982, pp. 57 and 173; and 1983, pp. 106–107. The People’s Daily (22 January 1983), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, January 1983, pp. 5–7. See Mendl’s explanation about the security debate between ‘political realists’ and ‘military realists’ in Japan in the early 1980s onwards. Mendl, Japan’s Asia Policy, pp. 33–5. Thomas Rohlen and Christopher Björk (eds), Education and Training in Japan, Volume I, London and New York, Routledge, 1998, p. 13. For a good example of this, see Ienaga, ‘The Glorification of War in Japanese Education’, pp. 113–33. D-93-HR, ED, 15.10.80, p. 4, an LDP member’s comment. D-94-HC, ED, 28.4.81, p. 17, Education Minister Tanaka’s comment. D-94-HR, ED, 25.2.81, p. 25 and D-101-HR, CAB, 21.6.84, p. 32, a DSP member’s comment. The People’s Daily (22 January 1983), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, January 1983, pp. 5–7.

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FT, 18.8.82, p. 10. BP, 3.8.82, p. 5. XHNA, 2.8.82, p. 21 and 9.9.82, p. 18. AS, M.25.8.82, p. 22. On 24 August, an association called Utari in Hokkaido demanded the MOE to correct the textbook accounts. 135 D-96-HR, FA, 30.7.82, pp. 6–8, a Komei member’s comment; D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 15, a DSP member’s comment; and D-96-HC, AUD, 14.9.82, p. 12, a JSP member’s comment.

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6

The Japanese History Textbook Disputes in the 1980s (Part II) he previous chapter has explained the outline of the 1982 and 1986 disputes. It has also analysed the controversies which brought out into the open the latent nature of textbook screening. In so doing, it has indicated the relevance of the case study to the conceptual framework, i.e. the initial stage of government influence (Phase I) and the activities under government influence (Phase II). This was the first important reason for conducting this case study. The previous chapter has also cast light on the diplomatic disputes as the very first catalyst for bilateral joint research in later years. This aspect is also crucial in terms of the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’). This was another rationale behind the case study. The controversies are also indispensable in two other ways for this study. For one thing, the disputes shed light on what may be called ‘consequences’ of history education, directly forcing the Japanese government and indirectly Japanese society to react to overseas criticisms over history textbooks. Therefore, they provide the framework with some important clues to the formation of public dispositions (Phase III), uncovering Japanese views towards their country’s militarist past. Indeed, it is uncertain Japanese attitudes towards the diplomatic friction that indicated the influence of history education on the Japanese public. The textbook rows crucially unravelled what could happen on the receiving end of historical knowledge, i.e. to the developmental perceptions and views of students. For another, the disputes, under extensive foreign attention and pressure, brought into focus the hitherto rarely explored link between history education and international relations; thus, these cross-border repercussions also offer important connections to the ‘Wider Context’. The disputes demonstrated that the very Japanese reactions to foreign condemnations, directly involving the two foreign governments and drawing international attention at both governmental and non-governmental levels, left other Asian neighbours nervous about their relations with Japan. Its neighbours presumed that the views and attitudes of Japanese youths being formed through a particular type of history education would have a

T

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serious bearing on Japan’s long-term external relations. Thus, all these dimensions relating to the ‘consequences’ of history education will be examined in this chapter. What became increasingly illuminating during the course of the 1982 and 1986 disputes was that there existed a striking gap between how Japan perceived the problem and how its neighbours viewed it. The fact that a storm of overseas accusations was necessary and considerable time elapsed before Japan agreed to take the minimal of corrective measures in 1982 posits that there was a gap. And in 1986 the Japanese Education Ministry made a move only after foreign protests were launched.1 In order to consider what such a perception gap signifies and to search for clues to the influence of history education over the Japanese public, the first section will briefly sketch and compare civic campaigns and protests in China, South Korea and Japan. The second section will survey wider regional and cross-regional repercussions of the controversies. The final section will then analyse the textbook issue with reference to Phase III and the ‘Wider Context’ of the framework. 6.1 PUBLIC REACTIONS TO THE TEXTBOOK DISPUTES

One of the distinctive characteristics of the textbook disputes is that they were not confined to the intergovernmental level. Both Beijing and Seoul underlined their nationals’ indignation and the physical and mental suffering which they had experienced at the hands of the Japanese and which continues until today. It was not merely diplomatic manoeuvring that both capitals sought to emphasize the concerns of their people, which might otherwise have been shelved by the Tokyo government. At least on this occasion, both governments’ publicity exercises were firmly backed by public support. Indeed, the issue became ‘a matter of public concern for just-minded people everywhere’.2 The Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister, Wu Xueqian, admonished Japan’s attempt to divert public attention from this issue, stating that this would only serve to intensify Chinese people’s anger.3 Beijing further launched a campaign in the official press, calling for the Japanese public to join the Chinese in order to contain the worrying trend. ‘The Japanese people, who are also victims of militarism and the war of aggression are innocent’, said an editorial in the People’s Daily.4 (This is a view which neither the South Korean government nor press seems to have shared.) As a Japanese Dietman rightly pointed out, the political settlement of the row with Beijing and Seoul governments would not satisfy the people of both countries, nor the Japanese.5 Official Chinese newspapers introduced public views in the form of letters to the editor. These included stories of personal ordeals and witnesses to the brutality of Japanese troops as well as critical comments made by school teachers and historians. One cannot

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deny the impression that the opinions quoted in the official press were somewhat reworked versions of the Communist Party’s statements, and it is difficult to assess the genuine extent and depth of public debate beyond the official lines.6 But the Beijing government seems to have given vent to Chinese people’s strong resentment against, for example, the change from ‘aggression’ to ‘advance’, as Xia Yan (Vice-President of the China-Japan Friendship Association) expressed.7 In Chinese academic circles, which severely reproached the Japanese education authorities, Xu Deheng (a Chinese sociologist) said that the MOE was ‘blaming the victims’.8 Another scholar, Wan Feng (Vice-Chairman of the Chinese Society of Japanese History), contended that ‘this clumsy trick’ would not deceive either the Chinese or the Japanese.9 Other individuals like Bai Xiqing (President of the Chinese Medical Association) publicly spoke of the bacteriological experiments conducted in Harbin and other provinces in Northeast China by Unit 731 of the Japanese Army between 1940 and 1944.10 South Korean citizens, with their long-standing antagonism towards their former rulers, were a powerful voice supporting their government’s escalating protests.11 (About their views, see Appendix 6.1.) Among those who launched protest rallies across the country were groups of South Korean survivors who had witnessed Japanese troops’ savagery. Anti-Japanese demonstrations erupted almost daily in the capital from the onset of the 1982 dispute.12 Korean employees of Japanese banks in Seoul were in a delicate position; they held a public meeting in response to criticisms that they worked for Japanese companies.13 In any circumstances, the South Korean authorities must have approved these demonstrations, since unauthorized public gatherings were inconceivable at that time.14 With regard to the background of these widespread reactions, Lee Do-sung, journalist of the leading newspaper Dong-A-Ilbo (East Asia Daily), explained at that time that, regardless of their personal experience of Japan’s colonial rule, the Koreans in general could not help viewing Japan as a nation which had inflicted decisive damage on their country in contemporary history. They continued to consider postwar relations with Japan in a negative light even when disentangled from the old relationship.15 With regard to ‘colonialism’, The Korea Times commented that the Koreans still termed the period under Japanese rule ‘Ilch 35 nyon (35 years under Japanese imperialism)’ and not even ‘colonialism’.16 (About South Koreans’ like/dislike of foreigners before the 1982 dispute, see Appendix 6.2.)

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South Korean Public Protests and Campaigns in 1982 Civic organizations’ rallies • The Korea Independence Fighters’ Association • The Korean Federation of Education Association • The Korean Nuclear Bomb Victims’ Association • The Korean Senior Citizens Association (participants more than 1,500 members)17 Student public meetings and demonstrations • ‘The Japanese Go Home’, about 300 students at Korea University (9 September) • Approx. 1,000 students at Seoul National University (15 September), followed by another despite a ban on gatherings on the campus (16 September) • Approx. 1,000 students at Yonsei University, demanding the correction of Japanese textbooks and the resignation of President Chun Doo-hwan (21 September) • Approx. 500 students at Seogang University, making the same demand as above (27 September)18 Other relevant movements • Taxi drivers, restaurants, department stores and shops refuse Japanese customers • Citizens call for the boycott of Japanese imports19 • Educators’ associations call for the correction of textbook accounts (28 July)20 • Thirteen patriot memorial organizations, including the Kim Ku Memorial Society, issue a joint statement calling for the Seoul government to sever ties with Japan and launch a boycott against Japanese merchandise (11 August)21 • About 200 Korean employees of Japanese banks rally in Seoul, calling for the correction of textbooks (11 August)22 • A Korean delegation prepares a resolution proposal at a general meeting of the World Confederation of Organizations of the Teaching Profession (WCOTP) at Montreaux near Geneva in August 1982, denouncing the Japanese government for distorting accounts in school textbooks23 • The Korea Amateur Sports Association postpones the 10th Korea-Japan Junior Athletic Friendship Meeting scheduled in Seoul from 21 to 23 August 198224 • A protest rally of 3,000 participants in Taegu (28 August)25 • Memorials for the 59th anniversary of the Kanto Great Earthquake in the Tokyo metropolitan area, the first memorials held across South Korea for the Korean victims of the massacre after the earthquake (1 September)26

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In Japan • The Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan)’s demands the MOE to make corrections (29 July)27

In the first dispute, the press and political parties in South Korea took a tougher stance towards Japan than their government did.28 Even the ruling Democratic Justice Party, which maintained a rather cautious attitude initially, eventually joined opposition parties, conceding that Koreans’ anger could no longer be controlled.29 A member of the Democratic Korea Party pointed out that the opposition parties had addressed the Japanese textbook issue in the National Assembly’s sessions since 1981.30 Lee Chai-hyung (Korean Chairman of the Korea-Japan Parliamentarians League) contacted Japanese Chairman Yasui Ken, asking for modifications to controversial accounts (28 July).31 Similarly, the Korea-Japan Cooperation Committee sent a letter to Kishi Nobusuke (the Japanese Chairman of the Committee),32 requesting that the Japanese members advise their government to rectify errors (29 July).33 Shortly thereafter, the Education-Information Committee of the Assembly adopted a resolution which urged Seoul to take a tough stance against Tokyo and demand amendments to the schoolbooks.34 The committee also asserted that the government should be prepared to break off diplomatic relations with Japan in order to achieve their goal.35 Later, the Foreign Committee inquired into the possibility of seeking the cooperation of other Asian countries, in order to pressure Tokyo into correcting distorted accounts.36 Foreign diplomatic sources viewed that Seoul’s turnaround from a wait-and-see attitude to a hardline stance was due to ever-mounting public fury against Tokyo’s ‘smokescreen tactics’.37 Finally, non-governmental reactions in Japan must be explained. From the onset of the first dispute leading Japanese newspapers were sympathetic towards Beijing and Seoul. The Korea Times reported that the Japanese news media, generally displaying pacifist inclinations and critical attitudes towards conservative bureaucracy, extensively covered the rewriting of history in textbooks.38 Japanese Newspapers Commentaries Cited in the Chinese and South Korean Press Asahi Shimbun • ‘[I]n the post-Meiji years, every time our country went astray, the cause was interference with education. This trait has shown no change in the post-war years.’ (XHNA, 2.9.82, pp. 13–14)

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Mainichi Shimbun • Some Japanese regard the acceptance of foreign criticism as being detrimental to Japan’s prestige; this means that their reflection on the past is not deep enough. ‘We know that foreign criticism is not pleasant from the viewpoint of saving face, but rising above such way of thinking would help Japan regain the trust of other nations.’ (KT, 15.8.82, p. 8) Tokyo Shimbun • ‘[T]he textbook problem has shown that one’s attempt to cover up his ugly performances has adversely laid bare more of these performances to the world.’ (XHNA, 13.9.82, p. 8) Yomiuri Shimbun • Why are there so many LDP members who close their eyes to the facts and want to whitewash history? Perhaps some of them admired or actively cooperated with Japan’s war policy then.’ ‘Is the political climate in Japan making Japanese political leaders forget Japan’s responsibility for the war? If so, then anti-Japanese sentiment will continue to grow.’ (KH, 13.8.82, p. 3) • Increasing postwar generations have no direct memory of the war, says a spokesman for the prefectural teachers’ union in Okinawa. (KT, 5.9.82, p. 2)

However, reactions were mixed among political circles. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) members in charge of education and foreign affairs remained relatively calm, at least on the surface. The LDP’s internal foreign affairs committees eventually reached a conclusion that the textbook dispute should be settled immediately in the light of national interests and diplomatic relations, which virtually approved of the correction of texts (the party’s self-assessment was that it was ‘a response of grown-ups’).39 The Japan Socialist Party (JSP) and the Japan Communist Party (JCP) were virtually mouthpieces of domestic protest movements against the government. Their persistent inquiries into the disputes and related issues are extensively recorded in Diet committees’ proceedings. Individual Dietmen, including LDP members, also opposed the government. A member of the Japan-Korea Parliamentarians League hinted at the establishment of a joint committee to study the Japanese history textbooks under review at its annual general meeting scheduled in September 1982. However, a planned private joint research committee, composed of historians, scholars and other experts from both countries (which was originally proposed in 1981), was left hanging.40 In addition, the Japanese side appeared more interested in avoiding an escalation of diplomatic tension than in actually pressuring their government to take positive steps.41

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Japanese citizens too raised their voice against the MOE and the government. Numerous Japanese individuals expressed their views in newspapers’ readers columns; others sent messages directly to Chinese and South Korean journals and news media. For example, the historian Irokawa Daikichi (Professor at Tokyo Keizai University) commented that whitewashing the militaristic past and romanticizing it in films would influence young people and make them ‘more susceptible to rightist arguments’.42 Among civilian groups were Christian associations and six Sino-Japanese friendship organizations. 43 Utsunomiya Tokuma (Chairman of the Japan-China Friendship Association) accused the government of listening to nationalistic opinion and of attempting to hinder Japan’s efforts at self-reproach towards the invasion of China.44 Similarly, Miyagawa Torao (Director-General of the Japan-China Cultural Exchange Association) maintained that repentant Japanese attitudes should be the cornerstone of the establishment of bilateral relations.45 Another voice from a Sino-Japanese organization was Kunitomo Shuntaro (Chairman of the Liaison Council for Repatriates from China) who tried to address the causal connection between the war of aggression, and the crimes of killing, and the education provided to young Japanese at that time.46 Other opponents of the education authorities included academics, teachers organizations,47 publishers unions, the Society of Asian Women and Citizens Society for Considering the Textbook Problem, the producer and the director of the first Sino-Japanese joint film ‘The Game Yet to Finish’, which dealt with Japan’s invasion of China.48 However, Japanese citizens’ protest rallies were, on the whole, confined to a small number of specific groups. The very first Japanese public demonstration was held rather late during the first dispute (21 August 1982), and its scale was minimal. Organized by eight civilian groups, 300 to 400 citizens and students gathered near the MOE building.49 Organized counter-rallies, i.e. in support of the MOE, were also virtually negligible, except for veterans’ gatherings.50 In fact, South Korean Education Minister Rhee Kyu-do, while acknowledging Japanese intellectuals’ and citizens’ criticisms against the government, commented that their actions alone could not influence the majority of the Japanese population, and that it was necessary to exert external pressure to force a correction of inaccurate historical accounts.51 In sum, it is undeniable from the above findings that the extent and thrust of reactions reflecting the voice of people, which emerged in parallel with the diplomatic exchanges, greatly differed between the former aggressor and its victims. The difference indicated that there existed a significant gap between Japanese people’s perception of the problem and their neighbours’ view of it.

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History Education and International Relations 6.2 REPERCUSSIONS IN OTHER COUNTRIES (EXCEPT CHINA AND SOUTH KOREA)

Although China and South Korea were the major players in the diplomatic disputes, they were not unique in their interest in the textbook issue in the 1980s. It caused widespread repercussions in Asia and beyond, across political and ideological divides, although reactions to the disputes varied from the vociferous to the almost negligible.52 According to the news sources used in this study, Taiwan, North Korea, Hong Kong, the ASEAN countries, Vietnam, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States all signalled varying degrees of vigilance to Tokyo in the wake of the 1982 dispute.53 The uneven press coverage of the disputes and some governments’ strict press control, in addition to the fact that this study uses only English and Japanese sources, make it difficult to assess actual situations in these countries. Subject to this constraint, this study presents an overview of the reactions of governments, the public and the news media in the countries mentioned above. (A summary of government reactions below includes some officials’ comments which were not necessarily made in their official capacity.) Government reactions The first point is that, while the Japanese government appeared to be surrounded by a flood of condemnations, only the Taipei government, apart from China and South Korea, launched a formal protest, calling for ‘proper’ actions by Tokyo on the textbooks in question.54 The three communist countries which made provocative statements through their official press, namely North Korea, the Soviet Union and Vietnam, seem to have had no official contact with the Japanese government.55 With regard to the 1986 dispute, official reactions on record are few, apart from those of Taiwan, North Korea and Vietnam.56 (As for details of these reactions, see Appendix 6.3. For a chronological summary of government responses, see Tables 5.1 and 5.2 in Chapter 5 respectively.) Second, the repercussions of the textbook issue crossed political and ideological divides; North and South Korea, China, Taiwan, the Soviet Union and Vietnam were all interested parties. Political rivalry did surface briefly though, as seen in Hanoi’s initial comment of ‘a Washington-Tokyo-Peking axis’57 and in an exchange of accusations between the official Soviet news agency Tass and the Chinese People’s Daily.58 However, Pyongyang paid attention to many concerned voices in Asia including the Korean, Chinese and Japanese peoples.59 Archrivals Pyongyang and Seoul came to take the same side in condemning Tokyo.60 Few acrimonious exchanges occurred between China and Taiwan on this issue. In fact, it was

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Table 6.1 A Comparison of Government, Public and News Media Reactions to the 1982 Dispute Government

The public

The news media

+++++

+++

+++

North Korea

+++

n.a.

+

Vietnam

+++

n.a.

+

The Soviet Union

+++

n.a.

+

Thailand

++

++

++

Malaysia

+

n.a.

+

Singapore

+

+

++++

Philippines

+

n.a.

+

Indonesia

+

+

++

Hong Kong

-

+++++

+++++

The United States

-

++

+

Britain

-

-

+

Taiwan

Strong reactions (+++++) Weak reactions (+) No or few reactions (-) Information not available in the sources used in this study (n.a.)

inconceivable that any party would support the Japanese government’s stand on this occasion. Rather, any political or ideological rivalry that emerged centred on the manner in which criticisms were made, all of which essentially carried the same message. Third, the governments of the ASEAN countries did not take particular action, with the exception of Thailand. Bangkok seems to be the only ASEAN member which made an official inquiry into the Japanese schoolbooks in 1982, although its response came rather late, and it finally decided not to lodge any official protest against Tokyo.61 A leading newspaper, the Manila Times posited that the Philippines did not pay particular attention to the 1982 dispute because of the late President Ferdinand Marcos’ concern with possible friction with the Japanese government and financial circles.62 Another comment worthy of note is one made by the Malaysian Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad. Not surprisingly, he denied that the controversy would affect his ‘Look East’ policy, yet he could not help but mention the dispute involving the economic giant in the region. It is possible to interpret that both Manila and Kuala Lumpur refrained from making explicit official accusations against Tokyo because of their economic ties with it. Finally, it must be noted that, possibly prompted by the 1982 dispute, at least two governments took a step (or a counter-measure) to revise their own history syllabuses. For instance, Taipei instructed

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its schools to teach students more about Japanese atrocities which took place in the war against China (5 August).63 Singapore’s Education Minister also announced a complete overhaul of the history curriculum for secondary schools in which one of the main revisions concerned the Japanese occupation (22 August).64 Public reactions The pattern of public protests, like government reactions, varied greatly from one country/area to another. During the 1982 dispute, the activities of Hong Kong citizens far exceeded those in other countries, although some public meetings were held in the US and Taiwan. During the 1986 controversy, some protests were launched in Thailand, Hong Kong and the Philippines, but few were reported in the newspapers.65 Since it is difficult to survey thoroughly public attitudes and grass-roots activities and to compare them across the regions, the findings presented below should be regarded as a partial picture of public reactions.66 In Hong Kong, students, teachers and university faculty staff played a central part in organizing large-scale demonstrations and signing campaigns in the summer of 1982. (See Appendix 6.4.) The Federation of Students and the Professional Teachers’ Union launched a rally to commemorate the fifty-first anniversary of the Japanese invasion of Manchuria (19 September).67 That day participants handed the Japanese consulate a petition with over 400,000 signatures, with the rally marking the climax of a two-month long campaign by students.68 Public protests even showed signs of violence when a homemade bomb exploded at a Japanese department store, and another was discovered. The Asian Wall Street Journal reported the outrage of Hong Kong citizens as follows: ‘Tokyo professes to consider the row over. But recent outburst[s] of anger in Hong Kong suggest popular feelings weren’t appeased by the [Japanese] government’s pledge to remedy the contents in question by 1985 …’.69 The Taiwanese people remained relatively quiet about the textbook revisions for some time in sharp contrast to the furious tone of local newspapers. Protest campaigns spread gradually from a group of college professors and students to citizens. On the other side of the Pacific, activities against the revisionist schoolbooks centred around a group called ‘Alliance Against Japanese Distortion of History’, which was founded by American citizens of Asian origin in September 1982. Although its activities out in the streets were on a much smaller scale than those organized by Hong Kong students, the group examined various background factors of the textbook issue. It criticized Chinese and South Korean governments for settling the 1982 dispute for economic reasons as well as the White House for placing pressure on Tokyo to re-arm against possible Soviet expansion.70 The Alliance also lodged

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another Asian-American protest at the time of Prime Minister Nakasone’s visit to the US in January 1983.71 By contrast, organized public gatherings were almost non-existent in most of the ASEAN countries. The only organized campaign seems to have been that of the Chinese Journalists Welfare Association in Thailand, which sent a protest letter to the Japanese embassy in Bangkok. This scarcity of civic reactions among the ASEAN members can be explained by a few factors. One would be that, because few passages in the Japanese textbooks were directly related to their countries, anti-Japanese sentiments were not aroused to the same extent as in China and Korea. Another may be that the local press did not take up this issue, and the people had little knowledge of it. In effect, after the peak of the first row, The Indonesia Times pointed out that most Indonesians were unaware of the textbook issue except for what they read in the Western press; it also pointed to ‘a love-hate relationship’, deriving from the older generation’s admiration of Japan and their suffering under its occupation.72 A Singaporean parliamentarian also spoke of similar mixed attitudes towards the former aggressor. On the one hand, older people would feel uneasy when Singaporean leaders mentioned ‘learn from Japan’, but they would remain silent because they accepted their economic relationship with Japan.73 The news media’s reactions Governmental and public reactions provide only a partial picture of the repercussions the textbook controversies caused in other countries; this may be complemented by the news media’s reportage. First, in terms of the extent of newspaper coverage, it is evident that the 1982 dispute drew international attention. (See Appendix 6.5.) Although there was a discernible gap in quantitative terms between Asian newspapers, the thirty-four Asian newspapers under survey (except Chinese and South Korean newspapers) carried thirty-six articles on average between July and September in 1982. (As to the 1986 dispute, the gap between them was negligible since the total number was small).74 Among Asian newspapers, some carried more than 200 articles (Hong Kong and Singapore), while others had no more than twenty during the same three months. Where either governmental or non-governmental actors protested at Japan, the average number of articles per paper reached fifty-two. By country, Indonesian, Malaysian, Thai and Philippine newspapers carried fewer articles than Hong Kong or Singaporean papers. Second, in substantive terms, many newspapers directly mentioned controversial accounts in the Japanese schoolbooks and illustrated differences in the presentation and interpretation of historical events, by comparing either Japanese views and their views or the textbook manuscripts before and after authorization.

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Asian newspapers dealt with these accounts in detail; the Western news media tended to bring into focus major symbolic cases such as the ‘invasion/advance’ into China. For example, the Korean Central News Agency of North Korea gave the concrete details regarding the infringement of Korea’s diplomatic and administrative rights (or the Koreans’ acceptance of a ‘treaty’ as described in Japanese texts) and the confiscation of land (or ‘confirmation of land ownership’).75 It is also important to note that the tone of criticism in the press varied within the Asian region. For example, Thai and Indonesian accusations were, on the whole, somewhat reserved, compared with the expressions of outright indignation seen in the Hong Kong and Singaporean press. An editorial of the Bangkok Post said that an ‘often admirable nation’, having been an economic miracle, ‘is coming under well-deserved attack for a campaign to make its citizens forget what came before all this hard-won success’.76 In the case of Bulletin Today (later Manila Bulletin), most articles which were based on the Western Press simply reported the developments of the official disputes involving China and South Korea. Not unexpectedly, a number of articles compared the ‘two postwar periods’ of West Germany and Japan in terms of education, foreign policies and their attitudes towards the past and regional countries. They pointed out different approaches to the issue of history the two countries adopted. (These aspects will be dealt with in Chapter 7.) Finally, the local Asian media launched campaigns in various ways. Particularly in Hong Kong, the press played an active role in raising public awareness of the textbook issue, by broadcasting documentary films. For example, Hong Kong Television Broadcast (TVB), with the largest audience there, had on air a ninety-minute film including interviews with survivors of the Nanjing Massacre in midAugust in 1982. Documentary films such as ‘The Cruel War’ and ‘A Record of Blood’ (American and British films which featured the Nanjing Massacre and the Marco Polo Bridge incident) also drew public attention.77 In sum, the findings of the public reactions in China and South Korea have revealed their fierce indignation at the Japanese government’s practice of revising texts, though this outrage was expressed in varying degrees depending on their limited political freedom. Similarly, despite diverse repercussions — from formal government protests to private comments by officials, from large-scale mass demonstrations to subdued protests, and from local newspapers’ incessant coverage to occasional references, it has been shown that the textbook issue, crossing political or ideological divides, tapped into the long-subsumed but unhealed grievances of many Asian societies at that time. Apart from latent political calculations on the part of governments, many people in the region raised their voice in a genuine manner in protest at the rewriting of history textbooks by

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the Japanese government. In sharp contrast, Japanese public reactions were somewhat subdued, without any particular resurgence of either pro- or anti-government opinion, contrary to the Japanese news media’s strong opposition to the government. 6.3 THE ANALYSIS OF THE TEXTBOOK ISSUE (PART II)

Having presented an overview of the public reactions and the regional/cross-regional repercussions the 1982 and 1986 disputes triggered, this study will expound the case study findings in the light of the framework of analysis. Forcing the Japanese government and society to react to overseas criticisms over history textbooks, the disputes eventually revealed Japanese views and attitudes about Japan’s prewar/wartime conduct and provided useful pointers to the ‘consequences’ of history education. With the persistent pressure from Beijing and Seoul and with the extensive attention of other foreign capitals and non-governmental actors, the controversies continued to invite the question of how the future generation of Japanese would cope with regional and international relations and critically postulated the often unmentioned link between history education and international relations. What follows will focus on the major reference points the case study offers for Phase III (the formation of public dispositions) and the ‘Wider Context’ (the interplay between the domestic and external environments) in the framework. Finally, the chapter will examine how the Asian countries involved in the disputes perceived the link in question. Analysis III: The formation of public dispositions (Phase III) While assessing the extent of ‘influence’ is always a risky business, this study has sought to analyse the presumed consequences of history education by considering factors which could come into play in the mental constructs of students. The framework divided these factors into two dimensions: ‘Forming views about home and foreign states’ and ‘Learning lessons from the past’. But it must be noted that the textbook disputes did not deal squarely with the respective factors constituting these dimensions or the developmental views held by young people. Analysis III-a: Forming views about home and foreign states The framework allows us to approach the psychological dimension of ‘Forming views’ from the three perspectives: national identity, national pride and the trust and distrust of foreign countries and peoples. In the case study, the controversial accounts under review mainly concerned wartime incidents, and psychological factors naturally reverberated between the former aggressor and the victims. Nonetheless, for a great majority of the Japanese, young and old, the problem was not so much to accept or call into question one’s

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national membership, which can easily be defined due to geographical and linguistic factors (thus nationality and national identity virtually converge), as to agree on what is appropriate national identity for the Japanese. Thus, it does not seem that either the narratives of war with foreign countries or the explanations of primeval or premodern Japanese society particularly helped to construct national identity anew but to refine it in the minds of students. Nor does it seem that it is simply because of fears that the Japanese may lose their national character in more frequent cross-cultural and transnational contact, but because of the need to have a national identity with which Japanese people are at ease — probably more decent and not guilt-ridden. In this sense, a sense of national identity may overlap with that of national pride. (A relevant argument will be developed with reference to ‘educational considerations’ in the section of Analysis IV-a: the political culture approach below.) It is indeed in this context that the attitudes of the next generation of Japanese bureaucrats and businessmen, who were said to be more sympathetic to a notion of ‘a positive, rather than passive and introspective, nationalism’ which Prime Minister Nakasone proclaimed in the mid-1980s, should be assessed.78 The Asian Wall Street Journal commented in 1982 that LDP’s young party members were reportedly ‘less sensitive to formerly occupied countries’ feelings and more nationalistic than their elders’.79 This observation was being made despite Nakasone’s concern that, because of public memories of ultranationalism in wartime, the Japanese tended to place the state beyond their consciousness.80 Nor does it fit with the fact that the young Japanese generally do not associate with the prewar thinking of loyalty to the state and the emperor, unlike the older generation.81 Yet a young politicians’ group with a membership of over a hundred opposes the idea that Japanese history textbooks deal with ‘comfort women’.82 With regard to the trust and distrust of foreign countries and peoples, it is worth taking note of a survey conducted on Japanese adults in June 1982. It revealed that only 19 per cent and 1 per cent of the respondents thought that Japan should keep on good terms with China and South Korea respectively, while 34 per cent of them favoured the United States. (See Appendix 6.6.) On the other hand, another opinion poll that was conducted in South Korea showed that the South Koreans disliked Japan most among other countries. (See Appendix 6.2.) While this cannot be regarded as a clear indicator of trust and distrust, it at least shows ‘a psychological distance’ between Japan and the two neighbouring countries in the early 1980s. The other, cognitive dimension of ‘Forming views’ is pertinent to the specific information relating to the features of home and foreign states, and the framework has focused on the following three factors:

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autostereotypes and heterostereotypes, the awareness and understanding of issue-areas and national consciousness. Analysing the ‘legacy’ of Japan’s rule over Korea, two South Korean scholars touched upon the formation of the dispositions of the Japanese. Pointing towards the widespread national images reinforced over years, Lee Jin-hee (a Korean historian living in Japan) maintained that, because Japanese history textbooks were laced with a colonial view of history, Japanese people tended to believe Korea to be ‘a weak country’, which frequently suffered foreign invasion, ‘a trivial people’, ‘a country underdeveloped and barbarous’ and ‘a miserable country’.83 Similarly, hinting at the masses’ view of their collective identity and the relational aspect of national consciousness, Kim Hak-joon (Professor at Seoul National University) analysed Japan’s self-proclaimed spiritual and cultural superiority over Korea. He further elaborated on what he called ‘Japanese vanity’, tracing its origin back to the early Meiji period (the late nineteenth century) when the country, awakening from a long isolation, sought a model for development and modernization.84 In his view, Japan applied the ‘civilized’ systems imported from Europe to itself, while detaching itself from the ‘backwardness’ of the rest of Asia.85 Kim asserted that the Japanese had camouflaged the real aim of their rule over Korea by developing a type of Asian ‘white men’s burden’ and behaving like Europeans, who justified the invasion and colonization of Africa and Asia in the name of a duty to enlighten uncivilized peoples.86 Another factor that may affect the developmental views held by students is the awareness and understanding of issue-areas. While not strictly relating to the teaching of history, the 1982 dispute brought into focus the connection between issue-areas in combination with national stereotypes and national consciousness: economic assistance and war reparations. Sakamoto Yoshikazu (a member of the Japanese Committee of the Council of Japanese and Chinese Non-governmental Personages and Professor at Tokyo University) pointed out that some Japanese regarded Sino-Japanese cooperation as Tokyo offering assistance to Beijing, but forgot that Japan had greatly benefited from China’s contribution to its economic development. He maintained that war reparations (more than 300 million yen then) from China after the Sino-Japanese War (1894–95) had laid the foundation for the development of Japan’s capitalist economy and that China’s abandonment of reparations worth more than US $50 billion after the Second World War had equally helped the former aggressor to rebuild its economy.87 In fact, the People’s Daily warned as follows: ‘It is no exaggeration to say that, without the cooperation of the Asian countries, Japan could not be where it is.’ 88 Certainly, the issue of economic assistance to a large extent developed an established image of Japan as a donor country, hence a positive image. But the other issue, of war repara-

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tions, sidelined in Japan until recently, would definitely recall its negative image. Analysis III-b Learning lessons from the past The other aspect of the formation of public dispositions to which the framework alerts us is ‘Learning lessons’. In view of the settings in which students are situated, this study has hypothesized the three main factors which are likely to define a range of historical lessons they draw: the immediate relevance of students’ personal experience or their family’s; the commonality of students’ interest qua students; the climate of opinion; and vicarious experience. However, the textbook disputes did not necessarily make clear that Japanese students learned particular lessons from history because of these factors. (It is certainly arguable that the climate of opinion influenced their views but not to the extent of defining lessons to be learned. This point will be developed in the section on political culture below.) Rather, what the case study has revealed is counter-cases, in a double sense. First, Japan’s colonial rule and aggression, which the disputes mainly concerned, is a past becoming increasingly distant for the young Japanese, however important it may be in understanding national history. Year by year, the chances of students hearing about direct experiences of the Second World War are getting slimmer. Second and consequently, it is more likely that they fall short of learning almost any historical lessons from it. Certainly, many surveys continued to indicate the anti-militarist cast of the population after defeat. According to a survey conducted by Yomiuri Shimbun-Gallup Polls in May 1980, only about 20 per cent of the Japanese were prepared to fight for their country, if their country was invaded.89 Yet, beyond the general slogans of anti-war and antinuclear, what lessons the young generation extracted remains almost inscrutable. In fact, some critics pointed out the young Japanese’ indifference to national history up to 1945.90 In the mid1990s, one commentator noted ‘the queasy feeling’ about Japanese university students discussing the Second World War or any other conflict; he concluded that this came from their ‘studied avoidance of discussion’ about Japan’s policies in the 1930s and 1940s.91 Certainly, the ‘postwar generation of Japanese have not challenged their parents as did young Germans in the 1960s and 1970s’.92 In fact, according to the nationwide surveys conducted in the early 1990s on causes of the Sino-Japanese War (1937–45), 29 to 32 per cent of all the age groups (from twenties to over sixty-five) answered that it was fault of both countries, whereas 40 to 46 per cent of all the age groups said that it was Japan’s fault.93 It seems questionable that there is a wide generation gap on the war issue. The question of what might prevent the learning of lessons from the past now arises. One possibility concerns the scope and depth of

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the conception of the past. In this regard, Pat Murdo maintains that ‘the concern about influence [of the teaching of history] is as much a question today for the lack of detail that many postwar texts provided as was the indoctrination favouring military solutions before the war’.94 Commenting on the 1982 dispute, The Times said that the Japanese do not know enough in the first place to accept foreign condemnations of the nation’s militarist past.95 In 1986, a South Korean official claimed that the controversial textbook in question had simply made no mention of the Japanese colonial policies which had aimed to erase the features of traditional Korean culture.96 Another noted that the descriptions of the detailed processes leading to Japan’s annexation of Korea in 1910 fell far short of being satisfactory.97 Furthermore, towards the mid-1990s, political commentators and foreign officials began to question whether Japan’s pledge to teach young Japanese about its prewar/wartime conduct was taking effect. On the whole, their answers were negative. Generations of Japanese students were largely kept in the dark about the realities of Japan’s rule and about what its ‘advance’ actually entailed on the continent.98 The Independent of Britain pointed out that ‘an alarming number of Japanese under thirty years of age know little about the Pacific War, and some do not even know which country started it’.99 For the younger generation, the military past and ‘their forefathers’ misspent youth’ may be a foreign country, off limits.100 The Australian Prime Minister, Paul Keating, commented as follows: ‘I think we would like the Japanese people, particularly younger Japanese, to fully understand the ramification of the war, as in the telling of the history … Japan has to be more fulsome and complete in articulating its role during this period.’ 101 Then the real sin may be ignorance of the young Japanese. The other possibility in terms of hindering the learning of historical lessons has to do with the patterns of recognition, analysis and interpretation of specific realities. In fact, some of the patterns elaborated in the framework explain certain Japanese attitudes towards their recent history fairly well. What follows analyses the problematic patterns which were discernible among the Japanese, both decision-makers and the public. For example, the Japanese government’s tendency to postpone its judgement on the war can be regarded as a typical case of cognitive dissonance. Probably the most contentious problem embedded in the textbook issue is Japan’s acknowledgement of the war of aggression.102 From the onset of the first dispute, it was fairly plain to political observers, and perhaps to Japanese government officials themselves, that this issue could not be avoided.103 In fact, Chief Cabinet Secretary Miyazawa made the following comment (later reiterated by Prime Minister Suzuki):

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The Japanese government’s view is that the Second World War should not be repeated, but whether or not to call this war a war of aggression should be left to historians of the future generation. This has always been the Japanese government’s stance.104

It is not that Japanese political circles ignored the issue; on the contrary, the government and opposition parties repeatedly debated it at the Japanese Diet committees. Below is one of such exchanges between them: JSP: As to the past war, the Foreign Minister said that foreign countries regarded it as Japan’s aggression, a fact … Regarding the war which was mentioned in the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, do you think that it was Japan’s aggression, the war which inflicted enormous damage on Chinese people? This is very important. Foreign Minister: This is not an issue which can be described in simple terms. I think that Japan itself should not say what kind of war it fought or say this and that. Therefore, … Japan was severely criticized for fighting a war of aggression internationally, including China. This is a hard fact and the Japanese government should firmly recognize this fact.105

Despite his publicly stated concern over public opinion overseas in 1982, Foreign Minister Sakurauchi followed the majority of government officials.106 Towards the closing stage of the 1982 dispute, Education Minister Ogawa rather hesitantly admitted that Japan had fought a war of aggression and so did Prime Minister Suzuki at the House of Councillors’ Audit Committee (14 September 1982).107 None of the previous Prime Ministers or government officials had done so.108 Both disputes, however, ended without any clarification of the nature of the war by the Japanese government. The convenient logic that there might be another interpretation in the future other than the one currently accepted internationally allows the government to postpone its own judgement indefinitely and perpetuate cognitive dissonance.109 When this logic becomes accepted in teaching and learning at school, cognitive dissonance may persist in an institutionalized form and eventually result in a kind of political culture which suppresses any discussion of sensitive war issues.110 This study has also argued that a simple categorization of outcomes as successes or failures would impede learning from precedents. In this sense, to reduce the issue of war merely to the question of ‘whether or not to acknowledge aggression’ is simplistic too, if it ends there.111 In the Japanese case, it is not the question of jus ad bellum (a just war) nor jus in bello (a fair fight) to which the answer is obvious.112 Rather, the question should be interpreted as a first step

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towards further inquiries into all the relevant ramifications of Japan’s invasion.113 Japanese students would then be able to consider, for example, the implementing processes of Japan’s colonization and the harsh administrative policies which followed.114 They could also reflect on the treatment of prisoners of war and the notorious three commands — kill all, burn all and loot all (and another often unmentioned command — rape all).115 In this sense, a postwar Japanese slogan like ‘Ichioku Sozange’, which means that the entire Japanese population of hundred million should repent for losing the war en masse, overemphasizes the fact of defeat. At the same time it apparently simplifies the war Japan fought since it indiscriminately includes those who actually drove the country to war and millions of unknown soldiers and civilians, irrespective of their varying degrees of involvement in it.116 More importantly, by burying the past once and for all in this manner, such a slogan undermines serious attempts to bring complex realities to light. Dual-track thinking, based on both rational analysis and imagination-driven thinking, is also helpful in understanding some aspects of Japanese attitudes towards Emperor Hirohito, which constitute a crucial part of their views about the unsettling past.117 In late 1991, nearly three years after his death, a senior Japanese Foreign Ministry official conceded that: ‘The Emperor is at the heart of everything to do with the war. If we start to really examine the war we have to examine the role of the Emperor. For the government that is still impossible.’ 118 During the occupation, the US authorities eventually dropped an original plan to try him, which could have provoked widespread social unrest in a politically and economically confusing situation at that time, given the degree of the Japanese people’s emotional attachment to the divine figure.119 The image of ‘a deceived, innocent, peace-loving emperor’ was an essential unifying force and a political necessity.120 These judgements would certainly indicate rational reasoning, combined with political expediency. However, as a consequence, this image of an innocent figurehead was incorporated into the ‘new’ Japan; at the same time, the image conveniently led to a belief that ‘absolving the emperor also meant absolving the whole nation’.121 Throughout the postwar period, he remained out of public scrutiny and the discussion of his connection with the war became virtually taboo. Finally, a poor understanding of causal linkages or an absence of ‘why’ questions needs to be incorporated into one of the most difficult issues — Japanese views about the atomic bombs. It is understandable that Hiroshima and Nagasaki had such an immense impact on the minds of the population that it almost cancelled out what had gone before the bombs.122 Many schoolbooks included the symbolic photo of ‘mushroom clouds’. The earlier examination of the history syllabus has revealed that the issue of nuclear weapons

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and the prevention of war were emphasized. Still, many asked about the missing link: why do the Japanese focus on this tragedy without asking what had engendered it or reflecting on what the Japanese Imperial Army had perpetrated overseas, which took the lives of 20 million people? Indeed, their voice on the innumerable brutalities were surprisingly weak compared to that on the nuclear blasts. At the time of the dispute in 1982, Peter Ashley (an American political scientist) analysed the phenomenon as a new phase of nationalism, which gives great publicity to the horrors of the atomic bomb attacks on the one hand but blatantly deletes Japanese atrocities from their textbooks on the other.123 But it must also be stressed that this nationalistic thinking not only ignores a complex chain of reactions which took place between these two incidents but also vitiates the whole basis of historical study and learning in Japan. Analysis IV: The interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’) With all the three phases (the initial stage of government influence, the activities under government influence and the formation of public dispositions) having being considered, we now turn to the interactive aspects of the domestic and external environments. Analysis IV-a: The political culture approach This study has used the concept of political culture as one way of reintegrating the various domestic factors surrounding history education. With its capacity for synthesizing personal and collective history and analysing socio-political phenomena from both micro and macro ends, the concept gives us greater leverage in clarifying the crucial issues centring on Japan’s ambiguous stance on its wartime past. One such issue concerns the implications of historical facts for individual families. ‘Patriotism — or sense of belonging — is local, regional and often familiar rather than national in scale’.124 As long as the discussion is confined to the general subject of tarnished national history, it will not pose a bewildering question to the ordinary Japanese. Yet the more it touches upon factual details such as specific incidents, places, troops, divisions and personnel involved, the more uncomfortable it becomes to those who were involved and their immediate kin, except for those who were prepared to disclose the truth openly. The turbulent national past always poses the question of ‘who was involved in what during the war?’ at individual and familial levels. For decades after the war, many Japanese families must surely have suppressed unsettling feelings about relatives’ actual or possible involvement in atrocious and ignominious acts once debates on the war appeared in the national media (although these feelings may be receding in the background, because of the decreasing population of the war generation).125

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If so, it would not be difficult to conclude that family identity is a more immediate impediment in the objective treatment of the war than abstract patriotism or national identity, and it is very unlikely that politicians would probe into this most troublesome aspect of national history. Japanese political leaders’ comments about this family perspective were few and far between. Yet one Education Minister (Mori Yoshiro, Prime Minister April 2000-April 2001) spoke in a frank manner about Japanese soldiers’ behaviour and textbook accounts on the war at the Cabinet Committee in 1984. His comment is worth quoting at length: … My father was in Manchuria and eventually went to the Truk Islands and came back … When it comes to stories concerning Manchuria and other events during the war, I wonder what attitude my father took … My father was a General at that time … I wonder what judgement my father had made at that time and feel pain in my mind. I think the war made the Japanese people deeply reflect on the past in various ways. On the other hand, children nowadays do not know the past well. I do not disagree with Mr Uehara’s (a member of an opposition party) view that this should not be forgotten and should be remembered as the mental wounds for the rest of life. However, I wonder what impression children will have if they come to suspect that their grandfathers or great grandfathers may have been in Nanjing or elsewhere. For example, when children begin to talk about Mori’s grandfather who had been in Nanjing and they wonder whether his grandfather had done such things [italics added]. I wonder what they will think. We should renounce war and reproach ourselves for the war [we fought], and the Japanese should be profoundly responsible for this for life. But, as for practical issues such as the accounts concerning the war [in textbooks], we need to consider children’s position. I think this is what the director [of the MOE] calls educational considerations and I have the same view.126

In fact, this statement is very revealing as to the thinking behind the education authorities’ dealing with the textbook issue. In other words, the MOE sought to protect students from seeing their relatives or someone they know with suspicion and to maintain internal harmony in families, close communities and ultimately Japanese society as a whole.127 In this respect, Janet Hunter (an economic historian) analyses veneration in Japanese society: Any country would find it difficult to admit that so many of its people died in vain for a cause that was wrong. 128 As the previous chapter has argued with reference to political socialization, insular or inwardlooking thinking underlies the logic of ‘educational considerations’, and the family is as much a pillar of it as the state. Second, the concept of political culture brings to the fore Japanese

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attitudes towards their wartime history as a whole. The textbook disputes brought to light the government’s inability to come to terms with it. Yet it is more difficult to grasp Japanese people’s attitudes towards their burdensome past.129 In fact, Japanese society, until today, has been divided in many respects as to how to cope with its prewar/wartime record. And importantly, the sensitivity of these divides may have made Japanese people shy away from discussing the thorny issue in an open and critical manner, creating a social milieu of ‘meekness’. The most obvious divide appears on the political spectrum. The textbook issue illustrated one facet of the long-standing feud between the ruling LDP’s right-wing and the left-leaning Japan Teachers’ Union. However, a disturbing consequence of this divide was that the discussion of either the nature of the war or the responsibility for it was often shrouded in political antagonism; the right saw little reason to apologize for the country’s actions and the left generally blamed a militarist clique.130 Thus, the whole argument was obscured by the left-right political divide, with the issues of the historical facts left hanging in the air.131 Some also point to a dividing line between officialdom and the general public. Whereas large segments of Japanese people appeared to be gradually facing the seamy side of their national history, official Japan tended to indulge in war amnesia.132 In an opinion poll conducted by Asahi Shimbun in 1994, as to the question whether or not Japan did enough to compensate the peoples in its former colonies and the countries occupied by Japan during the Second World War, 72 per cent of respondents said ‘not enough’ as against 17 per cent who answered ‘enough’.133 According to the New York Times, opinion polls in 1995 showed that a majority of the Japanese thought that their government should show more remorse for the war.134 Yui Daizaburo (a historian) explains that the eventual return of Japan’s wartime leaders to power, including an imprisoned politician like Kishi Nobusuke (a minister who had supervised forced labour, but was later a leader of the LDP and Prime Minister) set the course in the postwar period, making it impossible for subsequent governments to question the past in a critical way.135 While the government continued efforts to heal scars on the Japanese psyche and to play down war-guilt, not all Japanese unquestioningly accepted an official version of national chronicles or a somewhat cleaner image of the country. On the one hand, an extremely powerful lobbying group of veterans and their families remained adamantly against any apology being made for the war, because they believed such an apology would dishonour the war dead.136 There were those who reproached ‘the “immoral-Japan” version of recent history’ and those who were preoccupied with the idea of Japanese uniqueness.137 Until today, some academics

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remained committed to campaigns against ‘masochistic’ national history presented by liberal and progressive historians.138 On the other hand, groups of Japanese scholars organized factfinding investigations in areas which Japanese troops had occupied. Individual researchers also revealed new evidence of Japan’s rampages during the war.139 Some of the former Japanese soldiers involved in atrocities also decided to speak in public. A separate group of bereaved families was set up in July 1986 (they do not support politicians’ controversial official visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, where class-A war criminals are commemorated with other war dead).140 A controversy over an exhibition on Japan’s role in the Second World War in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum caused yet another tug of war between conflicting groups, and again vividly illustrated the schism which exists in Japanese society.141 However, all these divisions seem for a long time to have reinforced evasive Japanese attitudes towards their past. While the country did not leave the issue of war untouched, there was not a strong urge in Japanese society until the 1990s to investigate the savage colonial enterprise and wartime brutalities for which the country was responsible and to analyse its prewar imperialism and militarism.142 Finally, as indicated in the above argument, the concept of political culture helps to explain the formation of opinion as an aggregate, cumulative process built on beliefs and attitudes at individual and intermediate levels. This approach corresponds to the ways in which China and South Korea analysed a particular political climate in Japan — or a revival of militarism to use their language.143 In his speech at the twelfth party congress (September 1982), Communist Party Chairman Hu Yaobang stated that ‘some forces in Japan … are carrying out various activities in an attempt to revive Japanese militarism’.144 In the wake of the second dispute, the People’s Daily noted that: … the forces that advocate and instigate aggression could consist of just a few people at the beginning but if their movements are neglected and winked at, they could develop into a disaster affecting millions of people. Therefore, even today countries in Europe are still continuing their pursuit of the fascists who have escaped unpunished while people in Asia are keeping close eyes over the revival of militarism.145

Since the first textbook dispute, China has repeatedly pointed out various worrying signs in Japan such as the ruling party’s campaigns to amend the Constitution, Cabinet Ministers’ visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, and Japan’s offer of military technologies to the United States in defiance of the spirit of the Constitution and a ban on the export of military weapons.146 Seoul’s concern about Japanese militarism was largely on the same lines. At bilateral foreign ministerial

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talks in 1986, Seoul placed on the agenda both the Education Minister’s controversial comments and some Cabinet members’ visits to the shrine at issue.147 It would be certainly naive to believe that China and South Korea envisaged that their former enemy would take the same old path to war again on the grounds of textbook revisions.148 Some may insist that what the continental neighbours branded as a revival of militarism was nothing more than pressure from the political right against liberal schoolbooks — a variant of neo-conservatism, or that the ruling LDP just revealed ‘its nationalist instincts’.149 But the Japanese government understood that the real issue for Beijing and Seoul was a political climate, more temporary in nature than political culture, in which militaristic or nationalistic thinking could be created relatively easily, even if it did not indicate a real prospect of militarism gaining ground in Japan.150 In this political climate, there prevailed a certain belief that patriotism can be taught at school. For some Japanese politicians, it was untenable to separate the objective understanding of national history from the realistic assessment of national security requirements. While the argument of political socialization has brought to light the entanglement of education and defence issues in the specific context of US-Japanese security dialogue, the concept of political culture points towards the broader and deeper background, whether instrumental views of education or more non-rational reasoning. Seen from foreign capitals, this peculiar political climate in Japan, even if transitory but potentially leading to a kind of political culture in the long run, smacked of an embryonic development of its old militarism. And its postwar democratic institutions did not appear to be sound enough to resist this disturbing trend or ‘some forces’.151 This made the Asian neighbours vigilant over any increase of Japan’s ‘defence’ capability. Analysis IV-b: Cross-border interactions While acknowledging that a society can hardly resist or reverse the flow of foreign influence indefinitely, this study has argued that its full-scale exposure to the outside world may not be so prevalent as it appears, depending on in which part of the world we live. Given that a great majority of population in the world receive primary and secondary education in their birth country, which inevitably reflects indigenous cultural tradition and value systems, and given that geographical, socio-economic and political circumstances still determine the pattern of communication across states, regions and cultural zones, this study has argued that mutual reinforcement between political culture and education may serve to integrate the domestic environment, while compartmentalizing the world into nation-states (or any other units). Seen in this way, it is little surprise

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that the dispositions that different nationalities develop may cause friction when they encounter each other. For example, the ways in which the textbook issue developed into the full-blown diplomatic disputes illustrate that there existed a striking perception gap between Tokyo and other Asian capitals about how they see national and foreign history, and more generally the issue of history. In the first place, the Japanese government totally underestimated the impact of the official certification of history textbooks on Asian countries. Few Japanese leaders seem to have thought about the international aspects of national history. Although the MOE could have anticipated foreign reactions from previous South Korean press coverage,152 its top officials stated as follows: Education Minister: What the MOE did in the textbook screening was not without reason, but we did not expect this situation [the dispute] at all … In our daily life, sometimes people offend others’ feelings without any intention. In this case, it must be explained that there was no intention and this must be understood. A bureaucrat of the MOE: It is difficult for us accurately to analyse and evaluate the cause of Chinese and South Korean dissatisfaction …153

While foreign criticisms met with very cool responses from Tokyo in this way, outspoken Cabinet members heated up the controversy at home and abroad. Both Beijing and Seoul were experiencing exacerbating dialogue with Tokyo. Such frustration was explicit in many commentaries. When they [Japanese officials in charge of screening textbooks] received a flood of protest from China and other Asian countries, including Japan itself, these Japanese officials pretend to be surprised and bewildered. Why? They ask. We really didn’t expect you to react so fiercely. Why? These things happened long ago, why haven’t you forgotten them? How can we forget our bitter ordeal under Japanese aggression?154

The perception gap in Sino-Japanese relations eventually surfaced at the top level. In a speech at the celebration of the tenth anniversary of their normalization (26 September 1982), which was held shortly after the first dispute, Premier Zhao Ziyang stated as follows: We in China have a saying: One ant hole may cause the collapse of a 1,000-li dike. We must further reinforce the great dike of Sino-Japanese friendly cooperation and protect it from any damage.155

In contrast, Prime Minister Suzuki’s speech contained the following passage which in the context sounded not just light-hearted but even ironic:

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It was something unimaginable ten years ago that the friendly cooperation and mutual understanding between our two countries would develop to such a depth and extent.156

Second, the perception gap was also apparent in the Japanese government’s initial handling of the issue as one of education administration. In fact, it was the MOE (and not the MOFA) that directly explained the situation to Chinese and South Korean embassies.157 Interestingly, according to one newspaper, Japanese Education and Foreign Ministries for the first time worked together to deal with a dispute involving foreign countries, although the latter had on many occasions liaised with the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) and the Finance Ministry. This seems to illustrate the unusual collision of domestic and foreign environments in the area of education.158 Tokyo even attempted to solicit understanding from both capitals by explaining the authorization system (which the Japanese decision-makers thought might have been misunderstood).159 In fact, Tokyo’s primary concern was the forthcoming summit meeting in Beijing (mentioned above) and the ongoing negotiations about loans with Seoul. However, for both of Japan’s neighbours, the issue was non-negotiable. For Seoul, it had to do with ‘the national pride and just cause’.160 It was undoubtedly a top priority which surpassed all time constraints.161 Vice-Foreign Minister Roe Jae-won stated explicitly that Seoul would not trade the ultimate goal of correcting Japanese history textbooks for its much needed loans from Tokyo ($4 billion).162 Indeed, Seoul did not have to save national prestige at the cost of economic benefit or seek recourse in linkage strategies on this occasion.163 For the Koreans, the Japanese rule was their ‘holocaust’.164 One South Korean official, who declined to be identified, voiced the following: I’m really afraid the Japanese don’t understand how serious this is. This is something that the people feel deeply, and it’s not going to go away unless the Japanese do something about it. I hope they do come to understand.165

A newspaper columnist deplored the situation as follows: The tragedy is that the Japanese may be innocent after all: Understanding their neighbours’ anger may be beyond their comprehension. The world perceived by them is different from that seen by others … We know that extreme mental isolation can produce such a state.166

For the first time since the normalization of bilateral relations in 1965, President Chun Doo-hwan made mention of detailed Japanese

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atrocities in Korea at a national address during the 1982 dispute.167 Like Seoul, Beijing in principle rejected the idea of a trade-off between the issue of history and national dignity, and economic aid from Tokyo. For China, the war against Japan denoted three things domestically: a struggle to build a nation-state, a struggle for liberation and the process of formation of Maoism.168 And the promotion of patriotism was considered as a basis for ideological and political education in the process of constructing a socialist state.169 China was apparently anxious to limit the impact of the first dispute on its vital relations with its largest trading partner.170 Still, the core problem concerned the fundamental principle of independence about which compromise was inconceivable.171 While presenting education as an institution guarding members of a state against cross-border influence, the framework leads us to consider how the institution of education in one state can interact with that in another. In this regard, the textbook disputes showed that both interstate and transnational educational cooperation have a long way to go when dealing with politically sensitive issues of national history. In this case, wholesome and open dialogue across boundaries of states and long-term educational coordination proved very difficult in practice. During the 1982 dispute, South Korea indicated that it would ‘help’ Japan to rectify historical accounts; Seoul sent a list of corrections to Tokyo and proposed joint research between Korean and Japanese historians. However, the South Korean Education Minister made cautious remarks to the effect that external pressure would be vital to set the historical record straight, maintaining that the criticisms made by Japanese intellectuals and citizens against their government alone could not influence the majority of the population.172 At the same time, South Korea also announced a modification of some history courses in order to teach its students more about Japan’s invasion. Taiwan gave its schools similar instructions; so did Singapore. In fact, these moves are indicative more of a spirit of retaliation than of cooperation. It is not, however, that the first dispute ended fruitlessly. Faced with all the chain reactions in the region and the bewildering talks with Beijing and Seoul, the MOE eventually agreed to amend some accounts in line with the South Korean correction list. The Japanese textbook screening standards were modified to refer to a spirit of international understanding and international cooperation. Two Japanese officials also commented about including war victims’ stories in teaching materials: Chief Cabinet Secretary: With the passage of time, those who inflicted damage are likely to forget the victimized, although they should not. This dispute questioned our reflection on this point in the form of criticism over textbooks. The Japanese government should reflect on this fully …173

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Education Minister: We self-criticize that we did not give sufficient considerations to the national feelings of foreign countries …174

Despite its apparent resistance to external interference, the Japanese government was unable wholly to ignore foreign opinion. Furthermore, neither Chinese nor South Korean criticisms of Japanese history texts were one-off diplomatic protests. Both countries continued to pay attention to the content of Japanese schoolbooks after the 1982 dispute. Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Wu Xueqian gave the Japanese government the following reminder: We will judge whether the Japanese side conscientiously correct the mistakes in the textbooks by its concrete actions and their effects. We reserve our right to comment on this matter.175

Similarly, South Korean Culture and Information Minister Lee mentioned ‘systematic and long-term measures’ to rectify wrong accounts of Korean-Japanese relations.176 In fact, the investigation of foreign textbooks was not the first time for South Korea, and the Japanese case should be understood as part of its long-term worldwide efforts. Vice Foreign Minister Roh Jae-won revealed that his government had collected 2,612 schoolbooks from forty-seven countries since 1975 and found distortions and erroneous accounts in 586 textbooks from thirty-four countries, and that its Education Ministry had requested foreign authorities to make appropriate corrections.177 Although the diplomatic protests did not address the problem beyond the Asian region, Chinese and South Korean officials adumbrated a version of world history based on more multinational approaches.178 Furthermore, their lingering concern over history education in Japan eventually led to bilateral joint research with Japanese scholars in later years. (These points will be further explored in the next chapter.) Analysis IV-c: The link perceived by the Asian countries involved in the disputes Before concluding the analysis of the disputes in the 1980s, it is necessary to reflect more broadly on how the link between history education and international relations worked in the case study. While the previous and current chapters have analysed the textbook issue in the light of the phases and components of the framework, this study would benefit from a holistic approach, by examining the ways in which the countries and peoples involved in the diplomatic disputes generally perceived the link in question. The answer seems quite evident in the case of Beijing and Seoul from their official demands. With South Korea being more articulate about this point than China, both maintained that the perception

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and understanding of the past formed through a ‘sanitized’ version of events taught at school would be detrimental to Japan’s foreign relations in the long term.179 The following statement illuminates Seoul’s understanding of the link under consideration: It is our conviction that a correct understanding of the history of Korean-Japanese relations is fundamental to the building of goodneighbourly and friendly relations of cooperation between the two countries on the principles of reciprocity, equality and mutual respect. In that spirit, we expect that through Japan’s incessant endeavour to correct misunderstandings of history, this affair will be turned into a stimulus for wholesome development of the future relations between the two countries.180

South Korean Education Minister Rhee more concretely projected the connection: If contents of the textbooks for students in a nation are indicative of militarism, that country, for sure, will provoke a war twenty to thirty years later. That is why Japanese attempts to distort historical facts in the textbooks are drawing our concern.181

On the other hand, the Chinese authorities, although by no means dismissive of the link in question, tended to place more emphasis on the immediate impact of the historical presentations in Japanese schoolbooks on diplomatic relations than on a remote, future connection. In their rhetoric, Japan’s dubious educational practice was ‘a major question of principle’ and ‘a provocation and threat’.182 Otherwise, their understanding of the link is similar to the Koreans. The editorial of the People’s Daily on the thirty-seventh anniversary of VJ day noted: Some people in Japan … are taking a series of noticeable steps in an attempt to make the Japanese people, especially the younger generation, forget the history of Japanese aggression against China and other Asian and Pacific nations, trying again to lead them astray to the old path of militarism.183

Other Asian countries also pointed to an important role which history education plays in terms of learning lessons from the past, and its potential consequences in regional and ultimately international relations; at the same time, they expressed their concerns over the behaviour of the younger generation of the Japanese who were left largely ignorant of the country’s contemporary history.184 These are set out in the table below.

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Comments Hinting at the Link between History Education and International Relations (including both those made at the time of the textbook disputes and those made in later years) Taiwan • Vice Education Minister Li Mou: ‘if the truth of history is altered, our offsprings will never learn the facts and eventually may commit the same mistakes their ancestors did’.185 North Korea • The Workers’ Party paper Rodong Sinmun (Labour Newspaper): ‘In singing praise to the past aggressive history of the Japanese imperialists, the Japanese authorities try to imbue the children and young with militarist consciousness and aggressive ideas and thereby lead them along the road of aggressive war, justify their line of militarisation and expansionist policy, and, further, realise the old dream of the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”.’ 186 Malaysia • PM Mahathir Mohamad in an interview with Asahi Shimbun (26 August 1982): if Japan did not deal properly with the military expansion during the Second World War, the Japanese would think that they were not responsible for it and many killings and atrocious acts in the past, and they would regard wars positively and might go to war again.187 Philippines • Foreign Minister Carlos P. Romulo with an interview with NHK Hong Kong (4 September 1982): the textbook controversy ‘has disturbed Philippine thinking on the probable directions of Japan’s future relations with Asia’. Japan’s textbook revisions may be ‘an omen, a dangerous tendency to alter the status of Japanese military invasion in occupied countries …’ and to ‘change the thinking of young Japanese so that they may accept certain policies of the past heretofore condemned’.188 Singapore • Lee Kuan Yew (former Prime Minister): ‘If they [the Japanese] are not willing to confront the past and educate their children on what happened, instead of sloughing it off as an “advance into south-east Asia”, it means that a younger generation of Japanese would be less reluctant, if pushed, to take the military road.’ 189 The United States • One former US diplomat: ‘… the generation now coming to power has little appreciation for the hostility that Japan’s former enemies still harbor,

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little gratitude for US postwar assistance, and less aversion than current leaders to setting Japan on an arrogant or imperialistic path once again. “This new generation has only known prosperity, and the things Japan has done by itself, and they don’t feel beholden in any way”.’ 190

Finally, what lay behind their perception of the link may need consideration. On the Chinese and South Korean sides, their alertness over history education in Japan in the 1980s was thanks to the lessons they had learned ‘at the cost of blood’ during the prewar and wartime years.191 Indeed, the textbook issue brought back to the Chinese and South Koreans their vivid memory of militaristic education in prewar Japan and what had followed it. The People’s Daily warned that an attempt to conceal the brutal side of history was not a new measure but a move which Japan had taken during the prewar years.192 The official daily also linked the brutality of Japanese troops to the militarist education system which had ‘deeply poisoned’ some Japanese.193 The monthly Chinese journal People’s Education recalled that prewar militarist education first began in schools.194 On the South Korean side, a columnist of The Korea Herald, Lee Won-sul echoed the point: History attests to the fact that the Japanese invasion of Manchuria took place immediately following the revision of history textbook upholding the mystic principles of kokutai (Japan’s nationhood) and tenno (emperor). By the same token, during the 1930s, Japanese history books were again revised to stress the concept of the Great[er] Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, and then, the Pearl Harbor tragedy ensued.195

Xiang Zhejun (a former prosecutor of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo) pointed out in an interview with Xinhua News Agency that: The verdict [of the Tribunal] contained special records showing the Japanese government at the time carried out military exercises in colleges and schools and imbued the youngsters with militarist ideology to prepare them for the war.196

On the other hand, the Japanese government’s attitude towards the whole discussion of the link in question was lukewarm, if not impervious. Japanese decision-makers were certainly not unaware of it; rather, it should be said that they knew it too well. But it is doubtful that it perceived the link in the same way as its Chinese and South Korean counterparts did, i.e. as something which signifies a long-term corner-stone of foreign policy. Moving towards the settlement of the first dispute, Tokyo announced the Miyazawa Statement. To repeat it here:

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• The Japanese government and people, keenly aware of the sufferings and damage which Japan inflicted on the peoples of Asian countries including South Korea and China, have followed the path of a peaceloving nation, determined not to reiterate the past deeds. • There is no change in the understanding of the South KoreanJapanese Joint Communiqué of 1965 and the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement of 1972. The spirit of these statements should be reflected in school education and in textbook screening in Japan.

However, apart from pronouncing a spirit of international understanding and cooperation in new textbook authorization, the Education Ministry never officially clarified its fundamental policies about the treatment of the most contentious issues of bilateral relations in the past, i.e. exactly what the above statement stipulated — the sufferings and damage which Japan had inflicted. It is not difficult to find reasons for the Japanese government’s lukewarm attitude. Since the government itself did not go beyond the indirect recognition of foreign criticisms of its militarist and expansionist past, it dared not consider the link under consideration that would inevitably force it to look back on Japan’s prewar/wartime conduct. Furthermore, if the Japanese government had a problem with the self-portrait of its past, the ‘educational considerations’ which the MOE proclaimed were based essentially on inward-looking thinking. The more immediate aim for the Ministry was to preserve ‘harmony’ in the family, and perhaps in Japanese society as a whole. But that is where their concern over history education seems to have ended. Finally, the fact that Japan’s relations with its neighbours were conspicuously tilted towards trade and economic cooperation and not fully developed in other areas in the 1980s, may be another reason. CONCLUSION

This chapter has surveyed the public reactions and regional/crossregional repercussions which followed the diplomatic disputes in the 1980s. The extent and thrust of reactions reflecting the voice of people greatly differed between Japan, and South Korea and China, indicating a significant gap between their perceptions of the problem. Furthermore, Beijing and Seoul were not alone, questioning history education in Japan and its implications for regional and international relations. The textbook issue tapped into the longsubsumed, unhealed grievances of many Asian societies and beyond, across political and ideological divides. The chapter has also analysed the controversies with reference to the conceptual framework, namely the third phase which corresponds to the ‘consequences’ of history education (i.e. the receiving end of historical knowledge), and the interactive aspects of the

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domestic and external environments. As to ‘Forming views’, Japanese national identity and the national stereotypes of South Korea and Japan have been analysed. In ‘Learning lessons’, the case study has pointed out the lack of historical details in Japanese education and the indifference of young Japanese to the distant past. In this connection, the scope and depth of the conception of the past has been considered as a factor obstructing the learning of historical lessons. The other four factors relating to the patterns of recognition, analysis and interpretation have also been considered: cognitive dissonance (e.g. Japan’s merely theoretical acknowledgement of the aggressive war); a simple categorization of outcomes (e.g. the reduction of the issue of war merely to the question of whether or not to acknowledge aggression); dual-track thinking (e.g. the role of the Emperor in the war); and a poor understanding of causality (e.g. one-sided Japanese views of the atomic bombs). The concept of political culture has proved useful in understanding ambiguous Japanese attitudes towards their wartime past. It explains the implications of national history for individual families and Japanese attitudes towards the tumultuous past as a whole. China and South Korea also drew attention to an aggregate, cumulative process of the formation of public opinion, warning against various domestic movements and a particular political climate in Japan. In the discussion of cross-border interactions, the framework has presupposed integration at the national level and fragmentation at the international level. Illuminating a striking perception gap between China and South Korea on the one hand and Japan on the other, the textbook rows emerged as a case of conflictual interactions. While the case study has revealed the difficulties over educational cooperation between states, especially when politically delicate issues are involved, it has also pointed out some positive results in the wake of the 1982 and 1986 disputes and the opening of communication channels on the thorny issue between Beijing/Seoul and Tokyo. Finally, the chapter has reflected on how the countries involved in the textbook disputes perceived the link between history education and international relations, which indicated their different political understanding of it. Having examined the diplomatic disputes over Japanese history textbooks with reference to the whole framework of analysis, the case study has now been concluded. Nonetheless, as indicated earlier, the controversies in the 1980s were never closed to the satisfaction of any concerned parties, and the issue of history in fact continued to smoulder under the surface between Japan and its neighbours, well into the next century. The next chapter will look at what has happened since the textbook rows in the 1980s, with particular focus on cross-border interactions.

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History Education and International Relations NOTES

1

2 3 4 5 6

7 8

9 10 11 12 13 14

15

16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23

See Katzenstein and Tsujinaka’s explanation about the external pressure applied to immobilism in the Japanese political system and the internal pressure rarely operative in the system. Peter J. Katzenstein and Tsujinaka Yutaka, ‘“Bullying”, “Buying”, “Binding”: US-Japanese Transnational Relations and Domestic Structures’, in Thomas Risse-Kappen (ed.), Bringing Transnational Relations Back In: Non-state Actors, Domestic Structures and International Institutions, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995, p. 89. CD, 27.7.82, p. 4. XHNA, 5.8.82, pp. 4–5 and FT, 17.7.86, p. 3. XHNA, 16.8.82, pp. 3–5. D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 7, a JCP member’s comment. Given tight government control over news and civic activities in China and South Korea in the 1980s, some inference must be made between the government’s use of the press and the officially sanctioned freedom of public speech and activities. In China, the publication of views unacceptable to the Chinese authorities was hardly possible. To a lesser extent, this was true of South Korea where the media were under close government guidance, although formal censorship ended in January 1982. AP, 28.8.82. XHNA, 24.7.82, p. 3. XHNA, 3.8.82, p. 5. For the comments made by Chinese educationalists and academics, see Beijing Review, vol. 25, no. 31, 1982, p. 10 and Asian Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Chugoku Geppo (China Monthly), July 1982, p. 14 and August 1982, pp. 22–4. XHNA, 4.8.82, pp. 4–5. XHNA, 14.8.82, p. 14. KT, 31.7.82, p. 2. AP, 13.8.82 and 14.8.82. AS, M.13.8.82, p. 3. AP, 28.8.82. For example, riot police were immediately called in to break up unauthorized student demonstrations which criticized the Seoul government and the United States as well as the revision of Japanese textbooks. Lee Do-sung, ‘Japanese-South Korean Relations from the Viewpoint of Japanese People’, in the Director-General for Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau, the Minister’s Secretariat, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Gaikoku Hodo Kisha no Mita Nihon no Sugata (Japan in the Eyes of Foreign Journalists), Tokyo, 1985, p. 4. KT, 31.7.82, p. 2. KT, 30.7.82, p. 8, 10.8.82, p. 8 and 11.8.82, p. 8. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies) (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku (South Korea in 1982)’, in Ajia Chuto no Doko Nempo (Annual Report of the Developments in Asia and the Middle East), 1983, p. 40. KT, 13.8.82, p. 8 and AP, 13.8.82 and 14.8.82. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, 1983, p. 38. KT, 11.8.82, p. 8. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, 1983, p. 39. KH, 12.8.82, p. 8. A resolution adopted by the WCOTP implicitly criticized the distortion of historical facts in schoolbooks without naming Japan, just mentioning the abuse of textbooks by governments in ‘some countries’. See also KH, 18.8.82, p. 8.

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Japanese History Textbook Disputes in 1980s (Part II) 24 25 26 27 28

29 30 31

32 33

34 35 36 37 38

39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47

48 49 50 51 52

53

193

KT, 14.8.82, p. 6. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, 1983, p. 39. Ibid., p. 40. KT, 30.7.82, p. 1. South Korean newspapers carried shocking pictures of independence fighters executed as well as those depicting the destruction of historical sites and the rounding up of Korean women for brothels for Japanese troops. AP, 13.8.82 and FT, 25.8.82, p. 3. KT, 27.7.82, p. 1. Ibid. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Kankoku’, 1983, p. 38. According to Park Kyung-suk (Korean Deputy Secretary General of the League), the League discussed the issue during its general session in 1981. KT, 5.8.82, p. 1. About the Chairman’s plan to build a monument to the founding of Manchukuo, see XHNA, 24.8.82, p. 8. KT, 30.7.82, p. 1. Chang Sung-tae (Secretary General of the Committee) disclosed that the Committee already talked about the textbook issue in a general session in Tokyo in March 1982. KT, 31.7.82, p. 1 and 4.8.82, p. 1. KH, 5.8.82, p. 1 and 6.8.82, p. 1. KT, 25.8.82, p. 1. KT, 31.7.82, p. 2 and 5.8.82, p. 1. KT, 28.7.82, p. 1. A brief summary of Japanese newspapers’ coverage of the 1982 dispute and criticisms by Japanese citizens’ groups is given in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, August 1982, pp. 12–13. See AS, E, 19.8.82, p. 1 and AS, M, 27.8.82, p. 2. KT, 30.7.82, p. 1. KT, 1.9.82, p. 1 and 4.12.82, p. 1. KT, 17.8.82, p. 2. IT, 23.8.82, p. 7 and AS, M, 22.8.82, p. 22. KT, 1.8.82, p. 1. XHNA, 6.8.82, p. 9 and KT, 1.8.82, p. 1. XHNA, 11.8.82, pp. 9–10. At a meeting with the Education Minister (23 July 1982), the Chairman of the Japan Teachers’ Union was reported to have called for the correction of controversial texts. KT, 25.7.82, p. 1. XHNA, 6.8.82, pp. 9–10 and 9.9.82, p. 6. KH, 22.8.82, p. 1. See Note 32 above. AS, M.9.8.82, p. 6. As for transnational politics, especially horizontal interactions between national systems and vertical interactions between society and the government, see Karl Kaiser, ‘Transnational Relations as a Threat to the Democratic Process’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 359. Newspaper sources used in this chapter are partly supplemented by news summaries of the BBC, the Associated Press and Reuters News. This study examined the news sources from June to December in 1982 and from June to September in 1986 when the two textbook disputes were at the peak.

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54 Beijing (UPI, AP), BP, 2.8.82 and Taipei (AP, KNI), IT, 5.8.82. Japan severed diplomatic ties with Taiwan in 1972 when it normalized its relations with China. With North Korea, Japan has had no diplomatic relations since the Second World War. Apart from the overseas reactions and repercussions mentioned in the chapter, another two were possibly linked to the 1982 dispute. At the Human Rights Subcommittee of the United Nations in Geneva on 24 August 1982, a British representative severely criticized Japan’s bacteriological experiments on human beings during the Second World War. See AS, M.26.8.82, p. 3. Similarly, a US representative submitted a resolution at the same subcommittee (2 September 1982), calling for a disclosure of the bacteriological experiments. But this resolution was rejected at a vote on 7 September because India and Pakistan said that, given many other incidents which happened during the war, it was not appropriate to expose the incidents involving Japan. See AS, E.8.9.82, p. 2. 55 It is not clear whether there was some form of exchanges between Pyongyang and Tokyo governments, for example, through informal channels such as North Korean residents in Japan. 56 Beijing (UPI), BP, 10.7.86. 57 Seoul (AP, KNI), IT, 9.9.82. 58 See AP, 31.7.82. 59 Beijing (AFP, AP), ST, 8.8.82 and Pyongyang (Rodong Sinmun), BP, 28.8.82. 60 TWP, 28.7.82. According to The Straits Times, Reuters reported South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan renewed his proposal for talks with North Korean leader, Kim Il-sung about possible reunification of two Koreas. President Chun did not directly mention the textbook row but did recollect the colonial rule under Japan. 61 As for the other four members at that time, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, only a few officials’ comments are on record. 62 Quoted in AS, M.14.6.86, p. 3. 63 Taipei (Reuters, 5.8.82), ST, 6.8.82. 64 ST, 22.8.82. 65 NYT, 10.7.86. 66 As for North Korea, some criticisms against the Japanese history textbooks came from academic circles in late July and early August, and protest letters from workers were publicized in various newspapers in mid-August. See Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (ed.), ’1982 Nen no Chosen Minshushugi Jinmin Kyowakoku (North Korea in 1982)’, 1983, p. 76. 67 Hong Kong (Reuters, AP), BP, 19.9.82. 68 Hong Kong (AP, KNI), IT, 20.9.82. 69 The Asian Wall Street Journal, quoted in ST, 27.9.82. 70 AP, 17.9.82 and NYT, 19.9.82. 71 AP, 18.1.83. 72 IT, 7.10.82. 73 ST, 9.8.82. See, for example, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, ‘ASEAN Shokoku ni Okeru Seron Chosa (Opinion Polls in ASEAN Countries)’, 1978– 79, 1983, 1987 and 1992. 74 These figures are based on those provided by Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies, Tokyo). See Appendix 6.5. 75 A comment quoted in SWB, 26.10.94. 76 BP, 10.8.82. 77 Hong Kong, 3.9.82, ST, 4.9.82.

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78 FT, 17.7.86. 79 The Asian Wall Street Journal, quoted in ST, 27.9.82 80 Prime Minister Nakasone’s policy speech at the Diet (24 January 1983) in Diplomtatic Bluebook, 1983, p. 379. 81 TIM, 7.8.85. For an earlier survey on Japanese attitude towards the rest of the world, see Watanuki Joji, Politics in Postwar Japanese Society, Tokyo, University of Tokyo Press, 1977, pp. 137–60. 82 The group’s membership consisted of eighty-four Dietmen of the House of Representatives and twenty-three of the House of Councillors, in total 107 in November 1997. See Nihon no Zento to Rekishi-kyoiku o Kangaeru Wakate Giin no Kai (A Group of Young Dietmen Concerned with Japan’s Future and History Education) (ed.), Rekishi Kyokasho eno Gimon (Doubts over History Textbooks), Tokyo, 1997. See also Tawara Yoshifumi, Kyokasho Kogeki no Shinso (The Depths of Criticisms over Textbooks), Tokyo, Gakushunotomosha, 1997. 83 KH, 31.7.82, pp. 1 and 8. 84 KH, 31.7.82, p. 3. 85 Ibid. The argument is similar to the ancient Greek view of barbarians in the Orient. See Vilho Harle, ‘European Roots of Dualism and its Alternatives in International Relations’, in Vilho Harle (ed.), European Values in International Relations, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1990, pp. 5–6. 86 KH, 31.7.82, p. 3. See also Christopher W.A. Szpilman, ‘The Dream of One Asia: Okawa Shumei and Japanese Pan-Asianism’, in Harald Fuess (ed.), The Japanese Empire in East Asia and Its Postwar Legacy, München, Iudicium, 1998, pp. 49–63. 87 XHNA, 8.10.82, p. 4. 88 XHNA, 4.9.82, pp. 10–12. As for economic cooperation between Japan and other Asian countries, see Reinhard Drifte, Japan’s Foreign Policy, London, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Routledge, 1990, p. 97; Inada Juichi, ‘Japan’s Aid Diplomacy: Economic, Political or Strategic’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 18, no. 3, 1989, pp. 399–414; and Robert M. Orr, The Emergence of Japan’s Foreign Aid Power, New York, Columbia University Press, 1990. 89 In the same survey, 34% of respondents answered that they would resist invasion by non-military measures; 24% and 7% said that they would evacuate to a safe place and would surrender respectively. See Defense Agency of Japan, Nippon no Boei (Defense of Japan), 1981, p. 262. In 1991, The Times reported that a mere 10% of the Japanese people were ready to take arms for their nation, compared with 70% in the United States. TIM, 1.12.91. 90 See KT, 5.9.82, p. 2. 91 NYT, 2.7.95. 92 FT, 6.12.91. 93 Watanuki Joji, ‘Political Generations in Post World War II Japan — With Some Comparisons to the Case of Germany’, Institute of International Relations Research Papers, Series A-64, Institute of International Relations, Sophia University, Tokyo, 1995, p. 6. 94 Pat Murdo, ‘Textbook Controversies in Japan: How Dead Are They?’, in Thomas Rholen and Christopher Björk (eds), Education and Training in Japan, Volume I, London and New York, Routledge, 1998, p. 245. 95 TIM, 12.8.85. 96 KH, 8.7.86, p. 1.

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History Education and International Relations Kwon Byong-hyun (Director-General for Asian Affairs of the Foreign Ministry)’s comment. KH, 11.7.86, p. 3. TWP, 16.8.93. For a survey of elementary to high school students’ views about modern and contemporary history, see Nikkan Rekishi Kyokasho Kenkyukai (the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks), ‘Dai Sankai Nikkan Godo Rekishi Kenkyukai (The 3rd Joint Meeting for South Korean-Japanese History Textbooks Research)’, September 1992, pp. 80–1. IND, 22.3.93. TIM, 27.4.92. AP, 9.4.94. This issue dragged on well into the mid-1990s. As for the awkward handling of a parliamentary apology in the summer of 1995, see NYT, 7.6.95. In fact, similar issues were negotiated at the normalization of diplomatic relations with Seoul (1965) and Beijing (1972). See D-96-HC, ED, 19.8.82, p. 4, D-96-HC, FA, 19.8.82, p. 19, D-96-HC, BUD, 14.9.82, p. 16, a JSP member’s comment and p. 20. At the time of drafting the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, both parties were in sharp disagreement over the inclusion of the term invasion/aggression. The Chinese side eventually compromised, and the word did not appear in the text of the Statement. See AS, M.5.9.82, p. 2. About this exchange between Premier Zhou Enlai and Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei, see D-102-HR, BUD, 25.2.85, p. 16, a DSP member’s comment. As to a comment by a Foreign Ministry official who was involved in this negotiation, see D-96-HR, FA, 30.7.82, p. 3. As for a similar exchange which took place between Seoul and Tokyo at the time of normalization, see D-96-HR, FA, 20.8.82, p. 5, a MOFA official’s comment and a JSP member’s comment. D-96-HR, FA, 30.7.82, p. 11. See also XHNA, 1.9.82, pp. 20–1 and 26.8.82, p. 3. D-96-HR, FA, 9.8.82, pp. 2–3 and 16. The JCP reviewed the exchange between his party and then Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei on this point. See D-96-HC, SEC, 10.8.82, pp. 17–18, a JCP member’s comment and D-96-HR, FA, 20.8.82, p. 19. D-96-HC, SEC, 10.8.82, p. 12. There were also those who opposed the correction of schoolbooks, although acknowledging Japan’s aggression of China. They preferred to deal with the correction of texts within the existing educational administrative framework at a later date. AS, E.18.8.82, p. 1. AS, M.15.9.82, p. 1. D-96-HR, ED, 6.8.82, pp. 18–19. After the 1982 dispute, Prime Minister Nakasone admitted that it was a war of aggression in 1983. See D-98-HR, BUD, 18.2.83, p. 3. According to the People’s Daily (21 February 1983), this was the first acknowledgement by the Japanese Prime Minister after the war. See AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, February 1983, p. 11. D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 4, a JCP member’s comment. Irving L. Janis, Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decision and Fiascoes, 2nd ed., Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1982, pp. 174–97. If colonialism is a permanent aggression, the answer leads to the same argument. As for Indian Defence Minister Krishna Menon’s definition of colonialism, see NYT, 20.12.61. See, for example, Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations, New York, Basic Books, 1977, pp. 21–47.

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113 Tsurumi Kazuko, ‘Japan and Holy War’, Institute of International Relations Research Papers, Series A-60, 1995. 114 See, for example, Kobayashi Hideo, Nihon Gunseika no Ajia: ‘Daitoa-kyoeiken’ to Gumpyo (Asia under Japanese Military Rule: ‘Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere’ and Military Notes), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1993. 115 Qian Duansheng (a legal scholar and a political scientist) listed the four commands. CD, 8.8.82, p. 4. See, for example, Watanabe Kazuko, ‘Militarism, Colonialism, and Trafficking of Women: “Comfort Women” Forced into Sexual Labor for Japanese Soldiers’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, vol. 26, no. 4, 1994, pp. 3–16 and George Hicks, The Comfort Women, St Leonards, NSW, Allen & Unwin, 1995. See also Tanaka Yuki, Hidden Horrors: Japanese War Crimes in World War II, Boulder, Colorado, Westview Press, 1996. 116 D-103-HR, FA, 13.12.85, p. 4, a JSP member’s comment. 117 As for Emperor Hirohito, see, for example, Stephen S. Large, Emperor Hirohito and Showa Japan: A Political Biography, London and New York, Routledge, 1992 and Takeda Kiyoko, The Dual-image of the Japanese Emperor, Basingstoke, Macmillan Education, 1988. 118 FT, 6.12.91. 119 IND, 7.1.89. In effect, at the time of the general election in April 1946, the political parties standing for the emperor system obtained more than 95% of votes. Okubo Genji, The Problems of the Emperor System in Postwar Japan: Surveyed from an Examination of Arguments on the Subject, Tokyo, Nihon Taiheiyo Mondai Chosakai (The Japan Institute of Pacific Studies), 1947, pp. 75–6. For a comprehensive review of the postwar domestic debate on the emperor system, see Watanabe Osamu, Sengo Seiji-shi no Naka no Tennosei (The Emperor System in Postwar Political History), Tokyo, Aoki Shoten, 1990. 120 Ian Buruma, The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan, London, Jonathan Cape, 1994, p. 260. 121 FT, 6.12.91. 122 About the psychological effect of the bombs, see Wolf Mendl, Japan’s Asia Policy: Regional Security and Global Interests, London and New York, Routledge, 1995, p. 26. See also Michael J. Hogan (ed.), Hiroshima in History and Memory, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1996. 123 ST, 13.8.82. 124 Raphael Samuel, ‘Continuous National History’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, p. 16. 125 D-96-HR, ED, 6.8.82, p. 20, a JCP member’s comment. 126 D-101-HR, CAB, 28.6.84, p. 35. 127 The often-mentioned Japanese propensity to hold group values over and above individual beliefs, though gradually changing, may have held them back from recollecting the disheartening realities of their country’s wartime conduct. See BP, 13.6.86 (Post opinion). 128 GDN, 15.8.95. In Japan, where ancestors are extremely important, there is even more anxiety — a feeling that to apologize would be to betray the older generation. 129 As for a philosophical approach to Japanese attitudes towards their war experiences, see Kuno Osamu, Tsurumi Shunsuke, and Fujita Shozo, Sengo Nihon no Shiso (Postwar Japanese Thought), Tokyo, Keiso Shobo, 1966, especially

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130

131 132 133 134

135 136 137

138

139

140 141

142 143

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History Education and International Relations the last chapter, ‘Senso Taiken no Shisoteki Imi: Chishiki-jin to Taishu (The Philosophical Implications of War Experiences: Intellectuals and the Masses)’, pp. 184–221. TIM, 7.8.85. See Max Weber, ‘Structure of Power’, in H.H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills (trans. and eds), From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, London, Routledge 1948, p. 175. RTN, 27.5.94. NYT, 25.12.88. See AS, M.23.8.94, pp. 1, 6 and 7. NYT, 7.6.95. See also Wakamiya Yoshibumi, The Postwar Conservative View of Asia: How the Political Right Has Delayed Japan’s Coming to Terms with its History of Aggression in Asia, Tokyo, LTCB International Library Foundation, 1999. FT, 6.12.91. NYT, 7.6.95. Shimizu Hayao (a Soviet specialist)’s comment quoted in GDN, 5.7.85. See Steve T. Benfell, ‘Meet the New Japan, Same as the Old Japan: The History and Politics of Postwar National Identity’, USJP Occasional Paper 98–03, Harvard University, 1998. See, for example, Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, ‘The Restoration of a National History’, 1998. The Society was established in January 1997. Its membership was about 6,800 in August 1998. Kersten points out ‘the absence of an answering voice’ in response to a nationalist version of Japanese history presented by Fujioka Nobukatsu in the 1990s. See Rikki Kersten, ‘Neo-nationalism and the “Liberal School of History”’, Japan Forum, vol. 11, no. 2, 1999, p. 201. For example, Yoshimi Yoshiaki (Professor at Chuo University) discovered official documents in the Defense Agency’s library in January 1992, which indicate that the military was involved in the conscription of ‘comfort women’ and the establishment and supervision of military brothels. Until then, the Japanese government denied the military’s involvement in this. After his discovery, the government began an official investigation and publicized its results in July 1992. See Yoshimi Yoshiaki, ‘“Jugun Ianfu” Mondai no Rekishiteki Kyumei (Historical Research of ‘Military Comfort Women’)’, in Kokusai Kochokai Jikko Iinkai (Steering Committee of the International Public Hearing) (ed.), Sekai ni Towareru Nihon no Sengo Shori 1: ‘Jugun Ianfu’ to Kokusai Kochokai no Kiroku (Japan’s Postwar Compensation Issues as Questioned by the International Community Series 1: Records of the International Public Hearing on ‘Comfort Women’, etc.), Osaka, Toho Shuppan, 1993, pp. 107–22. Also active are civilians’ groups such as Center for Research and Documentation on Japan’s War Responsibility (established in 1993) and Violence Against Women in War-Network Japan (formed in 1998). AS, M.9.8.86, p. 23 and 10.8.86, p. 4. NYT, 19.4.90. See also Ellen. H. Hammond, ‘Politics of the War and Public History: Japan’s Own Museum Controversy’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1995, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 569. TWP, 30.11.91 and 16.3.95. For an early study on Japanese ultranationalist groups, see I.I. Morris, Nationalism and the Right Wing in Japan: A Study of Post-war Trends, London and New York, Oxford University Press, 1960. Comparing the 1930s and the

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144 145 146

147 148

149 150

151 152

153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160

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1980s, Pyle says that the nature of Japanese nationalism in the 1980s is different from that of the old nationalism in the prewar/wartime period. But it is arguable that the essence has not changed much; the difference may be just one of degree. See Kenneth B. Pyle, The Japanese Question: Power and Purpose in a New Era, 2nd ed., Washington D.C., The AEI Press, 1996, pp. 62– 4. See also Kersten, ‘Neo-nationalism’, pp. 197 and 199–200. XHNA, 4.9.82, p. 3. XHNA, 10.7.86, p. 9. The People’s Daily (21 August 1983; 15, 22 and 28 August 1985; and 20 September 1985) and Radio Peking (19 September 1985), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, August 1983, pp. 12–13, August 1985, pp. 8–9, and September 1985, pp. 9 and 40–1. At the time of Prime Minister Nakasone’s visit to Washington in January 1983, two key issues were trade and defence. Japan increased the defence budget for the fiscal 1983 by 6.5% and made a decision to offer military technology to the US. The US welcomed these decisions, but was still not satisfied. KH, 17–18.8.86, p. 3. China was confident that it had established itself as a far more formidable military power than Japan in the 1980s. See KT, 31.7.82, p. 1 and Xinhua News Agency (15 December 1982), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, December 1982, p. 10. FT, 18.8.82, p. 10. See also TIM, 3.9.84, p. 6. D-96-HC, ED, 19.8.82, p. 13, a MOFA official’s comment. See the foreword by the Director-General of the Defense Agency, the Defense Agency of Japan, Nippon no Boei (Defense of Japan), 1976, p. i. That year, he already mentioned foreigners’ concern over the revival of Japanese militarism and unnecessary misunderstandings. FT, 25.4.92, p. 17. Evidence against the MOE can be found in its own sources. When, in 1981, an opposition party inquired into the Chosun Ilbo (Korea Daily)’s front-page report of Japanese textbooks regarding Japan’s colonial rule over Korea, an MOE official responded as follows: At the MOE, we hope to examine what happened actually [about the use of the Japanese language and visits to Japanese shrines], if we can obtain appropriate materials and information from the South Korean Embassy, etc. D-95-HC, ED, 27.10.81, pp. 3–5, an MOE official’s comment. More crucially, a senior MOE official also replied as follows: It is a fact that since around 1980, the South Korean press and others expressed views on the Japanese textbook problem, but I have no knowledge of what was pointed out. D-96-HC, FA, 9.8.82, p. 17. On any account, it seems apparent that the MOE did not take any substantive measures before the first dispute arose. D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, p. 18 and D-96-HC, ED, 19.8.82, p. 15 respectively. CD, 13.8.82, p. 4. XHNA, 27.9.82, pp. 3–4. Ibid. AS, M.5.8.82, p. 4. AS, M.27.8.82, p. 4. D-96-HC, ED, 29.7.82, p. 2, and D-96-HR, ED, 30.7.82, pp. 2 and 4, both the Education Minister’s comments. KH, 6.8.82, pp. 1, 5 and KT, 8.8.82, p. 2.

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161 KT, 5.8.82, p. 1 and 25.8.82, p. 1. As to ‘a game of extortion’, see The Korea Times’ columnist C.K. Yun’s comment, KT, 19.9.82, p. 5. 162 KT, 25.8.82, p. 1 and KH, 25.8.82, p. 8. 163 For the discussion of the trade-off of interests and linkage strategies, see Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and Interdependence, 2nd ed., Boston and London, Scott, Foresman, 1989, pp. 31 and 225. As to asymmetrical interdependence between two states and reversed power relationships in a bilateral relationship, see ‘Power and Interdependence Revisited’, pp. 252–5. 164 KT, 12.8.82, p. 2, Nahm Yon-woo of Dankook University. 165 AP, 13.8.82. See also TWP, 25.8.82. 166 The Korea Times’ columnist C.K.Yun’s comment. KT, 19.9.82, p. 5. 167 AP, 24.8.82. 168 Radio Peking (19 August 1985), quoted in AAB, the MOFA (ed.), Chugoku Geppo, August 1985, pp. 40–1. This comment was made by Wang Shou-tao (a member of Central Advisory Commission of the Chinese Communist Party). 169 As to the nationalist component of Maoism, see Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, London Penguin Books, 1991, p. 147. 170 The People’s Daily, quoted in XHNA, 16.8.82, pp. 3–5. In a decade after the normalization of diplomatic relations in 1972, trade expanded from $1 billion to $10 billion (both approximate figures), with Japan ranking second and first in China’s exports and imports respectively. See AS, M.23.9.82, p. 1. 171 AS, M.30.9.82, p. 4. 172 AS, M.9.8.82, p. 6. Refer to Katzenstein and Tsujinaka’s argument on the use of external pressure by the government or business to urge bureaucracies to make a move, or the use of it by the bureaucracy to strengthen their position against rival ministries and politicians. Katzenstein and Tsujinaka, ‘“Bullying”, “Buying”, “Binding”’, p. 90. 173 D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 9 and AS, E.21.8.82, p. 1. 174 D-96-HR, ED, 27.8.82, p. 9. 175 XHNA, 10.9.82, p. 3. 176 KH, 6.8.82, p. 5. 177 KH, 25.8.82, p. 8 and KT, 6.8.82, p. 8. The Korean Educational Development Institute announced the results of the examination on 7 September 1982. The Institute called for non-governmental sectors’ efforts to correct distorted historical accounts, saying that ‘there were enormous obstacles in the course of settling the problem diplomatically’. They also said that most of the wrong accounts about Korea stemmed from Japanese materials which other foreign textbook publishers used. KT, 8.9.82, p. 8. 178 For a discussion of multinational approaches, see Nishikawa Masao (ed.), Jikokushi o Koeta Rekishi Kyoiku (History Education Transcending National History), Sanseido, 1992. 179 HER, 14.2.95, p. 14. 180 KH, 28.8.82, p. 3. 181 KH, 8.8.82, pp. 1 and 3. 182 XHNA, 5.8.82, pp. 4–5 and the editorial of the People’s Daily, quoted in XHNA, 16.8.82, pp. 3–5. 183 XHNA, 16.8.82, pp. 3–5. 184 KT, 24.7.82, p. 2. 185 Tokyo (AP, KNI), IT, 2.8.82. 186 Pyongyang (Rodong Sinmun), BP, 28.8.82.

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Japanese History Textbook Disputes in 1980s (Part II) 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196

AS, M.27.8.82, p. 7. BT, 5.9.82, p. 4. FT, 25.4.92. TWP, 22.2.89. The People’s Daily quoted in CD, 9.7.86, p. 4. XHNA, 4.9.82, pp. 10–12. XHNA, 24.7.82, pp. 14–15; 27.8.82, pp. 12–13; and 4.9.82, pp. 10–12. XHNA, 27.8.82, pp. 12–13. KH, 21.8.82, p. 2. XHNA, 1.9.82, p. 27.

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7

Twenty-five Years On — Cross-border Interactions in Historical Knowledge ince the textbook disputes in the 1980s, diplomatic skirmishes have erupted on and off between Japan and its neighbours over its history schoolbooks. Most notably in 2001 when another patriotic textbook for junior high schools was adopted by the Education Ministry (MEXT), China and South Korea vehemently criticized the approval1 The two major protesting countries had made clear their stance in the 1980s, claiming ‘our right to comment on this matter’ (Beijing) and ‘systematic and long-term measures’ (Seoul),2 and they continued to pay close attention to Japanese schoolbooks ever since. Along with those controversies, other historical issues, such as ‘apologies’ to war victims, postwar compensation and more recently visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, repeatedly came to the fore on the diplomatic agenda. While relations between Japan and its two neighbours became closer at the grass-roots level and through ever increasing interdependence on the commercial front, the ‘history card’ has come to acquire prominence on the foreign policy front, in particular for Beijing. In the meantime, the Japanese government stance on these issues fluctuated not only between prime ministers from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and those from non-LDP parties. Among the latter, Hosokawa (1993–94) and Murayama (1994–96) took more liberal and conciliatory approaches to Japan’s neighbouring countries and peoples. But it fluctuated also between prime ministers who belonged to different factions within the LDP. In any event, the fact that the Foreign Ministry of Japan (MOFA) now has the link called ‘Historical Issues’ along with other major foreign policy topics like Iraq and North Korea on its website, presumably in response to the ‘history card’ and overseas repercussions in recent years, explains how this subject has come to take centre stage in Japan’s foreign policy.3 Yet it must be noted that most of the sensitive issues discussed today were already raised in the 1980s. Whereas these episodes illuminate Japan’s difficulty in handling its colonial and wartime history, accounts in Japanese schoolbooks have gradually changed over the years, partially reflecting rethinking on the part of the Japanese government (see Table 7.1).4 Textbook examiners’ comments have also been made public, and

S

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some observers say that the certification process has become somewhat ‘more lenient’ in recent years, with the Education Ministry being more prepared for foreign criticisms.5 At the same time, it must be noted that cross-border cooperation between individual teachers, historians and researchers in Japan, South Korea and China continued and gradually gained momentum in the 1990s, alongside the official controversies mentioned above. And finally, Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo made moves to take intergovernmental initiatives in joint history research recently. Indeed, it has taken nearly a quarter of century to reach this stage since the first dispute in 1982. Of course, these developments are important in terms of the interplay between the domestic and external environments (the ‘Wider Context’) as indicated in the framework of analysis (see Figure 1.3 Relations between Multiple Frameworks in Chapter 1). Thus, this chapter will look at these recent transnational and intergovernmental joint research efforts and analyse the nature of these interactions. In this regard, some criticisms have been made against Japan in comparison with (West) Germany. Let us therefore make some reference first to the German case in order to come to grips with what broader issues may be involved in cross-border cooperation in historical studies and education.6 7.1 THE TASK OF COMING TO TERMS WITH THE PAST

While Japan has long been stuck with this historical conundrum, the same sort of issue existed for Germany — the other defeated and probably the only analogous country — which had a horrendous record of inhuman operations in the Second World War and had to start rebuilding a state after the war.7 Not surprisingly, German society also faced the problem known as Vergangenheits-bewaltigung (coming to terms with the past).8 Here, we look at a few dimensions which the two countries have in common in confronting the past. First, neither West Germany nor Japan embarked on a path of serious scrutiny and disclosure of their unpleasant war records in the immediate aftermath of the war. With indigenous historical studies covering only up to the First World War, German historians’ publications about the Holocaust were hardly found until the mid-1950s, and the most important studies were conducted in the United States, England, Israel and France.9 Efforts by Japanese historians and journalists to reveal what had been taboo or left unmentioned about Japan’s actions during the war gathered momentum only in the last two decades.10 Just to name a few, Morimura Seiichi (1981) is one of the first authors to inform the public of Japanese troops’ biological and chemical experiments on prisoners of war and civilians.11 Senda Kako (1984) is another who openly dealt with ‘comfort women’, later followed by Yoshimi Yoshiaki (1992).12 With regard to the role of the Emperor in the war, the major works only came out in the late

-

-

‘Comfort women’ or sex slaves

Unit 731

The International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo

Postwar compensation issues

The Emperor’s responsibility for the war

Forced labour

*

-

1999 (B)

1999 (A)

—-

2003 (A)

2004 (B) —-

2007 (A)

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The Nanjing Massacre

1987

Jikkyo Shuppan

22/12/08

Major historical issues

1983

1994 (B)

204

Textbook publisher & publication year

Table 7.1 Japanese High School History Textbooks at a Glance

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-

-


Unit 731




*

*

*

*

*

1999 (B)

Sanseido 1998 (A)

-

*

*

1995 (B) —-

2004 (A)

*

*

*

*

2004 (B) —-

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-

Forced labour


1988

1983

1994 (B)

22/12/08




Twenty-five Years On – Cross-border Interaction 205

-

*


Unit 731



-

-

*

-

-

-

-

-

-

1999 (A)

-

-

-

2003 (A)

-

-

-

-

*

2007 (A)

2003 (B)

-

2007 (B)

Note 1: An explanation given (); a brief explanation given (); mentioned, but without any explanation ( * ); and not mentioned ( - ). Note 2: In the column of publication year, (A) and (B) mean textbooks for the courses ‘Japanese History A’ (which places more focus on modern and contemporary history) and ‘Japanese History B’ (which covers national history from ancient times to the contemporary era) respectively. Note 3: The textbooks compared here are limited to those published by the same textbook publishers throughout most of the period between 1983 and 2007and those which were available at the time of writing.


-

*

1998 (B)

Yamakawa Shuppan

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1995 (B)

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Forced labour


1987

1983

1994 (A)

206

-





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1980s.13 This slow progression towards openness about their war records also applies to the efforts made by the teaching profession. It is not that both countries’ educational institutions came up with definite answers about how to treat their burdensome history in the early postwar years. Second, the Historikerstreit (historians’ debate) in West Germany and the textbook disputes in Japan, which both emerged in the 1980s, revealed that both societies found it difficult to face their catalogue of brutal operations even after four decades. Indeed, there existed divisions of opinion on the issue of the past among intellectuals, politicians and the public in both countries, whether generational, political, ideological or social, while both societies seemed to struggle for internal harmony. Although generational change is likely to mitigate the difficult situation, the identification of former persecutors and collaborators was of course painful for any one. That is, it was painful for the postwar generation to point at their parents, their grandparents or someone they knew intimately and to unveil their crimes in the open.14 A turbulent national past always poses the painful question of ‘involvement’ in what people regard as unspeakable.15 Despite and because of these divisions over the hidden chapters of their national history, civilian groups and academic associations in both countries have gradually strengthened their campaign for conflicting interpretations of the wartime record. Unless this point is understood and handled properly in domestic society, cross-border interactions and influence may backfire over the long term. Third, the Historikerstreit subsumes general problems in historiography that are certainly relevant to the case of Japan. One of the focuses in the historians’ debate was the uniqueness and comparability of historical events. Incidents like the Holocaust may deserve the treatment of singularity; but their extremity and uniqueness does not rule out comparability.16 If it does, it decontextualizes and render them rationally inexplicable. The acceptance of comparability, i.e. recovering historical distance and detached analysis, is essential in dealing with any historical event. Furthermore, the moral implications of uniqueness and comparability must be considered. Comparability does not, and should not, lessen the gravity of moral issues embedded in respective incidents. The guilt of crimes of the Holocaust, the Nanjing Massacre and others should by no means be trivialized or absorbed in any context, whether it was unique or not.17 Mary Fulbrook precisely touches upon this point: Attempts to diminish the sense of guilt and responsibility for the Holocaust by equating it with, or excusing it with reference to other atrocities elsewhere must be dismissed as misplaced. On the other hand

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to wrench the Holocaust out of ‘history’ and place it on an isolated plane of unique reprehensibility is equally misplaced: this too abstracts evil from its everyday context and represents not only an abdication of the historian’s task of attempting to explain, but also evades the moral questions of guilt and responsibility.18

A kind of historical research suggested here is to analyse an event of its own kind like any other in history and, in this sense, to normalize it. Indeed, the normalization of history seems to be one of the key factors in conducting historical studies. As indicated above, however, it may have been the most difficult part of the task of facing the past for both countries. The important part of the equation is the differences in the manner in which West Germany and Japan coped with their expansionist and aggressive past. In fact, the two countries took completely different paths in dealing with this in terms of history education and the management of international relations.19 First, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) on the whole went much further than Japan in terms of revealing the major crimes and cruelties which the Third Reich had perpetrated. In West Germany, the historians’ debate certainly illustrated their attempts to unload the unpleasant past, and a resurgence of apologetics was observed in the 1980s. The Historikerstreit, although it sent a confusing message abroad, mainly involved academics and journalists; the Bonn government was not pulling the strings behind the scenes. Interestingly, Bonn’s nervousness about the debate was evident when its Foreign Ministry sent a collection of the major texts of the debate to all its embassies and consulates in November 1986.20 By contrast, the Tokyo government was notoriously taciturn. Its grudging admission of even the indisputable facts such as the aggression into neighbouring countries and the Nanjing Massacre was fully exposed in the textbook disputes in the 1980s. Thus, Bonn and Tokyo took quite different approaches to the treatment of their past, one by facing it and the other by half shutting its eyes. When Murayama was in office, three important statements were announced around the fiftieth anniversary of defeat: ‘Statement by Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama on the “Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative”’(31 August 1994); ‘Resolution to Renew the Determination for Peace on the Basis of Lessons Learned from History’ of the House of Representatives, National Diet of Japan (9 June 1995); and ‘Statement by Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama “On the Occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the War’s End”’ (15 August 1995).21 However, his statements, although made in his official capacity, seem to have largely reflected his personal views. And in 1995 the Japanese Diet was still split over the wording of the parliamentary resolution expressing apologies for the war. Japan was

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unable to close the book on its past because there was still no honest consensus on what it represented, and it is questionable if the situation has changed much since then, in particular in political circles. Second, a major difference between the two countries was also observed in history education. Although the regular school courses in the FRG did not deal with the history of the Nazi past until the 1960s, it is still sharp contrast to the situation in Japan, where the signs of frankness about the country’s gruesome past only appeared in the early 1990s. West German historians and teachers began to contact their counterparts in other European countries in the late 1940s and Polish schoolbook authors and historians in the 1960s.22 This seems to have made significant contributions to the mutual understanding of problems in the writing and teaching of history in the countries concerned.23 In particular, Franco-German cooperation was a significant factor in terms of the design of the history curriculum.24 With the French military government’s support, both French and German historians met in Speyer in August 1948, March 1949 and October 1949, and close networks were established between the French Société des Professeurs d’Histoire et de Géographie de l’Enseignement Public and the German Internationales Schulbuchinstitut of the Kant-Hochschule in Braunschweig (Brunswick).25 Both organizations had a specialist-working group for examining primary and secondary textbooks used in the two countries. Twenty German and fifteen French professors in Freiburg worked together in July 1950 for the first time in fifteen years (thereafter in Mainz in 1951, in Tübingen in 1952 and in Tours in 1953, then a biennial event).26 After years of incessant Franco-German consultations and efforts to give more objective historical accounts, historians from both sides mutually expressed their satisfaction with each other’s textbooks at a conference in 1962.27 In parallel with the direct revision of textbooks, academic conferences and seminars between the two neighbours — indirect revision — also contributed to this end. By the early 1990s, the German school syllabuses had come to cover the Third Reich comprehensively, and it seems that the aim of contemporary education shifted to developing popular attachments to the country without fostering excessive nationalism.28 After discussions over many years, a common Franco-German history textbook for the students preparing for the Baccalauréat and Abitur qualifications was introduced in both countries in 2006. It covers the period from 1945 onwards. Although this is the easiest chapter of their bilateral history, the common textbook is regarded as ‘the forerunner of an ambitious project’ set up at the intergovernmental level.29 In sharp contrast, as explored in the previous chapters, it was not until the disputes arose in the 1980s that the Japanese education authorities awoke to the sensitivity of the treatment of key external relations in school education. In the German context, referring to

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Hitler’s ‘invasions’ as ‘advances’ was out of the question.30 Seemingly responding to the textbook issue, the Ad-hoc Education Council in Japan (set up in accordance with Prime Minister Nakasone’s initiative in August 1984) recommended the internationalization of education in June 1985. Belatedly, it stressed the need for a change of perspective — not to see the world from the Japanese perspective but to reconsider Japan from the perspective of ‘Japan in the world’. The Council even explained that the awareness of internationalization must start at the grass-roots level.31 However, it was not particularly intended to improve the teaching of history in schools or even to take any initiative in that direction. It was not until the 1993 version of textbooks (published from 1994 onwards) that the MOE’s textbook screening process was discernibly relaxed, and the accounts of the ‘comfort women’ and ‘Unit 731’ (the Japanese Imperial Army’s biological and chemical warfare unit) saw some change (see Table 7.1). Needless to say, the experiment of Franco-German educational cooperation was almost inconceivable in the context of Japanese-Asian relations, even though more complex political situations in the region have to be taken into account. Although similar efforts were not entirely lacking in the Asian context, such efforts were still relatively recent, and some of them were secured only by diplomatic posturing, as the following sections will explain in detail. It seems that the Japanese teaching profession largely worked in isolation until the 1980s. For example, apart from communication on purely individual and small-group bases, it was only in March 1991 that the first joint research meeting was organized between South Korean and Japanese groups of historians. In Japan, history and history education have remained a thorny issue throughout the postwar period until today, whereas Germany had adopted an open approach to these contentious issues a few decades earlier. 7.2 TRANSNATIONAL COOPERATION WITH SOUTH KOREA AND CHINA

Having briefly reviewed the postwar developments in historical studies and history education in Germany and Japan, this section focuses on joint research activities organized by groups of individual researchers in Japan, South Korea and China, while there are numerous informal networks between school teachers and historians who are concerned about the direction of history education in East Asia.32 And these movements are not confined to bilateral cooperation; they now seem to be increasingly multilateral in nature, involving a wider range of participants. For example, Chinese, South Korean and Japanese historians worked together to compile a supplementary textbook on modern East Asian history for middle school students, and it was published in the three countries in

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2005.33 The same year, about sixty legislators from eleven Asian countries (Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mongolia, the Philippines, Russia, South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam) gathered in Cheju (South Korea) to form a regional network for promoting peace and cooperation through the joint study of history.34 Here we focus on bilateral cooperation which began earlier than these multilateral activities. South Korean-Japanese cooperation Japan and South Korea witnessed a considerable expansion of contacts between academics, teachers and students from the mid1990s onwards. For example, the Japan-South Korea Joint Education Study Group held the first meeting in the summer of 1995 to discuss ways to improve history education in both countries, and their second meeting was held the following year, attended by not only elementary and secondary teachers but also South Korean high school students and Japanese citizens.35 Below are three cases of joint research projects, relatively long-term and large-scale, organized by private groups of scholars. (a) The Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks This study group of individual Japanese and South Korean scholars, which was set up in 1989, seems to have been one of the first nongovernmental movements formed in the wake of the diplomatic disputes in the 1980s. The group approached the issues of war, citizenship and imperialism from new perspectives under cross-national scrutiny.36 The study group was conceived when Fujisawa Hoei of Kanazawa University was contacted first by Yi T’aeyong, a South Korean historian, then president of Honam University. Yi proposed to organize a joint study on history textbooks following a model of German-Polish exchanges; Fujisawa’s book which mentioned the bilateral model led Yi to contact him.37 In the summer of 1990, Fujisawa met several historians in South Korea to organize a study group, and the study group was established. About thirty people participated in the activities of this group, including historians of modern Japan and Korea, scholars of history education, high school and junior high school teachers, textbook publishers’ editorial staff and undergraduate and graduate students. This was a result of the genuine efforts made by individual researchers in both countries; neither the Japanese nor the South Korean government was directly involved in the organization of this study group.38 The purpose of the group was originally to examine descriptions in the history textbooks used in both countries, but the group eventually decided to examine Japanese history textbooks for high schools first because of time constraints.39 The study group

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held four meetings in 1991 and 1992, twice a year alternately in each country.40 Every meeting was open to the public and attracted about a hundred people.41 While the Japanese scholars who attended the meetings understood and generally accepted that Japanese-Korean history was mainly that of Japan’s aggression and Korea’s resistance against it, they still found that perception gaps existed with their Korean colleagues.42 To understand what these perception gaps are, a few issues pointed out by the South Korean historians should be mentioned here.43 One concerns the debate over the conquest of Korea.44 A Japanese scholar referred to the famous Meiji government debate of 1873 over whether or not to conquer Korea, in which several government leaders insisted that Japan should attack Korea immediately. On the other hand, a South Korean researcher argued that the idea of conquering Korea would go back to the Edo period (1603–1868). Through early-eighteenth-century Japanese thinkers and reformists of the feudal system, he traced the origins of the idea to the ancient myth, recorded in Nihon Shoki (The Chronicles of Japan, AD 720). The Korean professor also noted that Toyotomi Hideyoshi (a famous feudal warlord who united Japan, 1537–98) had invaded Korea in the sixteenth century and that late Edo thinkers had thus regarded the invasion as part of a ‘recovery of lost territory’. According to him, after Hideyoshi’s invasion, Japanese intellectuals, strongly influenced by the ideology of the warrior class, supported the idea of conquering Korea but also viewed Korea as inferior and despicable. Most of the Korean scholars placed the early Meiji debate on the conquering of Korea within the larger sweep of Japanese history and regarded current problems as the extension of that tradition. In sum, the 1873 debate has much deeper historical roots; the idea is not a modern development. Another difference also emerged between the Japanese and South Korean delegates in terms of the scope of Japan’s twentieth-century war and in terms of responsibilities for the war. The ‘Fifteen Years War’ is a term often used to describe the war in the Asian theatre, i.e. a series of wars beginning with Japan’s invasion of Manchuria in September 1931, thus leading to the full-scale war with China, further invasion of Southeast Asia and the subsequent war against the United States and the United Kingdom, and finally ending with defeat in August 1945. According to progressive Japanese historians, this idea of regarding a series of battles as a single war, rather than as disjointed incidents as some conservative Japanese researchers do, not only reveals the essential nature of these wars Japan fought but also brings Japan’s war responsibilities to the fore. However, in response to this view of the fifteen-year war, the Korean participants raised a succinct question: how does it relate to Japan’s colonial rule of Korea? In the eyes of Koreans, the concept of

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the Fifteen Years War was essentially a Chinese-and-US centred view of history, which effectively sidelines the colonization of Korea. From the Korean perspective, the war was either a seventy-year war that began with the Kanghwa Island incident of 1875, a fifty-year war beginning with the Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), or a fortyyear war beginning with the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905). At the end of this war, Japan made Korea a protectorate and annexed it as a formal colony in 1910. According to Korean scholars, Japan and Korea were at war at least from the time of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894, although even progressive Japanese historians viewed the events of the period only as ‘resistances’ not wars. In the Korean high school history textbook, anti-Japanese resistance during the Sino-Japanese War is explained as being organized by the ‘Tonghak farmer’s army’, while Korean resistance to Japan after the RussoJapanese War is similarly described as the anti-Japanese war of ‘righteous armies’. From the Korean perspective, the Koreans fought a war beginning in 1895. In sharp contrast, although Japanese textbooks have increasingly described the Korean resistance to Japanese rule as the ‘righteous soldiers’ movements’ or the ‘righteous soldiers’ struggle’, Korea has not been regarded as an independent country waging a war against Japan. The study group, bringing back these substantial debates on fundamental historical concepts and views as homework, dissolved in March 1993 after two years of joint activities and published a book. Thereafter, the study group members moved on to pursue their individual research on textbooks and exchanged views with each other on a personal basis.45 (b) Japan-Korea Joint Studies Forum46 This is a joint research project organized by the Japanese and South Korean researchers working in the fields of the humanities and the social sciences. This forum started in 1995, and research was conducted for three terms over nine years. In each term, seven groups were engaged in different research areas (see Table 7.2). The research results of these groups have been published as the JapanSouth Korea Joint Research Book series both in Japanese and in Korean. Twenty volumes have already been published by Keio University Press and Korea University Press (See Table 7.3). Out of the twenty volumes published in this series, several are particularly related to history and mutual historical perceptions (see Table 7.3). They generally deal with the historical background of philosophy and ideology in Japan and Korea. For example, the sixteenth volume questions what ‘civilization’ and ‘opening’ are, what they bring — war or peace — and reconsiders these questions which caused ideological struggles in both countries about a century ago. One of the three volumes focusing on exchanges between the

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Table 7.2 Research Areas of the Japan-Korea Joint Studies Forum The first term (1996–98)

The second term (1999–2000)

The third term (2002–04)

Political economy Politics North Korea

History 1 History 2 Japanese-South Korean relations International politics Politics Economics Sociology

History 1 History 2 Culture/Society

Culture History 1 History 2 Economics

Cultural exchange Civil society Politics/society International relations

Table 7.3 Books Related to History and Historical Perceptions (Japan-South Korea Joint Research Book Series) Vol. 2 Vol. 3 Vol. 11 Vol. 12 Vol. 14 Vol. 16 Vol. 17 Vol. 20

Exchanges between Japan and Korea in modern history and mutual perceptions (Part I) Ideas about the state and external perceptions South Korea, Japan and ‘the West’ — confusion and ideational transformation Exchanges between Japan and Korea in modern history and mutual perceptions (Part II) — the period under the control of the Japanese Empire The developments of Japanese-South Korean relations in the postwar period ‘Civilization’, ‘Opening’ and ‘Peace’ — Japan and South Korea Exchanges between Japan and Korea in modern history and mutual perceptions (Part III) — before and after 1945 Japanese-South Korean exchanges in East Asia

two countries deals with ‘Asia’ and ‘Oriental peace’ in the face of ‘the West’ and looks at a drama of modern Japanese and South Korean thoughts which were driving both countries to what they were under the control of the Japanese Empire (Vol. 12). Another attempts to understand how Japan has perceived Korea and explores the history of exchanges and mutual influence between both sides, based on the comments and views expressed by intellectuals and North Korean residents in Japan, covering the period between the colonial rule and the post-liberation era (Vol. 17). Other two volumes (Vols 14 and 20) deal with more recent developments of Japanese-South Korean relations in the postwar period, by exploring the dynamism of foreign policy, economic activities and cultural exchanges and the transformation of Japan-ROK relations. They also examine the role which Japanese-ROK exchanges played in establishing East Asian networks, from cultural, industrial, economic and

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political perspectives and consider how their exchanges should be. These are in fact a massive scholarly output, and they highlight significant progress in bilateral academic exchanges which cover not only the subject of Japanese-Korean history but also political, socioeconomic issues between the two countries. (c) Japan-South Korea Historians’ Conference (Nikkan Rekishika Kaigi)47 In 2001, this body was set up as a forum for exchanges between Japanese and Korean historians in order to deepen understanding of each other and to broaden the scope of their exchange activities and cooperation. This came into being in response to a proposal made by the Joint Commission on the Promotion of Research on the History of Japan-South Korea Relations (1997–99). The administration of the Conference is facilitated through Japanese and South Korean national committees of the International Committee of Historical Sciences (ICHS).48 So far the members of the body have met seven times in Seoul and Tokyo with the first meeting in November 2001 and the last one in November 2007.49 The feature of this group is that it does not specify any particular geographical areas or historical periods for research. Those historians conducting research in various themes, including those in European and Middle East history, meet and exchange their views in broad frameworks of history. So far, the following main themes were taken up at the seven meetings: (1) trends of historical research in Japan and South Korea after 1945; (2) modernization in world history; (3) Table 7.4 The Sub-themes and Topics at the Sixth Meeting (October 2006) (1) War and peace — to rewrite history from the perspective of peace ‘The rivalry between the Second World War and “post-modernization”’ ‘The history and historicization of memories about Yi Sun-sin — an understanding of “The Japanese War of Imjin” and South Korean perceptions of the Japanese embedded in the theory of victory and defeat’ (2) Memory — various actors who talk about history and the position of historians ‘“Memory” and history in South Korean society’ ‘The issue of emotional memory in historical descriptions — from the testimony of survivors of the battle of Okinawa’ (3) History as civilization — restraints on historians and international dialogue over history ‘International dialogue between historians — a case of eleven Balkan (Southeast European) countries’ ‘Distortion and confusion regarding an understanding of South Korean modern and contemporary history’

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nationalism — the past and the present; (4) new trends in historical research: the role of traditional knowledge; (5) religion and faith in history; (6) what and in what way should historians talk about now?; and (7) riots or revolutions?. According to Miyajima Hiroshi (a Japanese representative), their discussions got into full swing after the first three meetings which had focused on sorting out past historical studies.50 For example, the following topics were discussed at the sixth meeting (see Table 7.4). However, it must be said that these topics are still quite broad and not on specific historical facts which concern bilateral relations. In this sense, it is still not certain whether or not the results of these extensive exchanges of views will be produced in some form for the wider public in the future. Sino-Japanese cooperation When it comes to joint history research between Japanese and Chinese experts, newspaper reports are few and far between. It seems that the first contact was made between the Japan Teachers’ Union and Chinese educationalists in 1985. They announced plans for joint research and the compilation of a handbook for history education; yet there seem to have been few follow-up reports of their activities.51 Of course, informal networks and academic projects across borders have been on the increase.52 For example, the civilization of China was a topic discussed at an international symposium in 1994, attended by some hundred historians from Britain, Greece, India, Japan and the United States.53 The same year, researchers from the Cultural Agency of the Xinjiang-Uygur Autonomous Region and Bukkyo University (Japan) launched a joint excavation project of the Niya archaeological site in China’s Taklimakan Desert. In 1995, another research team was organized for the excavation of the Liangzhu ruins in Zhejiang by the International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Kyoto) and the Bureau of Preservation of Cultural Relics of Zhejiang Province.54 However, these are not research projects with a particular focus on bilateral history. In fact, Japanese business circles, the Japan-China Economic Association and the Japan Association of Corporate Executives, for example, showed keen interest in the issue of history between the two neighbours and called for joint history study by experts.55 But so far there has been little news coverage of private groups’ joint research activities between Japan and China, which are relatively comprehensive and long-term. 7.3 INTERGOVERNMENTAL COOPERATION ON THE MOVE

Having looked at joint history research between groups of individual scholars across national borders, this chapter now turns to intergovernmental cooperation. As mentioned in Chapter 5, such cooperation

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was already proposed by Seoul back in 1982 and 1986. Before the first attempt at official cooperation was made between Japan and the ROK in the late 1990s, some suggestions were also made by Japanese political leaders, including Prime Ministers Kaifu (1991), Miyazawa (1992), Murayama (1994) and Hashimoto (1996),56 to conduct joint research on history between and among Japan, China and South Korea and to improve history education.57 However, it must be noted that it was only after October 2001 that intergovernmental initiatives gained momentum, and historians from these countries finally got to work with official endorsement and support.58 In May 2005, China, South Korea and Japan, though tentatively, agreed to establish a trilateral history research committee.59 But it is still not clear how this trilateral body will work with, or separately from, the bilateral history panels between Japan and its two neighbours. Below is an overview of developments in the field of bilateral cooperation. The Japan-ROK (ROK-Japan) Joint History Research Committee It was in October 2001 when Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro and South Korean President Kim Dae-jung agreed at the summit meeting to set up a joint study group in order to promote mutual understanding and bridge gaps in historical perceptions between the two countries.60 But this was not the first attempt at joint history research by both governments; a similar body was inaugurated in July 1997. It was originally proposed by the ROK government, following a Japanese cabinet minister’s controversial remarks on Japan’s colonial rule of Korea, and then agreed at a bilateral summit in November 1995. The body, which was named the Joint Commission on the Promotion of Research on the History of Japan-South Korea Relations, was first conceived to be as semi-official by Seoul, but Tokyo insisted that it be purely private; it was eventually set up as a private body. The commission, consisting of thirteen scholars from each side, worked for three years until June 2000 to make a set of recommendations; but it seems to have failed to deliver substantial results (see the previous section, 7.2 (c)) JapanSouth Korea Historians’ Conference).61 What prompted joint history research again in 2001 after all these years was ironically a Japanese history textbook, written by nationalistic historians and approved by the MEXT, which Seoul criticized Tokyo for whitewashing its wartime deeds.62 Although South Korea demanded that the results of joint research be reflected in textbooks, the Japanese government stated that the outcome could not be incorporated directly in schoolbooks because of the screening system in Japan. According to a Japanese Foreign Ministry official, the two governments agreed to treat the results as reference points only.63 A Joint Support Committee, comprised of both government

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officials and private personnel, was also set up to assist the joint research. In May 2002, the first phase of the joint research began. The committee, composed of university professors, history experts and researchers with Japanese Chairman Mitani Taichiro (Professor at Seikei University) and South Korean Chairman Cho Dong-geol (Honorary Professor at Kookmin University), was divided into three panels focusing on ancient, medieval, and modern and contemporary history respectively. To discuss nineteen themes, the committee members met at six plenary meetings, a joint report conference and an editorial meeting, apart from a number of group meetings.64 However, the administration and the pace of research activities differed greatly among the three panels. The first panel focusing on ancient history seems to have proceeded smoothly from the beginning, and they had twenty meetings and conducted field work, visiting various locations in Japan and South Korea. The second panel with focus on medieval history had twelve meetings, and the third panel working on modern and contemporary history met fourteen times but could not get to work for nearly a year at the beginning.65 A full-scale report of the first round of joint research was submitted and made open to the public in June 2005, one year behind the original schedule.66 The 1,900-page document was a collection of the opposing views separately explicated, rather than the views shared, by both South Korean and Japanese historians. This final report made clear only that there exist huge gaps in historical perceptions on key events that strained bilateral relations repeatedly. In fact, one member of the committee said, it was ‘impossible’, to share views.67 The cause of the impasse seems to be two-fold: (a) disagreement over historical facts or interpretations and (b) disagreement over whether or not to introduce a political agenda in relation to historical facts or interpretations in question, in fact political disagreements affecting disagreements over history. For example, the issue of South Korean people’s right to seek compensation from Japan is entangled with conflicting views and interpretations of Japan’s colonial rule over Korea. The Japanese participants held the view that, according to the 1965 Treaty of Basic Relations between the two countries, Japan’s obligation to compensate South Koreans for the damages inflicted under the colonial rule was resolved. However, some South Korean members maintained that, although the issue of compensation may have been resolved at the governmental level, South Korean individuals still had the right to claim compensation because the issue of ‘comfort women’ was not on the agenda of negotiations for the 1965 Treaty. On this issue, a South Korean member urged both countries to start negotiations to review the Treaty since it failed to address various issues of

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Table 7.5 An Outline of the Report of the First Phase of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee (the Main Themes and Topics by Panel) (1) The first panel Focus on Japanese-Korean relations in the fourth to the sixth centuries Some papers with specific focus on the following: – The inscription of the tomb of Gwanggaeto the Great of Goguryeo and the issue of the Japanese army (the fourth century) – The five kings of Wa and Goguryeo/ Baekje (the fifth century) – The story of Wa in the Book of Song (Canonical Book of the Liu Song Dynasty) (the fifth century) – The system of exchanges (the sixth century) (2) The second panel Literature reviews by both Japanese and Korean groups on: – Japanese ‘pseudo-missions’ – Japan’s invasion of Korea by Toyotomi Hideyoshi: the Japanese War of Imjin and the Second War of Jeong-yu – Official Korean missions sent to Japan Papers presented by Japanese scholars: – – – –

The period of Japanese ‘pseudo-missions’ in Japanese-Korean relations Korean kings’ missions and Muromachi Japan Japan on the eve of invasion of Korea Korean military logistics and transportation at the early stage of Japan’s invasion of Korea by Hideyoshi

Papers presented by South Korean scholars: – The control over Japanese visitors and the treatment of violators of commerce and navigation rules during the first half of Joseon – The historical implications of Japan’s invasion of Korea – Japanese and Korean historical perceptions of Japan’s invasion of Korea – Korean diplomacy towards Japan and translators of Japanese work during the second half of Joseon – Similarities and differences between the two countries’ perceptions of their bilateral relations in the medieval period (3) The third panel Part 1 Japanese-Korean relations before 1910 – The issue of treaties between Japan and Korea – International relations in East Asia and its modernization – Sino-Japanese War/Russo-Japanese War and the Korean Peninsula Part 2 Japan’s colonial rule and Korean society – – – – –

The structure of colonial rule and Korean responses to it The colonial rule and changes in society The colonial rule and changes in the economy The mobilization of population under the wartime system Japanese army stations in Korea

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History Education and International Relations Part 3 Japanese-ROK relations after 1945 – The normalization of Japanese-ROK relations – Economic relations between Japan and the ROK – Issues in Japanese-ROK relations Part 4 Research results and mutual understanding – The history of research on Japanese-ROK relations – Mutual understanding between Japan and the ROK

history. But one of the Japanese members expressed his surprise and disappointment at the Korean panellist’s claim since it was ‘political rather than academic’.68 Other cases are concerned more with historical facts and interpretations per se. For example, both sides had conflicting views about the validity of the 1905 Japan-Korea agreement based on which Japan made Korea its protectorate, and the annexation treaty which was signed in 1910. According to a Japanese panel member, Japan may have pressured Korea into signing the 1905 agreement, but it did not threaten Korea with force. Thus, the agreement was valid. International law at the time regarded a treaty as invalid if a nation’s leader was threatened by force to sign it. But a Korean scholar claimed the Imperial Japanese Army virtually threatened Korea with force, surrounding Korean Emperor’s palace and confining government officials who were opposed to the agreement. He also argued the 1910 annexation treaty was invalid because it was not ratified.69 Finally, when the committee compiled the report, the South Korean members again asked their Japanese counterparts to make sure the results of their joint study are reflected in Japanese textbooks, as they did so at the outset. But the Japanese members rejected the idea because of the ‘psychological pressure’ placed on textbook writers and editors.70 The timing was not good either. The preparation of the final report coincided with the emergence of the territorial issue of Dokto (in Korean) and Takeshima (in Japanese) and of the textbook issue.71 Earlier in 2005, the Council of Shimane Prefecture (western part of Japan) approved an ordinance to designate 22 February as ‘Takeshima Day’ in order to promote public awareness of Japan’s claim to the islets at issue, which are located in the East Sea or Sea of Japan. Furthermore, a school textbook compiled by nationalist historians supported Japan’s claim.72 With regard to these differences, Prime Minister Koizumi’s remarks were ostensibly simple, which were made prior to the summit meeting with President Roh Moo-hyun in late June 2005: ‘I think it’s all right that views are different among historians. It is not the case that we cannot keep friendly relations due to differences. Summit talks are held to deepen friendship while mutually recognizing differences’.73 Following the submission of the final report in June 2005, the

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second phase of the joint study was originally planned to begin by the end of that year. Its agenda included the establishment of a task force which will develop history textbooks to be used in both countries.74 However, it was after nearly two years of suspension that both governments could make a move for the second round. And it seems that Seoul pressed Tokyo to face up to its militarist past in the wake of Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo’s controversial remarks on the ‘comfort women’ in March 2007. Japanese Foreign Minister Aso Taro and his South Korean counterpart Song Min-soon agreed in March 2007 when they met in Cheju to launch the second phase by the end of April. The Japanese side had a tough time finding scholars to be on the panel for the second round because the two countries are now going to examine history textbooks as part of their joint study. A total of twenty members, ten from each country, to sit on the committee were finally appointed, and the Foreign Ministry announced the Japanese members just two days before the first chairmen’s meeting in Seoul on 27 April 2007.75 Apart from these committee members, six members each from both countries were appointed for the textbook sub-group.76 At the chairmen’s meeting, Japanese Chairman Toriumi Yasuhi (Professor Emeritus of the University of Tokyo) and Korean Chairman Cho Kwang (Professor of Korea University) discussed administrative procedures, and the following points were agreed: (1) The committee seeks to deepen an understanding of Japanese and Korean history through academic research activities; (2) The first plenary meeting is to be held in Tokyo in late June 2007; (3) As to the administration of the sub-group which looks at history textbooks, both countries have discussions separately, and then both chairmen discuss the matter and make decisions; (4) Each panel discusses themes/subjects of its joint research; (5) The joint research period is for two years; and (6) The administrative procedures of plenary and panel meetings will follow those of the first round.77

Therefore, the basic structure of the three panels remains the same as the first round’s, except for the separate sub-group on history textbooks to be set up for the first time. And this time, the focus of the second phase will be how to narrow the gap between Japanese and South Korean historical perceptions and views.78 Eventually, the first plenary and panel meetings were held in Tokyo on 23 June 2007.79 At the plenary meeting, the following points were agreed: (1) The joint research period is for two years in principle, and if possible the panels aim to complete a report within two years;

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(2) Each panel decides its research themes/subjects at an earliest possible day and start research on the agreed themes; (3) The results of research will be compiled as a research report; and (4) The second plenary meeting will be held in Seoul on 24 November 2007. Until then, each panel organizes its own meetings as appropriate.80

While we need to wait until the publication of a final report of the second phase in 2009 in order to access the achievement of this joint research, it is certain that the main focus will be on the outcome of the sub-group which deals with history textbooks. The Japan-China (China-Japan) Joint History Research Committee There were a number of visits and exchanges arranged through government agencies between Japan and China, in particular in the field of science and technology, which began in the 1980s and increased dramatically since then. But it must be said that, when it comes to joint research on history, such an intergovernmental initiative began only recently. It was when Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and his counterpart Machimura Nobutaka agreed in May 2005 to set up a joint research panel to study history issues and to appoint panel members by the end of that year.81 When Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and Chinese President Hu Jintao had a summit meeting in Beijing in October 2006 in order to improve strained bilateral relations, the communiqué issued following the meeting said that scholars of both countries would start joint research on Sino-Japanese history by the end of 2006.82 It was also agreed that joint history research would be conducted in line with the principles of the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, the SinoJapanese Treaty of Peace and Friendship, and the Sino-Japanese Joint Declaration.83 In fact, this was what the Chinese Foreign Ministry claimed in its very first protest during the textbook dispute in 1982: the schoolbook authorization in question was not conducted in accordance with the spirit of the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement of 1972. Thus, the joint study, which was agreed by Tokyo and Beijing, was to toe the lines of the three political documents from the very beginning. The first-ever meeting for joint history research under the tutelage of Japanese and Chinese governments was held in Beijing on 26 and 27 December 2006. It seems that the meeting itself was rather a ceremonial occasion. However, high expectations were raised towards the work of the committee on both sides from the outset. For example, Ruan Zongze, a senior researcher at the China Institute of International Studies, said that important events such as the Nanjing Massacre and the July 7 Incident were expected to be discussed at the meeting.84 Japanese Chairman Kitaoka Shin’ichi

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(Professor at the University of Tokyo, former Deputy Japanese Ambassador to the UN and a former member of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee) believed that both sides could narrow differences in their understanding on wars through joint research and increase mutual understanding. Not surprisingly, Beijing considered the joint research a ‘very correct decision’,85 and Chinese Foreign Minister Li said that this research would raise Sino-Japanese relations to new heights.86 Furthermore, the opening ceremony speech by Chinese Chairman Bu Ping (Director of the Institute of Modern History, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) was nothing but straightforward: The historical issue is one of the major obstacles to relations among East Asian nations. In post-war Japan, there seems to be words and deeds which don’t accept its responsibility for the war and deny even the historical facts of its aggressive war. It offends the victim country and is the reason why the historical issue has not yet been solved. Through this joint research we should get over such obstacles and observe the basic principles written in the political documents exchanged between Japan and China.87

However, it seems that there are slight differences in emphasis on the joint research between the Chinese and Japanese teams. Whereas the Chinese side is concerned directly about the history issue per se, the Japanese counterpart is more apprehensive of the ramifications of the history issue for other fields of bilateral cooperation such as resources, energy, the environment and ageing population.88 In fact, the Japanese Chairman clearly states that ‘to develop a common view of history’ is not the aim of the committee. As he maintains, the approach taken in this joint project is ‘parallel history’, that is presenting both sides’ views and clarifying where they differ and why.89 In any event, if the issue of history comes to the fore, China may also have to cover the Communist Party’s excesses.90 Otherwise, not much was disclosed about what topics were actually taken up at the first meeting, apart from the fact that they had discussion on the 2,000 years of Sino-Japanese exchanges as well as modern and postwar history and that two subcommittees were set up to deal separately with ancient, medieval and early modern history, and modern and contemporary history. The committee, composed of twenty members, ten appointed from each country, decided only on its work schedule and the scope and topics for the joint research.91 The second meeting was held in Tokyo on 19 and 20 March 2007. The original plan was to produce research results by December 2007 or January 2008 at the third meeting (which was actually held on 5

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and 6 January) and finally to submit a research report in June 2008 before the fourth (final) meeting.92 The results were also to be presented at the thirtieth anniversary of the conclusion of the Treaty of Peace and Friendship between Japan and China. According to the Japanese Chairman, the committee came to about 80 % agreement on the specific topics of common focus for the second part of the final research report, which deals with modern and contemporary periods.93 For example, below are an expected outline of Volume 2 of the report and a list of their common research interests. An Expected Outline of Volume 2 (Modern and Contemporary Periods) Part 1

From the First Opium War (1840) to the Manchurian Incident (1931)

Part 2

From the Manchurain Incident (1931) to the End of the Second World War

Part 3

From 1945 to the Present (In this part, one chapter is on ‘Historical Perceptions and History Education in Japan and China’.)94

A List of Common Research Interests (from the First World War to the 1920s) The First World War The Twenty-one Demands The May Fourth Movement The Washington System and ‘Shidehara diplomacy’ The Northern Expedition and Japan’s deployment of troops in Shandong The Eastern Conference The Huanggutun Incident (assassination of warlord Zhang Zuolin) and the Northeast Flag Replacement (nominal reunification of China under the Kuomintang) The Beijing government’s effort to revise unequal treaties The Kuomintang government’s revolutionary diplomacy95

However, it seems that certain issues did not get on the agenda at the second meeting. Although Chinese and Japanese historians reviewed their wartime past, for example, the rampage of murder, rape and looting by Japanese troops in the Chinese city of Nanjing in 1937, they did not take on board the issue of ‘comfort women’ despite Chinese protests at Prime Minister Abe’s controversial comments on it.96 The outcome of the joint study must be awaited until the end of 2008 when a report is due.

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7.4 THE ANALYSIS OF RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

Having reviewed recent transnational and intergovernmental joint research activities from around the 1990s onwards, this section will analyse them with a particular focus on the nature of these crossborder interactions, building on the arguments developed with reference to the framework of analysis in the previous chapter (see Analysis IV-b: Cross-border interactions). Initial cross-border interactions in historical scholarship Having been neighbours for centuries does not necessarily mean that people know each other well. As mentioned in the framework of analysis, the full-scale exposure of a society to the outside world may not be so prevalent as it appears, and cultural, political and other circumstances still determine the pattern of communication. This study has also argued that views and attitudes of a majority of world population about international affairs are ‘domesticated’. Quite often, cross-border interactions have to start simply from the level of ‘We didn’t know that’, in particular when it comes to grassroots contacts. Even before we can talk about any positive or negative impact of transnational or interstate communication, the very initial contact has to take place from this level. In the 1990s, South Korean and Japanese groups of individual scholars began to work together just in that way. Even after the two major diplomatic rows in the 1980s with the extensive news coverage of them, it seems that Korean scholars did not have enough information about the Japanese textbook screening system and that their criticisms were based on their reading of particular nationalistic schoolbooks and other texts were assumed to be similar in content. Kimijima Kazuhiko (one of the Japanese organizers of the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks and a professor at Tokyo Gakugei University) points out that the information the Koreans received previously by way of the MOFA, the MOE or the Japanese mass media was neither sufficient nor accurate. Japanese counterparts also learned more about the South Korean system, and they were also ignorant that some corrections were made in Japanese texts based on the exchanges between Tokyo and Seoul after the 1982 dispute.97 Given that the participants from both countries were scholars who were keen on the textbook issue, it is even more surprising that they were not fully informed about basic facts. Through these initial surprises, the study group was able to build a basis for further discussion and proceed to read Japanese history textbooks together and examine specific texts closely from both Korean and Japanese perspectives for the first time. Without doubt, cross-border cooperation could bring valuable learning opportunities to participants, even more so if they start

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from scratch. Such learning could be very concrete and practical. For example, the first panel (ancient history) of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee visited many historical excavation and preservation sites in both countries and obtained invaluable materials; they were able to exchange views with many people concerned.98 The second panel (medieval history) also discovered historical materials and found their joint research meaningful in examining similarities and differences in their historical perceptions. Although they could not conduct joint field work, the Japanese side’s field work on diplomatic documents is reported to be of great importance in bilateral history.99 The importance of the first step towards joint research and broader communication is emphasized in the Chairmen’s joint messages at the sixth plenary meeting of the above-mentioned committee. They say that it was probably the first time that researchers from both countries had conducted joint research on Japanese-Korean history from ancient to contemporary times in three panels and that it was meaningful that they could produce research results. More crucially, it stated that, although Japanese and Korean scholars had naturally different views because of their different research environments, they could deepen an understanding of why these differences had emerged.100 In this way, the significance of joint academic research across national borders has been reconfirmed by historians. Joint history research with limited progress Besides the initial ‘reward’ from cooperation across state borders, it must be noted that there is a mountain of challenges to be met. This study has already argued that the institution of education in a state interacts with that in another only in a limited manner, pointing to regional and disciplinary asymmetry. In particular, the textbook disputes indicated that both interstate and transnational educational cooperation have a long way to go when dealing with politically sensitive issues in national history. Wholesome, frank consultations across national borders and long-term educational arrangements proved very difficult in practice. It is therefore not surprising that the official report of the first phase of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee cautiously points out the constraints and problems which must be understood in order to deepen joint research between the two countries. First, while the members of the committee have generally positive views about the establishment of the study group and recognize the need to create an academic community of historical research across national borders, the Japanese Chairman says that, in the discipline of history, there are unique circumstances which make it difficult to create an academic community beyond national borders.101 Especially, the third panel on modern and contemporary history seems to have had

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a hard time in getting to work in the first place and spent nearly a year on building trust among its panel members.102 The South Korean Chairman harshly criticizes the fact that papers which cannot be regarded as scholarly work were presented at the third panel, while praising the fact that joint research provided a good opportunity for researchers from both countries to work on common themes and confirm academic achievements and issues in question.103 He also points out that the committee did not have a chance to make clear individual researchers’ historical perceptions and responsibilities, while a Korean member of the third panel comments on ‘nonacademic background factors’ of the research presented by some Japanese members.104 Second, as mentioned earlier in the framework of analysis, the writing of history itself is related closely to the formation of a state, and historical scholarship has to varying degrees contributed to the development of nationalism in respective countries. And this is not only in national history but also in history of international relations.105 Even the first panel whose joint research on ancient history proceeded smoothly from the beginning admits that the results produced by Japanese and Korean members are miles apart (e.g. a major controversial issue like Gaya or Mimana in Japanese in the southern part of the Korean Peninsula). Both sides were unable to overcome their nationalistic or hegemonic thinking, although the joint study group was set up admittedly on the grounds that the textbook issue should not strain Japanese-ROK relations.106 One of the third panel members observes that, because of the nature of the joint study, the first of its kind which was supported by both governments, both sides were somehow under pressure to speak for their own country’s position and as a result the air was thick with mutual criticism and antagonism.107 Third, genuine scholarly and methodological problems may stand in the way. For example, the Japanese and South Korean members of the second panel had different historical divisions and names with regard to the period designated as ‘medieval history’. At the same panel, minor themes were sometimes chosen for individual papers from major themes, and these papers did not reflect comparative historical perspectives and ended up by presenting separate unrelated arguments.108 A South Korean member of the third panel echoes the point. Whereas the Korean side sought to approach core problems from a general framework, the Japanese side were rather hesitant to do so, which sometimes resulted in putting problems in a rather trivial framework and in avoiding critical arguments.109 When the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks met in the 1990s, it was one of the first joint research efforts at the non-governmental level. There seems to have been much disagreement about interpretation and conceptualization in

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historical studies at the very fundamental level. Understandably, it made the participants think that it would certainly take many years to narrow the gap between the two countries.110 Similarly, the agonizing process of joint research is well expressed by a South Korean member of the third panel of the Japan-ROK Committee: ‘A spoonful of food cannot make you full instantly.’ 111 Surely, both sides wanted to see some positive results from their bilateral cooperation, but it is simply impractical to think that all demands are met once and for all at the first round of joint research. This painstaking process just reminds us of the fact that this is the very first step and that it has taken nearly a quarter century to get to this stage since the first diplomatic controversy. This is the fourth point. Still another point is that, even if joint research on history continues among experts, their research results may not be shared by wider communities beyond academia. For example, cooperation between government and non-governmental actors, as seen in Europe, is currently inconceivable in Japan, says a head of the NGO Foreigners’ Assistance Kobe and a member of another group compiling data on forced Chinese and Korean labour during the war.112 When it comes to historical conciliation, the role of civil society is very weak in Japan. Andrew Horvat (visiting scholar to Tokyo Keizai University’s International Center for the Study of Historical Reconciliation) concludes that ‘the overwhelming strength of the Japanese state compared with civil society has inhibited the development of NGOs, making it extremely difficult for them to function as independent conduits to China and South Korea’.113 Certainly there has to be political leadership in these activities. But the problem seems to be that, even before political leadership can be argued, there has to be a genuine willingness and long-term commitment, not a one-off passing interest aroused by war fictions and films (even if these can be entries), among the people to confront their turbulent national history squarely.114 Sixth, the participants of the Japan-ROK Committee, after all, did not have a chance to make clear their stance on the issue of history as a group when it came up between Tokyo and Seoul, although they understood that the aim of the committee was to deal with general historical perceptions and understanding and to clarify views, both shared and not shared, by the two sides in academic discussion rather than to look into the problems concerning schoolbooks.115 Such frustration was particularly strong among the second and third panel members. For instance, the historical period on which the second panel focused was a period in which bilateral relations were thought to be relatively friendly, and there were high expectations towards joint study achievements. But the presentations and discussions were sometimes interrupted because of different attitudes towards the textbook issue between the two sides.116 One member

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points out that the third panel could have researched into accounts in history textbooks, since the joint study committee was set up because of that very issue in Japan. But the Japanese side was strongly opposed to such an attempt, and this did not materialize.117 Finally, in relation to the previous point, the prospect of compiling a common history textbook must be touched upon. When individual Japanese and South Korean scholars had joint research meetings in the early 1990s, the group was unable to decide on this point. This is understandable to some extent, given that they were only able to examine Japanese schoolbooks but not their South Korean counterparts at that time.118 The Korean researchers were divided between those who stressed the ultimate need for a common textbook and those who thought it impossible. On the other hand, many Japanese participants thought it impossible because of differences in the textbook system, the organization of history textbooks and the interpretation of history between the peoples and scholars of Japan and the ROK.119 But it seems that the Japanese participants were more cautious about this common textbook project than their Korean counterparts. In any event, the second phase of the JapanROK Joint History Research Committee is due to discuss history textbooks at the new sub-panel. Judging from the problems encountered so far at the panels, the path to a common history textbook does not look easy at the moment. The results of the sub-panel meetings have to be awaited. Possibly negative consequences? As indicated earlier in the framework of this study, cross-border interactions are not necessarily smooth or constructive between states or peoples. This study has already argued that the dispositions different nationalities develop may cause friction when they encounter each other. Such contacts can sometimes bring negative consequences, (a) if the parties concerned are unprepared for the perception gaps they may experience with one another, (b) if they have too high expectations and (c) if promises are not kept. These conditions may trigger possibly explosive repercussions in respective societies and lead to external diplomatic pressure, if not retaliatory measures. Even if the parties concerned could avoid worst scenarios, they might still find themselves in a complete impasse. One of the second panel members of the Japan-ROK Committee comments that both sides could not organize any field work on the theme of Japan’s invasion of Korea by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and that it is doubtful whether both countries would ever be able to conduct substantive joint research on the theme, despite the fact both parties gave great importance to it.120 Furthermore, to make matters more complicated, although the joint research efforts mentioned are understood to be academic

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activities, it cannot be denied that it is part of a larger project of opening up the unfinished business of postwar reconciliation and individual compensation which began in the 1990s as a result of external pressure on Japan.121 In fact, financial compensations and other settlements relating to the so-called ‘comfort women’, forced labour, Unit 731, the treatment of prisoners of war are still on-going issues. Although difficult historical themes may get on the joint research agenda sometime in the future, if they are left unattended for a long time, such a delay may further provide the seeds of future tension, which seems to underlie the whole issue of history between Japan and its neighbours. Cross-border interactions in historical knowledge Joint research efforts are certainly the first step towards a broader understanding of each other’s views. But if such efforts result in meetings and gatherings merely with mutual recognition of differences in their perceptions and thinking, there will not be much meaning in such activities. As a result of intellectual exchanges, each other’s views must be taken back home and reconsidered by participants as well as the wider public. The ultimate focus must be on reconciling conflicting ideas and views between different parties, and the final analysis must be on whether or not a clash of these ideas and views can feed back into each society. This chapter has already mentioned the perception gap which emerged between South Korean and Japanese historians over the conquest of Korea and the scope of Japan’s twentieth-century wars. In both cases, the Korean scholars traced much deeper historical roots beyond immediate causes and located current problems within the larger sweep of Japanese history. These are points which even progressive Japanese historians tended to overlook. As to the Japanese view of the ‘Fifteen-Year War’, a succinct question was raised that it would implicitly assume the war with China and the United States, but not that with Korea. Kimijima comments that ‘Japanese historians were not able to respond to the Korean scholar’s challenging questions.’122 Furthermore, with regard to the compilation of a common schoolbook, it is pointed out that the organization of historical knowledge and topics is very different between Japanese and South Korean history textbooks. The former discusses Korea mainly in political and diplomatic histories and analyses modern history with the focus on Japan’s relations with Europe and the United States first, then China and last Korea. But in the latter case, Korea’s relations with Japan are central since Korean national history cannot be explained without reference to this bilateral relationship.123 As these examples indicate, the magnitude and importance of the same historical event is enormously different between the states

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concerned. The issue of history at bilateral or multilateral levels often concerns the fundamental principles of national self-determination, independence and state sovereignty, and it is often emotionally charged with national dignity and national identity. Therefore, the issue of history is non-negotiable for the Chinese and the South Koreans, and different ideas and views have to be brought back home and examined carefully along with the emotional dimension of historical knowledge. If all goes to plan, the second phase of the Japan-China Joint History Research Committee and that of the Japan-ROK Joint History Research Committee will be completed sometime in 2008 and 2009 respectively. But, for practical reasons, we will have to wait for a year or two and possibly more, until some of those research findings and achievements find their way into teaching materials in Japan, China and South Korea. As the 1982 dispute led to the modification of the textbook screening standards (i.e. a spirit of international understanding and international cooperation was added), it would be difficult for any state indefinitely and completely to ignore foreign opinion, as long as it tries to live in the international community. And as this kind of cognitive influence continues, the mutual reinforcement between political culture and education and its resulting twin phenomena which the conceptual framework has indicated — the integration of the domestic environment and the compartmentalization of the world into nation-states (or any other units) — will prove not irrevocable. The question of ‘to what extent?’ must take into consideration the fact that geographical, socio-economic and political circumstances still determine the pattern of communication across states, regions and cultural zones. CONCLUSION

This chapter has reviewed recent joint history research between Japan, and South Korea and China at both transnational and intergovernmental levels and then analysed the nature of these cross-border interactions, making some comparison with the case of Germany. While bilateral research cooperation between Japan and its two neighbours certainly brought participants ‘reward’ through initial exchanges of views, fieldwork at new historical sites and the acquisition of novel materials, this study has also cautioned against problematic factors which must be understood in order to further joint research on history. Some of them are related to the very nature of historical scholarship, its relevance to the formation of a state and its academic and methodological problems. Others concern the sheer scale of this kind of joint research which demands many painstaking years, the difficulty of sharing research findings and achievements with wider communities in each society and, more specifically, the reflecting of research results in history educa-

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tion in each country. The years spent for the preparation of bilateral and multilateral cooperation and for research itself after the 1982 dispute are not ‘lost years’. Cross-border interactions in historical knowledge are indeed historic projects themselves. NOTES 1

The textbook is Atarashii Rekishi Kyokasho (The New History Textbook) compiled by Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform and published by Fusosha in 2001. For this group’s activities, other neo-conservative movements and their opponents such as the Children and Textbooks Japan Network and the Committee for Truth and Freedom in Textbooks, see Caroline Rose, ‘The Battle for Hearts and Minds: Patriotic Education in Japan in the 1990s and Beyond’, in Naoko Shimazu (ed.), Nationalisms in Japan, London, Routledge, 2006, pp. 131–54. 2 XHNA, 10.9.82, p. 3 and KH, 6.8.82, p. 5 respectively. 3 http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/postwar/index.html. 4 For translations of recent history textbooks used in Japanese junior high schools, see http://www.je-kaleidoscope.jp/. The site provides for English, Chinese and Korean translations of MEXT-approved textbooks for use from April 2006, as well as the original Japanese versions. 5 See Takehiko Kariya et al., ‘Kentei wa Yakunitatte Imasuka (Textbook Authorization: Is It Useful?)’, Ronza, January 2007, pp. 102–17. 6 With regard to comparison with Germany, see MOFA’s comments at http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/q_a/faq16.html. 7 This study has excluded East Germany since its official account, by emphasizing that the founders of the communist state had fiercely resisted Nazi Germany, conveniently allowed its leaders to detach themselves from the previous regime and not to confront this crucial period in a critical manner. 8 Bartov explains the word ‘Vergangenheitsbewaltigung’ as follows: ‘This somewhat ambiguous term stands for the complex confrontation between personal and collective national memory (and its repression), on the one hand, and the memory (or amnesia) of individuals and groups belonging to other national entities, along with historical documentary evidence, on the other; it also refers to the use and abuse of the past by individuals and groups with the view of [sic] legitimizing either past actions or current opinions and aspiration.’ Omer Bartov, ‘Savage War’, in Michael Burleigh (ed.), Confronting the Nazi Past: New Debates on Modern German History, London, Collins & Brown, 1996, p. 135. 9 Shoeps’ comment, in Ralf Dahrendorf, The Unresolved Past: A Debate in German History, A Wheatland Foundation Conference (September 1987), Gina Thomas (ed.), London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990, pp. 29 and 90. 10 See Wakamiya Yoshibumi, The Postwar Conservative View of Asia: How the Political Right Has Delayed Japan’s Coming to Terms with its History of Aggression in Asia, Tokyo, LTCB International Library Foundation, 1999. 11 Morimura Seiichi, Akuma no Hoshoku: ‘Kantogun Saikinsen Butai’ Kyofu no Zenbo (The Devil’s Debauchery: Horrifying Truths about the Japanese Kwangtung Army’s Bacteriological Unit), Tokyo, Kobunsha, 1981. 12 Senda Kako, Jugun Ianfu (Military Comfort Women), Tokyo, Kodansha, 1984. Later, official documents concerning comfort women were found by Yoshimi Yoshiaki in 1992. See also Note 139 in Chapter 6.

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13 See Takeda Kiyoko, The Dual-image of the Japanese Emperor, Basingstoke, Macmillan Education, 1988; Inoue Kiyoshi, Showa Tenno no Senso Sekinin (The Showa Emperor’s Responsibility for the War), Tokyo, Akashi Shoten, 1989; Chimoto Hideki, Tennosei no Shinryaku Sekinin to Sengo Sekinin (The Responsibilities of the Emperor System for Aggression and the Postwar Period), Tokyo, Aoki Shoten, 1990; and Fujiwara Akira, Showa Tenno no Jugonen Senso (The Showa Emperor’s 15-year War), Tokyo, Aoki Shoten, 1991. Earlier press coverage on Emperor Hirohito includes Yomiuri Shimbunsha (ed.), Showa-shi no Tenno (The Emperor in the Showa Era), Tokyo, Yomiuri Shimbunsha, 1967–76. 14 Ian Buruma, The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan, London, Jonathan Cape, 1994, p. 90. 15 Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, London, Little, Brown and Company, 1996, p. 4. Burleigh further questions why other nationals like Austrians, Balts, Croats, Frenchmen, Hungarians, Romanians, Slovaks and Ukrainians were also involved in the Holocaust. Michael Burleigh, Ethics and Extermination: Reflections on Nazi Genocide, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997, p. 204. 16 Bartov, ‘Savage War’, p. 136. 17 See Meier’s comment, in Ralf Dahrendorf, The Unresolved Past, p. 9. 18 Mary Fulbrook, The Divided Nation, London, Fontana Press, 1991, p. 368. 19 As for the postwar developments of Germany and Japan, see Otake Hideo, Futatsu no Sengo: Doitsu to Nihon (Two Postwar Paths: Germany and Japan), Tokyo, Nihon Hoso Shuppan Kyokai, 1992. See also the second panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. One of them refers to the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research. 20 Charles. S. Maier, The Unmasterable Past: History, Holocaust, and German National Identity, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1988, p. 175. 21 For these statements, see the following websites of the MOFA respectively: http://www.mofa. go.jp/announce/ press/ pm/murayama/state9408.html; http://www. mofa.go.jp/announce/press/pm/murayama/address9506.html# resolution; and http://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/press/pm/murayama/95 08.html). 22 Barbara Marshall, Willy Brandt: A Political Biography, Oxford, Macmillan, 1997, p. 71. As to the improvement of accounts in history textbooks, see Fukagawa Yasushi, ‘Doitsu no Sengo 50 Nen: Tai Porando Gaiko ga Motsu Imi’ (Germany’s 50 Postwar Years: the Implications of its Foreign Policy towards Poland), 1995, no. 3, pp. 45 and 57. 23 The German Historical Institute London (GHIL), officially opened in November 1976, is also an independent academic institution which aims to encourage contact between British and German historians and to promote research on the comparative history of both countries, the British Empire/ Commonwealth and Anglo-German relations. 24 With regard to international efforts to improve textbooks, see Kondo Takahiro, Doitsu Gendai-shi to Kokusai Kyokasho Kaizen (Contemporary History in History Textbooks in Germany and History Textbooks in Contemporary History of Germany: Textbook Improvement Activities

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between Germany and its Neighboring Countries), Nagoya, Nagoya University Press, 1993. F. Roy Willis, France, Germany, and the New Europe 1945–1967, California, Stanford University Press, 1968, p. 241. John E. Farquharson and Stephen C. Holt, Europe from Below: An Assessment of Franco-German Popular Contacts, London, George Allen and Unwin, 1975, p. 64. Ibid., pp. 66–7. Yasemin Soysal, ‘Identity and Transnationalization in German School Textbooks’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, 1998, pp. 53–61. An article by Robert Graham in FT, 30.9.06. The common history textbook project was agreed in 2003 by President Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroder as ‘an imaginative spin-off from the celebrations of the 40th anniversary of the Elysee Treaty’. AS, M.9.8.82, p. 6. Policy Division, the Minister’s Secretariat of the MOE (ed.), Monbusho Nempo (Annual Report of the Education Ministry), no. 112, 1984, pp. 83–90 and no. 113, 1985, pp. 168–70. In 1981 the Japanese and the Americans made recommendations on each other’s textbooks of geography, history and social structure, based on their two-year joint research on them. An article by Ichioka Yoichiro (Nihon Keizai Shimbun Correspondent) in The Japan Economic Journal, 9 June 1981. Vietnamese and Japanese scholars also conducted a joint research on the starvation in northern Vietnam towards the end of the Second World War, when the country was occupied by Japanese troops. See an article by Hayashiya Hiroaki (Yomiuri Shimbun correspondent) in DY, 28.8.95. An article by Hanai Kiroku, JT, 27.6. 05. The Japanese edition ‘The History That Opens the Future’ was released in June 2005. Twenty-three scholars from South Korea, seventeen from China and fourteen from Japan formed a committee in Nanjing, China in 2002. HNA, 26.5.05. Another supplementary reader was published in April 2005, compiled by the Hiroshima Prefecture Teachers’ Union in Japan and the Taegu Chapter of the South Korean Teachers’ Union. The Parliamentarians’ Alliance for Peace in Asia (PAPA) was inaugurated in October 2005. YNA, 22.10.05. The group is called ‘Nikkan Godo Jugyo Kenkyukai’ in Japanese. An article by Odagawa Koh and Fukushima Shigeru in AS, 17.9.96. See also an article by Kobayashi Ginko in DY, 19.8.96. There are also a joint study group comprising researchers at Tokyo Gakugei University and Seoul City University and another organized by Hitotsubashi University and Seoul National University. According to Kimijima Kazuhiko, there was an unsuccessful attempt at setting up a joint research group between Japan and South Korea in the late 1960s. Kazuhiko Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy of Japanese Colonialism: The Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks’, Inokuchi Hiromitsu (trans.), in Laura Hein and Mark Selden (ed.), Censoring History: Citizenship and Memory in Japan, Germany, and the United States, Armonk, N.Y and London, M.E. Sharpe, 2000, pp. 222–3. See, for example, Fujisawa Hoei, Doitsujin no Rekishi Ninshiki: Kyokasho ni Miru

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Senso Sekinin-ron (German Views of History: How Their Textbooks Explain Their Responsibilities for the War), Tokyo, Akishobo, 1986. Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, pp. 203–204. As to South Korean history curriculum guidelines and the textbook system in the postwar period, see ibid., pp. 204 and 217–19. Nikkan Rekishi Kyokasho Kenkyukai (the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks), ‘Dai Sankai Nikkan Godo Rekishi Kenkyukai (The 3rd Joint Meeting for the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks)’, September 1992. Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, p. 204. Ibid. Ibid., pp. 206–16. These examples are summarized based on the same chapter by Kimijima. Ibid. See the debate between Kato Akira, Japanese researcher at Joetsu University of Education, and Yi Hyon-hee, South Korean researcher and professor at Songsin Women’s University. Ibid., p. 216. Following up their work in the early 1990s, Fujisawa and Yi worked on history teaching methodology under the common theme of ‘How to Teach Japanese-Korean Relations during the Period of Japanese Colonial Rule’ in 1997. See an article by Sasamoto Hiromi (staff writer) in DY, 18.9.97. http://www.jkcf.or.jp/kaigi/forum/. The author’s translation. As for their activities, see: http://www.jkcf.or.jp/ kaigi/historian/. Also known as Comité International des Sciences Histoiriques (CISH). See http://www.jkcf.or.jp/kaigi/historian/. The steering committee members are as follows: Professor Miyajima Hiroshi (Sungkyunkwan University); Professor Kibata Yoichi (University of Tokyo); Professor Hamashita Takeshi (Ryukoku University); Emeritus Professor Cha Ha-soon (Sogang University); Professor Lee Tae-jin (Seoul National University); and Professor Oh Sung (Sejong University). See the Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation’s website at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/kaigi/historian/. The Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation, News, No.32, p. 5. AS, M.11.7.85, p. 3. In the field of science and technology, there have been numerous exchange and training projects organized by Japanese and Chinese universities and research institutes. These research areas include astronomy, meteorology, earthquake prediction and ocean development, See, for example, XHNA, 27.5.80 and 24.7.87. It must also be noted that there have been invitation and dispatch programmes supported by the Foreign Ministry. For example, the ’21st Century Partnership Promotion Invitation Programme’ which started in 1980, invited about eighty Chinese people from various sectors, who were regarded as likely to assume leadership roles in the future, to Japan every year. Another is ‘Invitation of China’s Education Professionals’, which started in 1996 and invited about twenty selected teachers from across China to Japan every year. Through the ‘Dispatch of Japanese Educators’ scheme, about thirty Japanese teachers and board of education members selected from across the country were sent to China every year. This scheme started in 1996. XHNA, 11,10, 94. An editorial in DY, 23.8.95. XHNA, 17.6.05 and 10.5.06.

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56 A policy speech by PM Kaifu Toshiki during his ASEAN visit, Singapore, 3 May 1991; a policy speech by PM Miyazawa Kiichi during his visit to the ROK, Seoul, 17 January 1992; a statement by PM Murayama Tomiichi on the ‘Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative’, 31 August 1994; and an agreement between PM Hashimoto Ryutato and South Korean President Kim Yong-sam at the summit meeting, 23 June 1996, respectively. In accordance with the ‘Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative’ (1994), an Asian Historical Document Centre was launched in November 2001. 57 China and South Korea also have a controversy over their ancient history. A memorandum of understanding, signed between Seoul and Beijing in December 1998, called the two countries to launch a joint study on their ancient and medieval history. KT, 23.12.98. Both countries are concerned about Koguryo (or Goguryeo) history. Koguryo is an area stretching from the upper part of the Korean Peninsula to northeast China, and both claim that it was their kingdom. Koguryo history has also implications for the registration of historic sites in the area for the UNESCO World Heritage List. On this issue, some South Korean observers suggest promoting joint research with North Korea. KH, 5.11.03, an editorial in KH, 7.9.06 and KT, 7.3.05. 58 The MOE and the Japanese National Commission for UNESCO rejected an offer from the South Korean Commission for UNESCO that the two countries jointly review their history textbooks. MDN, 23.7.97. 59 KT, 9.5.05. More recently, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan also suggested trilateral cooperation on the history of the Second World War. XHNA, 24.1.06. 60 Kyodo News, JT, 26.4.07. 61 An article by Jo Toshio in AS, 17.7.97. See also an article by Sasamoto Hiromi (staff writer) in DY, 18.9.97, KT, 1.6.00 and AS, 17.10.01. The six core members of this private group are: Chi Myong-kwan, a professor of Japan studies at Hanlim University; Yamamoto Tadashi, president of the Japan Center for International Exchange; Sunobe Ryozo, a former diplomat and visiting professor of international relations at Obirin University; Lew Woongick, a history professor of Yonsei University; Yoo Kun-il, chief editorial writer at Chosun Daily; and Okonogi Masao, a professor of Korean politics at Keio University. 62 An article by Gary Schaefer (Associated Press writer) in AP, 11.5.01 and Kyodo News, JT, 28.4.07. 63 JT, 6.3.02. See also an article by Kim Ji-ho (staff writer) in KH, 5.3.02. South Korean and Japanese civic groups, Headquarters of the Movement to Correct Japanese Textbooks and Asia Network for History Education, Japan, also asked the committee to reflect the outcome of the joint study. KT, 1.3.02. 64 25 May 2002 (Seoul): the inauguration of the joint study group, the first plenary meeting; 30 November 2002 (Tokyo): the second plenary meeting; 24 May 2003 (Seoul): the third plenary meeting; 29 November 2003 (Tokyo): the fourth plenary meeting; 4 June 2004 (Seoul): the fifth plenary meeting; 3–5 June 2004 (Seoul): Joint report conference; 3 December 2004 (Tokyo): the first editorial meeting; 26 March 2005 (Tokyo): the sixth plenary meeting; and 10 June 2005: the report submitted and made open to the public. See JapanKorea Cultural Foundation’s site: http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/. 65 http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. 66 The report can be seen on the website of the Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation: www.jkcf.or.jp/history in both Japanese and Korean.

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An article by Takahara Kanako (staff writer) in JT, 11.6.05. Ibid. Ibid. XHNA, 8.6.05 and AS, 26.4.07. http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. XHNA, 20.6.05. An article by Takahara Kanako (staff writer) in JT, 11.6.05. XHNA, 20.6.05. AS, 26.4.07. The six Japanese members are Kimura Kan (Kobe University), Shigemura Toshimitsu (Waseda University), Nagashima Hiroki (Saga University), Furuta Hiroshi (University of Tsukuba), Yamauchi Masayuki (University of Tokyo), Yamamuro Kentoku (Teikyo University). The six South Korean members are Lee Chan-hee (Korean Educational Development Institute), Chung Jae-jeong (University of Seoul), Kim Do-hyung (Yonsei University), Chung Jin-sung (Seoul National University), Hyun Myung-cheol (Kyunggi High School) and Shin Joo-baig (Kookmin University). http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/20070427.pdf. Kyodo News, JT, 26.4.07. Prior to the first plenary meeting, a support committee was held on 22 June 2007, and both government officials and panel members attended it. Three officials from each country were: Sasae Kenichiro, Kanamori Etsuya, and Ishikawa Kazuhide from Japan and Kim Chae-sin, Hong Yun-sik and Kim Hong-sub from the ROK. See http://www.mofa.go.jp/ ICSFiles/ afieldfile/2007/ 06/21/ JKmember.pdf. http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/20070623.pdf. XHNA, 12.5.05. According to Japanese Chairman Kitaoka, in April 2005, Japanese Foreign Minister Machimura proposed to his counterpart Li Zhaoxing and State Councilor Tang Jiaxuan that Beijing and Tokyo launch a bilateral joint history research project; but there was little response from the Chinese side at that time. See Kitaoka Shin’ichi, ‘Japan-China Joint History Research Gets Under Way’, Gaiko Forum, Autumn 2007, p. 3. XHNA, 8.10.06. XHNA, 16.11.06. XHNA, 26.12.06. Ibid. http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/china/meet0612.html. The outline of Bu Ping’s speech as shown at MOFA’s site: http://www. mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/china/meet0612.html. See the outline of Japanese Chairman Kitaoka’s speech at MOFA’s site: http:// www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/china/meet0612.html. See Kitaoka, ‘Japan-China Joint History Research’, p. 11 and p. 8. South China Morning Post, 18.11.06. XHNA, 27.12.06. According to a newspaper editorial, China agreed to Japan’s request that the joint study discuss the history of bilateral relations in the postwar period and Japan’s economic assistance to China. See an editorial in DY, 24.12.06. XHNA, 19.3.07 and 20.3.07. See Kitaoka, ‘Japan-China Joint History Research’, p. 9. Ibid., p. 10. Ibid., pp. 9–10.

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History Education and International Relations An article by Tabushi Hiroko (Associated Press writer) in AP, 20.3.07. Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, pp. 205, 216–17. See the first panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the second panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See Japanese Chairman Mitani’s comment at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See South Korean Chairman Cho’s comment at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See Japanese Chairman Mitani’s comment at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the first and third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the second panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, pp. 220–2. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. An article by Eric Johnston (staff writer) in JT, 7.4.07. Ibid. Ibid. Lily Gardner Feldman (a senior fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School for Advanced International Studies) points out that European citizens have played an influential role in helping Germany reconcile its past with its neighbours and with Israel. She also notes that leading non-governmental actors in Europe such as business, academic, cultural and religious leaders are driven not only by moral obligation and a desire to confront the past, but also by pragmatism in such fields as commerce, scientific exchange and minority rights. See South Korean Chairman Cho’s comment at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the second panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. See the third panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, pp. 217–19. Kimijima himself researched into Korean textbooks since 1992. Korean textbooks had been changed six times in accordance with changes in the national curriculum guidelines. Ibid., pp. 220–2.

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120 See the second panel members’ comments at the sixth plenary meeting at http://www.jkcf.or.jp/history/all_j.pdf. 121 As for postwar reparations with Asian countries, see Ito Tetsuo, ‘Dainiji Sekaitaisengo no Nihon no Baisho-Seikyuken Shori (Japan’s Treatment of Reparation Demands in the Post-Second World War Period)’, in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gaimusho Chosa Geppo (Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Monthly Research Report), 1994, pp. 91–115. 122 Kimijima, ‘The Continuing Legacy’, pp. 206–16. 123 Ibid., pp. 220–2.

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8

Conclusion his book has set out to explore the implications of history education for international relations — both interstate and transnational relations. It has sought to answer a central question: is it possible to indicate a theoretical link between history education and international relations? In order to answer the question, this study has broken down the domestic environment into three phases — the initial stage of government influence, the activities under government influence and the formation of public dispositions. It has then proceeded to consider the interplay between the domestic and external environments. In this way, the study has attempted to trace ‘the sources of opinion inputs’ which may condition the public and policy-makers to encounter the external environment in particular ways, while taking account of the relevant parameters and problems of causation at each stage. This necessitates evaluating the connections between the phases constituting the framework of analysis.

T

Figure 8.1 The Framework of Analysis (the same as Figure 1.2)


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THE CONNECTIONS BETWEEN PHASE I (the initial stage of government influence) AND PHASE II (the activities under government influence)

The logical thread connecting Phases I and II is government influence, and this needs to be traced from the very first move of the government, through the activities it directs, to the public, i.e. students. The study has started with the premise that, in conjunction with the concept of power and the factor of information, the government may take steps to shape public opinion through education. In the case study, government influence at the initial stage is over intermediaries such as schoolteachers in the case of the preparation of curricula, and historians and textbook writers in the case of schoolbook authorization. The powers exercised by faceless intermediaries, that is the bureaucrats and teachers who were involved in certification at various stages, are not explicit. Still, the Education Ministry did issue general curriculum guidelines for schoolteachers and give authors and historians both compulsory and non-compulsory directives about specific contents in schoolbooks. While it is necessary to assess the extent to and the ways in which the MOE actually interfered with the content of teaching on the basis of its specific guidelines and comments, the case study has brought to light the fact that the government had in some cases the final say on teaching materials which students were to use in schools. In the cases of syllabuses and schoolbook certification, some kinds of government preferences and expectations may have come into play. In the diplomatic exchanges, both Chinese and South Korean governments precisely charged that the MOE, and ultimately the Japanese government, was responsible for the glossing-over of historical facts in school textbooks. Furthermore, the disputes brought into focus power relations between the government and the intermediaries (i.e. historians and teachers) during the process of schoolbook certification, showing how the Japanese education authorities were not so tolerant of deviation from the presumed official lines. In fact, government influence was exerted in a very tangible manner during the 1986 dispute, when the Japanese government dealt directly with the particular private group which sought to compile their history textbook. In Phase II, the framework has further elaborated the ways in which the government could influence the future public through the activities of writing history, education and history education. Using the postmodernist discourse on historiography, it is possible to indicate government influence over the formation of public opinion. In fact, the postmodernist assumption that historical presentations share the status of authority, with the source of power being enshrined in the literary form, has considerable merit in the


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case of schoolbooks. This is because the historical knowledge conveyed at school to a considerable extent takes the form of authoritative presentations to students. The knowledge offered through teaching materials in general gives an impression that it is ‘established’ or at least ‘accepted’ and hence imposes certain connotations on students. In this particular setting, it is arguable that the transmission of historical knowledge between the disseminating side (i.e. the government) and the receiving side (i.e. students) through the intermediaries (i.e. historians and teachers) is close to the pattern of the exercise of power which postmodernists claim. The framework has also permitted us to analyse the role of education, focusing on political interference with the pursuit of knowledge and understanding. The case study has undoubtedly shown that education can offer students carefully selected, even if not ideologically coloured, explanations, interpretations and assessments of political and socio-economic issues at home and abroad, in the past and the present. It is also apparent that the educational institutions which the government administers do this job for the succeeding generation in a comprehensive and organized manner and over a long period of time, although it is difficult to point to any obvious cases of government control in Japan in the contemporary context. The practice of textbook certification surveyed in the case study was far from directly imposing particular ideologies or views on students. On the other hand, in what can be regarded as attempts at political socialization, some quarters in the ruling party stressed the need to sharpen a sense of the state among the young Japanese and to cultivate a broad base for a US-Japanese security dialogue in the early 1980s. They advocated that the young should adjust their perceptions about their country and the world, by studying more positive aspects about Japan through the historical study which formal education offers. There were signs of the entanglement of the education and defence issues in the Defence White Paper at that time, i.e. the fostering of a patriotic spirit and the generating of interest in security issues at school. Inside the MOE, ministerial thinking readily accommodated this political climate. In relation to the argument of political climate, we have also explored the potential of any national government for using history as a means of canvassing broad public support and assisting specific policies in the pipeline, apart from reviving memories and experiences of the past generation and creating a sense of nationhood. Parallel to the discussion of the establishment and maintenance of hegemony through educational institutions, the framework has also highlighted the official nature of history education, by pointing to the dual imposition of national history on both domestic communities and foreign countries. In the case study, the intrastate aspect of


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history education was brought into perspective by the Okinawans and the Ainu who were opposed to the central government’s views of their local/communal history. The connections between Phase I and Phase II are also evident in historical examples. The most obvious and extreme example of government exercise of power over public opinion through education was, needless to say, prewar/wartime Japan. The establishment of an education system was not only imperative to train key personnel in bureaucracy and government in the process of modern state formation, but also intrinsically interwoven with the formation of values, beliefs and attitudes of the public. Primary education played a central role in fostering reverence for the emperor and promoting national solidarity. In its endeavour, the government was well aware of the importance of ‘history’ as a subject. Centralizing the education system in its hands (from the training, selection and recruitment of administrators and teachers to the specification of curriculum), the Japanese government unswervingly subjugated educational institutions to state purposes. The nation was presented to students as the Land of Gods and the Emperor as the divine figure. Another historical example of explicit political control over the public was the postwar reeducation programme initiated under the tutelage of the Allied Powers. The US occupying forces set out to reform the prewar/wartime education system, imbued with militarism and ultranationalism, and to reverse the prevailing militaristic thinking of the Japanese people. Yet government influence over the teaching of history is not confined to Japan. During the first row of 1982, South Korea announced a modification of its history curriculum, with a view to teaching its students more about Japan’s invasion. Taipei gave its schools similar instructions; so did Singapore. In sum, the case study and its background information have shown that government influence was exerted over the intermediary actors such as textbook authors, historians and teachers. Needless to say, we cannot argue for such influence in a sweeping manner without taking into account the socio-economic and political situation in each specific society. Nevertheless, government influence on the formation of prospective public opinion through education is potentially formidable, given the fact that educational institutions are often in the hands of governments. THE CONNECTIONS BETWEEN PHASE II (the activities under government influence) AND PHASE III (the formation of public dispositions)

While evaluating the influence of any educational activities over students is a difficult task, this study has sought to analyse the


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presumed consequences of history education, by considering factors which could play a part in the mental constructs of students. In this sense, the textbook disputes cast light on Japanese views and attitudes about their prewar/wartime conduct and provided useful pointers to such consequences. Although the controversies did not bring into focus all the factors or developmental views considered, there are some important empirical indications which are relevant to ‘Forming views about home and foreign states’ and ‘Learning lessons from the past’ in Phase III. For example, the survey of the history syllabus used in the 1980s revealed that it clearly placed national history at the heart of the subject and encouraged students to pay attention to the cultural aspects of political, economic and social phenomena. While the guidelines suggested paying more attention to the Asian region, only a partial picture of Japan’s relations with Asian neighbours was presented. In sharp contrast, the syllabus highlighted Western influence on Japan in general, while little mention was made of US-Japanese relations in the early years of the postwar period. The textbook disputes further revealed that, although the MOE did not issue instructions to rewrite tainted national history entirely, it exerted an implicit but fairly effective influence in order to dilute the image of wartime Japan. It seems that there were ‘educational considerations’ behind the logic of the MOE, which insisted on keeping students away from having doubts over the prewar generations who may have been involved in military operations during the war. From these findings one may observe that the next generation of Japanese bureaucrats and businessmen is more sympathetic to a notion of ‘a positive, rather than passive and introspective, nationalism’,1 which Prime Minister Nakasone proclaimed in the mid-1980s. These observations are worth emphasizing. For Nakasone himself was concerned that, because of memories of wartime ultranationalism, the Japanese people tended rather not to think of the state seriously, and the younger generation generally did not identify themselves with the prewar thinking of loyalty to the state and the emperor. Certainly, teaching about wars with foreign countries or about primeval or traditional Japanese society can be regarded as contributing not so much to the creation of new Japanese identity as to the presentation of national images with which Japanese people are at ease. The survey results of June 1982, which clearly indicated Japan’s psychological distance from neighbouring China and South Korea (rather than the United States), may also be relevant to another factor, the issue of trust towards foreign countries and peoples. As if reflecting this Japanese attitude, South Korean views of the Japanese were almost a mirror image. Analysing the ‘legacy’ of Japan’s rule


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over Korea, South Korean scholars maintained that, because Japanese history textbooks were laced with a colonial view of history and because the real aim of Japan’s rule was camouflaged, the Japanese people had developed derogatory images of Korea, while proclaiming spiritual and cultural superiority and detaching themselves from the ‘backwardness’ of the rest of Asia. The claim that the young party members of the LDP were reportedly less sensitive to the feelings of formerly occupied countries and more nationalistic than their seniors may also be connected to the history guidelines which hardly analysed Japan’s influence on Asian countries and to the texts which rarely mentioned the savagery of Japanese troops. The formation of stereotypes of self and others always involves shared understandings of the past. While it is not strictly related to the teaching of history, the case study has also considered the connection between issue-areas (e.g. economic assistance and war reparations) in the case of Sino-Japanese relations and the development of national stereotypes. In this particular case, the issue of economic assistance to a large extent helped to project a positive image of Japan as a donor country, whereas the other issue of war reparations which tended to be sidelined in Japan would give a negative impression. With regard to ‘Learning lessons’, the empirical findings from the diplomatic disputes in the 1980s revealed that Japan’s colonial rule and aggression in the late nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century was fast sinking into oblivion, before the young generation could discuss any historical lessons from them, reinforced by the fact that history courses did not deal with Japan’s regional relations fully. It is not surprising that in the 1980s and 1990s some critics pointed out the indifference of Japanese young people to national history up to 1945 and their avoidance of argument about Japan’s policies in the 1930s and 1940s. Following from the above points, this study has looked into the possible obstacles to learning lessons from the past. One of the possibilities concerns the scope and depth of the conception of the past. In the 1980s and 1990s, critics were more concerned with the young generation’s lack of historical knowledge, which is necessary to respond to any foreign accusations of Japan’s military operations in the past, than with the instruction of particular ideas or subjects. Political commentators made generally negative observations about the young Japanese people’s understanding of their country’s prewar/wartime history, including the realities and ramifications of its colonial operations and the Pacific War. The other possible obstacle considered concerns the patterns of recognition, analysis and interpretation of past events. In this connection, the case study analysed questionable Japanese attitudes towards recent history which were laid bare during the textbook


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disputes. For example, the Japanese government’s tendency to postpone its judgement on the war can be regarded as a typical case of cognitive dissonance. If the convenient logic that there might be another interpretation in the future becomes accepted in teaching and learning at school, cognitive dissonance may persist in an institutionalized form and create a kind of political culture in which students rarely discuss certain aspects of the war. Similarly, some aspects of Japanese attitudes towards Emperor Hirohito may be attributable to dual-track thinking. It is arguable that, whereas the public scrutiny and discussion of his role in the war would certainly have been based on rational reasoning, the image of an innocent, peace-loving figurehead, which was preserved as a political necessity, was established and incorporated into the image of postwar Japan, and the subject became virtually taboo. In the framework we have also argued that a simple categorization of outcomes as successes or failures would impede learning from precedents and so would a poor understanding of causal linkages. What must be recalled in this respect is the rather apolitical approaches of the history syllabus and its methodological weaknesses such as superficial explanations, a partial exposition of sequential events and the absence or lack of analysis, in particular the analysis of causality. For example, this study has argued that to reduce the issue of war merely to the question of ‘whether or not to acknowledge aggression’ is simplistic and that the question should be interpreted as a first step towards further inquiries into all the relevant ramifications of Japan’s invasion and colonial operations. Japanese students would then be able to grasp the implementation of harsh administrative policies and brutal military conduct, rather than to study them in blanket terms such as the ‘annexation’ or the ‘incident’. The poor comprehension of causality also gives clues to one of the frequently mentioned complications — Japanese views about, or their allergy to, the atomic bombs. It is understandable that the two nuclear blasts had such an indelible impact on the minds of the Japanese. But up until the 1990s their voice on Japan’s brutal role overseas was surprisingly weak compared to that on the nuclear tragedy at home. In this sense, we must remember that the history syllabus was solipsistic; it emphasized the issue of nuclear weapons and the prevention of war but without sufficient reference to other aspects of the Second World War. In short, the case study indicates that the content of history courses has considerable potential to influence the formation of views about home and foreign states, and to define the range and nature of lessons students could extract from historical precedence.


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THE CONNECTIONS IN THE ‘WIDER CONTEXT’ (the interplay between the domestic and external environments)

With all the three phases (the initial stage of government influence, the activities under government influence and the formation of public dispositions) having being considered, we now need to examine the interplay between the domestic and the external environments. These connections exist in different dimensions. The first and most relevant dimension holds that the somewhat ambiguous Japanese attitudes towards their wartime past, either because of their concern over their family’s involvement in military operations of a heinous kind or because of their divided views about the burdensome past, rendered neighbouring countries suspicious of Japan’s foreign policy stance and vigilant over its domestic behaviour. China and South Korea drew attention to a particular political climate in Japan in the 1980s — what they called a revival of militarism. Seeing the formation of opinion as an aggregate, cumulative societal process built on beliefs and attitudes at individual and intermediate levels, they warned that ‘some forces’ started by a few people could spread to the rest of the population, if neglected. China, for example, criticized various political activities in Japan such as the LDP’s campaigns to revise the Constitution, government officials’ visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, and cooperation with the United States in military technologies. In this regard, Seoul shared Beijing’s concerns. Tokyo’s understanding was that its neighbours were more apprehensive of its political climate in which militaristic or nationalistic thinking could take root relatively smoothly, than of its imminent militaristic action. This political climate reminded foreign capitals of the initial stage of its old militarism. Furthermore, they were not entirely convinced that Japan’s postwar democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand this worrying trend. As a result, Japan’s efforts to upgrade its ‘defence’ capability haunted other Asians. As a second dimension, it is arguable that the textbook disputes themselves signify the interaction between the domestic and external environments. This study has maintained that the dispositions which different nationalities develop may cause friction when they get into contact with each other, given the greatly diversified educational background of the world population, the pattern of communication across states, regions and cultural zones, and the fact that societies can hardly exclude foreign influence indefinitely. Furthermore, since education at the pre-university level generally affects a large proportion of the population, the scope for potential tension across state boundaries is unlikely to be confined to the intergovernmental level. In this sense, the controversies exposed the deep-rooted antagonism which existed between Japan and its continental neighbours. Indeed, the ways in which the textbook issue


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developed into the serious diplomatic disputes in the 1980s reveal that there existed a striking perception gap between Japan and other Asian countries. This gap was in effect two-fold. First, the Japanese government totally underestimated the impact of the authorization of history textbooks on other countries. Few Japanese leaders considered international aspects of national history. Second, the perception gap was also apparent in the Japanese government’s initial handling of the issue as one of education administration. However, for Seoul, the issue was non-negotiable. For the Koreans, the disputes were in a sense ‘a history war’; it was a war over the recognition and interpretation of the crucial historical records between the former colony and its ruler. Like Seoul, Beijing rejected in principle the idea of a trade-off between the issue of history and national dignity, and Tokyo’s economic aid. For China, the core problem was the fundamental principle of independence. A third and less obvious dimension is that, while regarding education as an institution positioned to protect members of a state from cross-border influence, this study has also hypothesized that the institution of education in a state interacts with that in another in a very limited manner, pointing to regional and disciplinary asymmetry. The textbook rows, which caused reactions across the Asian region and beyond, showed that there had not been much communication between Japanese historians or teachers, and their South Korean, Chinese and other Asian counterparts until the 1980s, long after the normalization of bilateral relations. And even after the diplomatic disputes in that decade, joint research and educational cooperation across borders did not really gain momentum until the 1990s. In this regard, the case study proves that cross-border educational cooperation, intergovernmental or non-governmental, has to wait for years until it is realized, when dealing with politically sensitive and contentious aspects of national history. Furthermore, apart from its offer of cooperation and joint research, South Korea underlined the need to put external pressure on Japan to set the historical record straight. Seoul’s modification of history courses with a view to teaching South Korean students more about Japan’s aggression and the similar steps taken in Taiwan and Singapore, all indicate their desire to retaliate by presenting their version of history. In fact, these retaliatory measures can be regarded as another dimension of cross-border interactions — conflictual, reactive and potentially explosive. While some degree of nationalist leaning in school history syllabuses seems to be ubiquitous, the disputes in the 1980s showed that the teaching of history in Japan was frozen in a national mould. The case study seems to indicate that the presentation and interpretation of the historical events concerning the background of current political systems and boundaries of states more often than not provides the seeds of future conflict.


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Nonetheless, it is not that the diplomatic controversies ended without any positive results. As a consequence of all the chain reactions in the region and the bewildering talks with Beijing and Seoul during the first row, the MOE eventually agreed to incorporate some of the South Korean recommendations; the Japanese schoolbook screening standards were modified to refer to a spirit of international understanding and international cooperation. Despite its apparent resistance against external interference, the Japanese government did pay some attention to foreign opinion. As the framework has indicated, the twin phenomena — integration at the national level and fragmentation at the international level — are not irreversible. In addition, neither Chinese nor South Korean criticisms of Japanese history textbooks ended in one-off diplomatic protests. Both countries continued to be vigilant over their contents after the 1982 dispute. In fact, their vigilance over the issue of history never came to an end, and communication between educational circles across state borders slowly started. In sum, this study has indicated that there are connections both between the different phases of influence and between the domestic and external environments. While some connections are more tangible than others in the empirical findings, the overall link in question — that between history education and international relations — has now been established. THE FEATURES OF THE FRAMEWORK

While the analytical framework used here is instrumental in constructing the a priori link between history education and international relations, its explanatory power and specific applications need to be noted before any final conclusions can be drawn. First, the overall link running through the phases is contingent on the conditions of each society to which the framework is applied. As mentioned in Chapter 1, the link in question is presumably stronger in authoritarian states than in democracies. The many variables which the framework has assumed (e.g. the types of political systems, the determinants of educational influence, etc.) purport to allow for such flexibility. Second, the selective rather than rigid application of the framework’s components and phases to a specific case would be essential. For example, the textbook disputes did expose Japanese attitudes towards their past and the substantial overseas reactions to their attitudes, which offer crucial keys to the perceptions and worldviews held by the Japanese public. Yet the diplomatic rows primarily demonstrated that the historical accounts presented in schoolbooks created a storm of foreign protests; the content of teaching directly disparaged the national prestige of foreign states, offended the feelings of peoples overseas, and hence immediately aggravated relations


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with neighbouring countries. Neither Asian governments nor peoples proved the influence of an official version of history on Japanese students at the time of the diplomatic rows. The influence of history education in the 1980s, if any, would permeate Japanese society from then onwards, since the students then would start to take on responsible positions in society in later years. In the framework, the 1980s’ controversies can be depicted as an arrow directly connecting history education and the external environment, bypassing the formation of public dispositions. Finally, the domestic environment is presented in the framework as a rather self-contained world. This study has maintained that the domestic/foreign distinction must be applied to respective issue-areas in a flexible manner, with the two environments being virtually merged in some issue-areas but separated clearly in others. However, Japan’s experiences obviously showed that even politically sensitive educational matters could be brought under foreign scrutiny. First, although it is an exceptional case, Japan went through the reeducation programmes of the Allied Powers after the Second World War, and its wartime history education was suspended.2 Second, the textbook disputes demonstrated that the Japanese government’s attempt to separate foreign and domestic issues — diplomatic relations and history education — was unsuccessful in the end. As a result, the content of Japanese history textbooks has been changing gradually in response to foreign countries’ reactions since the disputes. This slow, piecemeal change must have affected the nature of history education at school to some extent. Furthermore, joint historical research with South Korea and China, fully supported by respective governments, took root at long last , and it now seems that the foundation for further cooperation between Japanese, Chinese and South Korean historians was established nearly twenty-five years after the first dispute in 1982. These findings illustrate that the external environment does influence its domestic counterpart, i.e. actors (both the government and the public), institutions and activities (education and the writing and teaching of history), while foreign influence is exerted virtually on each phase of the framework.3 Hence, the framework needs to be modified accordingly. (In Figure 8.2, the added external influence is presented in highlighted dotted lines.) Then, the modified framework should be placed in a setting of multiple frameworks (see Figure 1.3). Of course, it must be noted that the framework has initially been developed on the basis of deliberately excluding all foreign influence, in order to make clear the domestic process and focus on the link in question. Yet the empirical findings indicate that any link between history education and international relations must be considered in a more complex setting than originally hypothesized, pointing towards an area yet to be explored — the


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Figure 8.2 The Modified Framework

transnational influence on the content of teaching (especially at the pre-university level) across regions and across various issues.4 THE LINK IN QUESTION AS PERCEIVED BY CHINA, SOUTH KOREA AND JAPAN

While analysing the textbook issue in the light of the framework, this study has also considered the converse. That is how the link between history education and international relations worked in the case study. Thus, this study has examined the ways in which Asian countries perceived the link, in particular, those involved in the disputes. In the case of Beijing and Seoul, the central thrust of their assertion was that the perception and understanding of the past formed through the kind of history education offered in Japanese schools would be detrimental to Japan’s external and ultimately international relations.5 Both governments addressed a fundamental principle that there has to be a minimum of trust between states for a substantive political dialogue to start. Neither Chinese nor South Korean criticisms of Japanese history textbooks were ephemeral sallies against Japan. From 1982 onwards, both countries have remained vigilant towards the contents of Japanese schoolbooks, as proved by their protests in later years. Their alertness over history education in Japan cannot be separated from the lessons they had learned through their bitter experiences prior to 1945, which seem to be behind their understanding of the link in question. In addition, the fact that the South Korean government examined a great number of foreign schoolbooks apart from those used in Japan suggests a much wider scope of the textbook


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issue than the disputes in 1982 and 1986. In fact, Chinese and South Korean officials hinted at the importance of creating a version of world history based on more multinational consensus. Other Asians and Americans also expressed their concerns over the prospective behaviour of Japanese students who had missed the opportunity to learn the truth about a crucial period of their national history.6 On the other hand, it is doubtful whether the Japanese government, although not unaware of the link, perceived it in the same way as its Chinese and South Korean counterparts did. The Japanese government’s equivocal stance towards the whole discussion of the link can be attributed to several factors. First, while the government itself could not define its militarist and expansionist past clearly, any inquiry into the link would inevitably force the government to face the issue of the nature of the war. Second, if the Japanese government had difficulty with a national self-portrait, the ‘educational considerations’ for Japanese children they had in mind centred on the family perspective and represented an inward-looking thinking. The third factor may be Japan’s poor understanding of the management of international relations. In particular, its relations with Asian neighbours were, until recently, conspicuously tilted towards the economic dimension. In sum, the link between history education and international relations was addressed by both Beijing and Seoul, while Tokyo was inclined in practice to separate the teaching of history and the dimension of international relations. The case study also suggests that foreigners are likely to behave in anticipation of the link in question. In other words, if historical representations at school are falsified and objectionable in the eyes of foreign states and peoples, they tend to assume that the younger generation may be imbued with particular perceptions of themselves and foreign countries, even if they cannot specify such influence (and it is equally impossible to deny it). Furthermore, if the controversial teaching of history continues, foreign observers are likely to question the political climate or the political culture which a society has developed. A vicious circle of self-fulfilling prophecies is created. This is certainly a risk which is unnecessary and avoidable in the management of foreign relations. CONCLUSION

‘Is it possible to indicate a theoretical link between history education and international relations?’ Having considered the link in the light of the framework, and the observations made from the case study, the question can be answered affirmatively to a considerable extent, while it is also necessary to take into account a varying degree of relevance of the framework to a particular situation, in a given society at a certain point in time.


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While this study has sought to explore the link in question from both the empirical and the conceptual ends, it has encountered many methodological obstacles. Nonetheless, the validity of analysing the theme of this study on the basis of the framework should be noted here. Such an approach allows us to deconstruct the entire process — the implications of history education for international relations — and offers a focused analysis of the actors and factors involved in the various activities relating to the teaching of history. By extension, the similar situations in Japan’s foreign counterparts can be anticipated. If one approached the theme based solely on a whole range of empirical findings from the case study, one could not go beyond conventional discussions of education practices, domestic politics, nationalistic tendencies and bilateral relations. By contrast, if the link in question was conceptualized in a holistic manner, the resulting argument would be confined to a rather abstract set of behaviours of the public or decision-makers, without the possible roots of their behaviour being scrutinized sufficiently. The specific but crucial problems relating to individual processes, such as the preparation of national curricula and textbook authorization and the power relations working in each of these processes, cannot be identified or analysed. In this way, this study has attempted to extend the scope of a discourse on history education, synthesizing some important aspects such as relations between the government, the intermediaries and the public, historiography, the role of education in both the domestic and the international contexts, political culture and the nature of cross-border interactions. JAPANESE-ASIAN RELATIONS

While the textbook issue itself has broader implications for international relations, a short note should be added about Japan’s regional relations. The textbook issue cast new light on the issues left unsettled after the postwar peace processes between Japan and other Asian countries. From the onset of the first dispute in 1982, it was apparent that the core problem was Japan’s failure to acknowledge its war of aggression. In the Japanese domestic context, the issue presented formidable psychological problems for the Japanese people in forcing them to confront a most unwelcome aspect of their national history, and political difficulties for successive governments in forcing them to recognize some disagreeable dimensions of the war. In the regional context, Japan’s inability to come to terms with its ‘unfortunate’ past have impaired the reconciliation process between Japan and its Asian neighbours throughout the postwar years. In retrospect, the series of textbook controversies may have been a necessary step towards that direction, in particular on the non-governmental level.


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At the same time, the textbook issue itself became a reference point, symbolically representing the legacy of past Japanese-Asian relations, today more in combination with the issue of history in general. In the 1982 dispute, the problem of schooling the young was upgraded on Japan’s foreign policy agenda.7 In the 1990s, the issue resurfaced in the political context of Japan’s first participation in peace-keeping operations in Cambodia. Asian countries expressed mixed feelings of anxiety and cautious welcome, in response to Japan assuming such a role. Its greater role in regional security aroused their vigilance over its potential military capacity and raised arguments about history education in a new context. Today, some argue that it is not appropriate for Japan to have a permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council until Japan squarely confronts historical issues, in fact the ‘history card’ being used to the detriment of its foreign policy.8 With hindsight, it may be said that, on the one hand, the textbook disputes of the 1980s emerged because the overall political situation in Asia became relatively stable. It appears that Japan’s neighbours have been ready for some time to move onto the next stage of relations with the one-time enemy. Chosun Ilbo (Korea Daily)’s columnist Yang Ho-min made a succinct comment on the nature of bilateral relations: ‘We Koreans would not like to live forever criticizing Japan.’ 9 It is ironic that Prime Minister Nakasone added ‘mutual trust’ to the previously accorded three principles of Sino-Japanese relations (peace and friendship, equality and mutual benefit, and long-term stability) after the 1982 dispute.10 Indeed, Japan seems to wander in the shadow of the Asia-Pacific War. The issue of history brings us to consider different approaches to overcoming the most turbulent kind of past. Here what Wolfgang Mommsen (a liberal historian) said in the German context is worthy of note. For both revisionists and their opponents, the goal may be the same, that is, West Germany remains a part of Western political culture thereby stabilizing its position in the international community; but both came up with different approaches to the writing of German history in order to achieve their objective.11 Another nonrevisionist Jürgen Kocka similarly argued that, while some feared that too much discussion and remembrance of the catastrophic events would undermine collective identity, this overture might well be ‘a source of intellectual, political and moral strength’.12 For those who craved a new and less negative image of the country, non-revisionist messages were very powerful. Indeed, this liberal position can provide for the creation of another self-assertive and confident image. In this regard, postwar Japanese experiences reveal that, contrary to what the constraints of the past generally suggest, the Japanese government itself rekindles various issues of the prewar and wartime


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periods, simply by refusing to face the past squarely. This stirs up its neighbours’ suspicions about its somewhat selective amnesia over the war and reinforces the constraints of the past on itself. In other words, Japan has painted itself into a very uncomfortable corner, trapped in its past. To use a metaphor, Japan has kept bandages on its wounds too long. It has sought to protect the wounds. But wounds need exposure to the air at a later stage in order to heal properly. This study has found it difficult to conclude that the Japanese political leadership as a whole has fully addressed this political weakness which became manifest in the textbook disputes in the 1980s. LISTENING TO THE VOICE OF CLIO?

History does not provide any precise predictions or guidance for the future. If one conceives history as so doing, one has probably made a wrong-footed start in understanding what history is. Rather, it would be sensible to think that history simply offers clues as to where one stands and in what direction the future may unfold.13 What historical knowledge offers may be even more vague — what is durable and what is transient?14 However, even if historical lessons are plain, there remain many inherent obstacles. When harmony in society matters more than a commitment to the truth, it stands in the way of acknowledging facts and learning historical lessons. George Kennan’s message still resounds: History does not forgive us our national mistakes because they are explicable in terms of our domestic politics … A nation which excuses its own failures by the sacred untouchableness of its own habits can excuse itself into a complete disaster.15

Psychological and emotional factors are difficult to remove from interstate and transnational relations in confronting the most grisly aspects of national history. The aspect of ‘victim against victim, grave against grave’ presents a formidable and insurmountable obstacle.16 Logic and the heart often do not get along well.17 And the problem cannot simply be reduced to the choice between the two. Who can be sure not to succumb to ‘normative fatigue’ or even ‘normative burn-out’ in a prolonged, agonizing, often exasperating process?18 Still, the issues of historical objectiveness and justice for the victims remain, and a balance must be struck between the external process of reconciliation and the internal process of confronting the past.19 Furthermore, this study has argued that internal harmony is not single-layered. Although factors such as national identity and consciousness may be inextricable from the interpretation of


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history, the strong ties of family and local community may be even more influential than ties at the national level. This raises a concern as to where one can draw the line demarcating a moral community.20 The sense of community is also dependent on time. Should ancestors and offspring be considered as part of one’s community? Can one’s moral positioning or altruism be considered as all-inclusive as this in practice?21 Where is (not should be) the place of history in the tug of war between objectivity and self-defence? Obstacles may also be found in the tug of war between the nonpolitical and the political, and between different realms of the political. A flight into religious abstraction and salvation may be easier than facing disheartening facts one by one and engaging oneself in political discourse.22 Searching for answers in cultural explanation does not offer any practical measures to deal with heavily political issues. Equally, the task of learning lessons may fall into the unfaltering abuse and politicization of the past. Both historical narratives and the teaching of history, while meeting the diverse needs of a society and interacting with social forces, can become laced with political persuasions of various kinds which aim to influence prospective politicians, bureaucrats or citizens. In this sense, the writing and teaching of history constitutes an important societal process which requires tremendous intellectual and emotional strength, and caution at all levels of society. There remains yet another difficult question, whether or not a society is capable of making an objective evaluation of itself before it reaches a state of stability, i.e. a certain level of the foundation of democratic institutions and of economic development. In other words, does the reflexive assessment of a society in the stream of historical evolution count, while people remain preoccupied with immediate pressures and hardships of everyday life?23 The public investigation of controversial past incidents seems practically impossible when people are struggling for bread and butter in devastated post-conflict situations. In fact, the competing elements of time — the limited duration of human life, that of the state and ‘time resources’ needed for coming to terms with the past — appear to be vital to this process. It is obvious that the task should not be postponed indefinitely, since historical lessons will be lost unless the very generation which should be held accountable passes their experience onto the younger generation. A stable state which envisages little subversive confrontation from within or without may tolerate open criticism of events for which the government is responsible. Even in such a state, the situation may change at times of uncertainty.24 Is it possible to tell when a society is ready to face an unspeakable and disturbing past and to swallow bitter pills? At what stage of political or economic development is it possible to signal that a society has


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achieved such a degree of democratic maturity and acquired such confidence? Or, can such openness and tolerance be a matter of political expediency too? People often get into trouble in the same or similar situations over and over again, learning little from precedents.25 Although a degree of learning may take place across state boundaries and between peoples through shared sufferings and ordeals and through exhilarating achievements, the true beliefs hidden beneath public declarations and statements may be internalized and become potentially insidious. Either way, the emphasis is often placed on a certain kind of human behavioural pattern; hence, history is thought to repeat itself. Yet, at another level, our historical knowledge or collective memory may be simply one-sided or narrow-focused. Our already codified knowledge may contain serious flaws. In this sense, historical knowledge may be constitutive of history. People may repeat the same errors, when they continue to rely on their same historical knowledge but do not learn from history. When they do learn, history may prove a little more progressive. In concluding, this study does not predict that efforts to confront hard times and learn from the mistakes of past generations will, in a matter of a decade or so, induce accommodating attitudes between peoples formerly in a state of virulent feud, and create peaceful and favourable relations between long-standing enemies.26 To achieve such a springboard, the task envisaged here demands so much — a determined political will, plus patience, and the various facilities needed to realize it. It is difficult to imagine that all sides concerned could commit themselves to such a task.27 Even in transnational contacts such as exchange programmes and cultural events, those with cooperative attitudes are more likely to participate in such activities than those without. Frequent communication does not necessarily result in mutual understanding between peoples; communication may exacerbate differences and create unbridgeable distances between them. It is similarly difficult to conceive that those committed to the task would not end up with political divides, cultural antagonism or religious revelation or faith. A sharp edge may still remain in difficult circumstances where choices are tough or sometimes not available at all. Nonetheless, solving the problem, which looks as if it has no beginning or end, is not necessarily hopeless. Efforts to face the past may foster more realistic and cautious attitudes about foreign nationals and compatriots with different cultural and political backgrounds and lead to a consideration of their respective positions in their own right. At the very least, one’s awareness of historical biases is likely to create an understanding of different modes of thinking and the different logic employed by different peoples. What lags behind in this seemingly interdependent world may still be our


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knowledge and understanding of one another. It is perhaps most telling that the original Greek word for historia means ‘inquiry’. NOTES 1 2

3

4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

12 13

14 15 16

17

18

19

20

FT, 17.7.86. See James N. Rosenau, ‘Pre-Theories and Theories of Foreign Policy’, in R. Barry Farrell (ed.), Approaches to Comparative and International Politics, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1966, p. 66. See Bernard Cohen, ‘National International Linkages: Superpolities’, in James N. Rosenau (ed.), Linkage Politics, New York, The Free Press, 1969, p. 126. In the same volume, Holt and Turner also discussed the effect of external events on the insular polity. Robert T. Holt and John E. Turner, ‘Insular Polities’, pp. 205–17. See Georg Eckert Institute, Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research Braunschweig (an English brochure), 1995, pp. 20–3. HER, 14.2.95, p. 14. KT, 24.7.82, p. 2. See a comment made by a Foreign Ministry source. AS, M.25.9.82, p. 4. As to this point, see Kitaoka Shin’ichi, ‘Japan-China Joint History Research Gets Under Way’, Gaiko Forum, Autumn 2007, pp. 3–4. KH, 19.6.86, pp. 3 and 7. It was at the time of Chinese General Secretary Hu Yaobang’s visit to Japan in November 1983. Wolfgang Mommsen’s comment, in Ralf Dahrendorf, The Unresolved Past: A Debate in German History, A Wheatland Foundation Conference (September 1987), Gina Thomas (ed.), London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990, p. 47. Kocka’s comment, in Dahrendorf, The Unresolved Past , p. 60. John Tosh, The Pursuit of History: Aims, Methods and New Directions in the Study of Modern History, 2nd ed., London and New York, Longman, 1991, pp. 10–11 and 18. Ibid., p. 19. George F. Kennan, American Diplomacy 1900–1950, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1951, p. 73. Ian Buruma, The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan, London, Jonathan Cape, 1994, p. 217. See also Walter Benjamin, Illuminations, Hannah Arendt (ed.), Harry Zohn (trans.), London, Fontana Press, 1973. Lee Do-sung, ‘Japanese-South Korean Relations from the Viewpoint of Japanese People’, in Director-General for Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau, the Minister’s Secretariat, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Gaikoku Hodo Kisha no Mita Nihon no Sugata (Japan in the Eyes of Foreign Journalists), Tokyo, 1985, p. 6. Richard Falk’s phrase ‘normative fatigue’ is quoted in Fred Halliday, ‘Three Concepts of Internationalism’, International Affairs, vol. 64, no. 2, 1988, p. 190. Lily Gardner Feldman, ‘German Morality and Israel’, in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), The Federal Republic of Germany at Forty, New York and London, New York University Press, 1989, p. 458. Peter Gordon and John White, Philosophers as Education Reformers: The


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21 22 23 24

25

26

27

259

Influence of Idealism on British Educational Thought and Practice, London, Boston and Henley, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979, pp. 232–3. See Mandan Sarup, Education, State and Crisis: A Marxist Perspective, London and Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982, p. 100. Buruma quotes Chrisoph Stolzl (a curator at the Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin)’s comment. Buruma, The Wages of Guilt, p. 237. Mary Fulbrook, The Divided Nation, London, Fontana Press, 1991, p. 317. R. Murray Thomas, ‘The Symbiotic Linking of Politics and Education’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, p. 11. Peter H. Merkl, ‘Conclusion: Were the Angry Old Men Wrong?’, in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), The Federal Republic of Germany at Forty, New York and London, New York University Press, 1989, p. 472. For example, see Angell’s comment on narrow nationalisms and ideological cleavages. Robert Cooley Angell, Peace on the March: Transnational Participation, New York and London, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1969, p. 21. Donald P. Warwick, ‘Transnational Participation and International Peace’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, p. 323.

09 Appendices:Hirano

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Appendices Appendix 4.1 A Gist of Textbook Screening Standards for Social Studies Subjects (Used in the 1980s) The scope (1) Textbooks must cover subject-matters indicated in the Course of Study. (2) Textbooks must not include unnecessary subject-matters in accordance with the Course of Study. The depth The content should be appropriate to students’ physical and mental development, for example, in terms of the text, questions, sources, notes as well as pictures, photos, maps and diagrams. The selection and treatment • The text, questions, sources as well as pictures, photos, notes, maps and diagrams should be appropriate for instruction. All these should not be comprehensive, and only basic matters should be chosen. • Textbooks should take into account students’ life, experience and interest, and they should be appropriate for voluntary study. • Textbooks should treat each section fairly without placing emphasis on particular sections. • Sources such as statistics should be reliable. • Subject-matters should be selected in the light of contemporary life and scientific technology and according to students’ developmental stages. • Other fields and courses, civics and special activities should be taken into consideration where necessary, and there should be no contradictions and duplications. • Particular geographical regions should not be treated favourably. • The contents, index and legends should be appropriate. • Citation should indicate sources where necessary. • Textbooks should not advertise nor accuse particular commercial corporations or specific products. The structure, layout and volume • Textbooks should be organized systematically and cumulatively.


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261

The layout and relevance of the text, questions and sources should be appropriate. The same applies to pictures, photos, notes, maps and diagrams. The structure and layout should be consistent and not repetitive. The volume and balance must be appropriate, which can be covered fully during the assigned class hours.

The accuracy • There should be neither errors nor inaccurate points in the text, sources and other parts. • There should be no contradictions between the text, sources and other parts. • Textbooks should not take up one-sided views without sufficient consideration, and they should not describe uncertain current phenomena in a definite manner. • There should be no typographical errors. The drawing/writing and expressions • Textbooks should not use terms and sentences which are difficult for students to understand or those which they are likely to misunderstand. • Sentences should be well versed and not long. Pictures, maps and figures should be of good quality. • Chinese characters, other writing forms, terminology and symbols should be appropriate and consistent. *Note: The textbook screening standards for social studies were almost the same for compulsory education and the senior high school level. As for the former, see the Official Gazette, No. 15211, 22 September 1977, p.16 and for the latter, the Official Gazette, No. 15744, 12 July 1979, p.5.


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Appendix 5.1 Chinese and South Korean Press Reports of Japanese Textbook Screening Results during the 1982 Dispute (Excerpts)* (1) Xinhua News Agency The comparison of texts before and after textbook screening The original text

The text after textbook screening

‘the surprise attack launched by Japan- ‘“a naval battle” between the fleets of ese warships against the Chinese navy Japan and the Qing dynasty’ in 1894’ ‘the “incident of September 18” in ‘the Japanese army’s “bombardment of 1931 when the Japanese army invaded some sections of the railway in south northeast China (Manchuria)’ Manchuria”’ Japan’s ‘full-scale aggressive war against China’ in 1937

‘a full-scale offensive against China’

(Source: XHNA, 28.6.82, p.18) (2) People’s Daily Related campaigns •

•

A collection of five photographs taken during the Nanjing Massacre in 1937 is shown with the caption ‘a preliminary count of the corpses, according to the Far East International Military Tribunal, was 340,000’. (Quoted in XHNA, 2.8.82, pp.26-7) Another three photos selected from a book compiled by a veteran Chinese dramatist, Ma Yanxiang, show that Japanese troops insulted the bronze statue of Dr Sun Yat-sen in front of the Shanghai municipal government and that they decapitated a young Chinese man, and how part of Guangzhou was ruined after bombing by Japanese air planes. (Quoted in XHNA, 4.8.82, p.16)


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(3) The Korea Times The comparison of texts before and after textbook screening The original text


‘Japanese forces, which occupied Nanking, massacred numerous noncombatants, and [the] incident which was severely criticised by foreign countries...’.

The MOE’s explanation to a publisher: ‘The truth of the Nanking incident is not yet established. The incident should be described as having occurred under abnormal circumstances. Furthermore, it should be made clear that military personnel were also killed.’ (Source: KT, 18.7.82, p.4)

‘deportation of Koreans for forced labor’

‘implementation of the national mobilization order to Koreans’ (Source: KT, 28.7.82, p.1)

The comparison between Japanese textbooks and Korean historians’ views Japanese textbooks

Korean historians’ views

‘[T]he Japanese government asked for the abdication of the Korean emperor on the occasion of the Hague Emissary incident and concluded the third Japan-Korea Agreement in 1907....’ ‘Korean people resisted against such forceful colonization policy from place to place but Japan subjugated them by military force.’

‘[T]he Korean emperor sent personal letters to Russia, Germany, the United States and France, denying the validity of the 1905 protectorate treaty. Japan forces [sic] his abdication in a decision meeting [over] which its emperor presided, on July 17, 1907, following the Hague [Emissary] incident.’ ‘Then the Japanese...disbanded Korean armed forces to prevent military resistance against the invasion.’

‘[T]he governor-general in Korea held ‘[T]he military police subjugated indelegislative and administrative authority pendence movements of Korea rather in Korea, maintained public security than maintaining public order.’ with military police and applied severe restrictions to the rights and freedom of Koreans.’ ‘Japanese authorities “confirmed land rights through large-scale surveys ... and requisitioned vast areas for official ownership. A rapidly growing number of Koreans left for Japan and Manchuria after losing their land”.’

‘[T]he Koreans were robbed of their land and forced to become tenant farmers as a result of this “confirmation of land ownership”.’


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Japanese textbooks

Korean historians’ views

‘Japanese was spoken as the official ‘By a royal decree issued in March language in Korea along with Korean.’ 1938, Korean [language] became an optional subject and was later excluded from the regular curriculum. In 1942, students who spoke Korean in school[s] faced punishment.’ ‘[W]orhip at the Shinto Shrine was en- ‘The Japanese colonialists established a couraged.’ Korean Shinto Shrine in July 1919, changing the name from “Chosen Jinga” [Korean Temple] to “Chosen Jingu” [Korean Shrine] in 1935, when they began forcing Koreans to worship there.’ (Source: KT, 31.7.82, p.4) 4) The Korea Herald The comparison of texts before and after textbook screening The original text


‘[T]he Japanese side induced a collision (during the Unyang-ho incident of 1875) and under the excuse of this incident, Japan forced Korea to open its ports.’

‘[T]he collision took place because the Korean side launched a bombardment on the Japanese ship (Unyang-ho) and eventually Korea opened its ports.’

Japan ‘invaded’ Korea following the Japan ‘advanced’ to Korea. conclusion of the protectorate treaty of 1905. Many Koreans were ‘forcibly drafted’ Many Koreans were ‘mobilized’. into the Japanese army or for other purposes, including young women for the ‘entertainment’ of Japanese soldiers particularly during the Second World War. (Source: KH, 27.7.82, p.1)


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The comparison of Japanese textbooks and Korean historians’ views

Japanese textbooks

The Korean National History Compilation Committee’s explanations

‘[A] Japanese naval vessel was confronted by a [sic] Korean forces as it sailed in to the mouth of Han River to demand water.’

The Kwanghwa-do Island incident in 1875 was ‘a Japanese act of provocation plotted by the Japanese beforehand.’ ‘[T]he Koreans fired at the Japanese vessel because it had intruded into Korean waters without permission and did not follow instruction[s] to withdraw.’

‘Japan acquired a superior position in trade through the treaty [signed between Korea and Japan at Kwanghwado] and wanted to be superior to China by strengthening the independence of Korea.’

‘[T]he treaty was to remove the strong influence of China from Korea and a step for the invasion of Korea, not for Korea’s freedom or to strengthen Korea’s independence’.

‘[T]he Tonghak Farmers’ Movement’ is explained as ‘a rebellion of farmers’. ‘The movement was due to the oppressive administration of government officials in local provinces and the invasion of many foreign nations’.

It was ‘to oppose the conservatism and invasion’. ‘[T]he farmers rose mainly against the Japanese policy of invading Korea.’

‘Queen Min of Korea was killed by ‘[T]he plan to kill the queen was plotJapanese military solders and civilians.’ ted and done by officials of the Japanese government in an effort to remove the influence of China from Korea.’ (Source: KH, 6.8.82, p.3) *Note: The Korean newspapers cited above did not necessarily represent the South Korean government’s views.


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Appendix 6.1 South Koreans’ Views about the 1982 Textbook Dispute and Foreign Countries •

South Koreans’ views about the Japanese government’s promise to make corrections in textbooks: Not acceptable 47.2%; Dissatisfied 43.0% (Immediate corrections necessary 94.9%); and Positive 7.3%

•

Countries which South Koreans regard as a friend: The United States 86.4%; Taiwan 76.9%; Canada 70.0%; and Japan 10.4% (the ratio was 15.8% a year before; 54.2% of those who regarded Japan as a friend said that it was not a good friend)

•

Unless Japan makes corrections, South Korea severs diplomatic relations with Japan: Yes 63.7%; No 12.8%

(Sources: A survey by an evening newspaper Kyonghyang Shinmun in Seoul (conducted between 10 and 13 September after the first textbook dispute and publicized on 6 October). AS, M.7.10.82, p.2)


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Appendix 6.2 South Koreans’ Like and Dislike of Foreigners (before the 1982 dispute) •

Countries which South Koreans dislike: Japan 36.5%; North Korea 34.1%; the Soviet Union 12.8%; and China 1.8%

•

Countries which South Koreans like: The United States 43.5%; Switzerland 15.4%; West Germany 5.1%; France 4.7%; and Britain 4.3%

•

South Koreans who dislike the Japanese by the age group: 30-34 45.6%; 50 or over: 21.0 %

•

South Koreans who dislike the Japanese by the education level: University-educated 43.3%; Primary school leavers 26.3%

(Source: Korean Gallup Polls (a survey conducted on 601 males and 617 females between 20 and 30 January 1982 and publicized on 12 August 1982), quoted in KT, 12.8.82, p.8)


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Appendix 6.3 Reactions of Governments and Officials in Other Countries* Taiwan • A government memorandum addressed to Tokyo: the textbook revisions not only overlooked the Chinese feelings but also disregarded the hopes for peace between Japan and Taiwan (the official Central News Agency). (Taipei (AP, KNI), IT, 5.8.82) • The Education Ministry instructs the National Institute of Compilation and Translation to increase the accounts covering a period from the first SinoJapanese war of 1894 to Japan’s surrender in 1945 (5 August). (Taipei (RTN, 5.8.82), ST, 6.8.82) North Korea • The official newspaper’s commentary: ‘[I]mpudently ignoring public opinion at home and abroad’, the Japanese authorities ‘refused to admit the distortion and forgery, but attempted to justify’ the revision of textbooks. (Beijing (AFP, AP), ST, 8.8.82) • The Party paper: ‘...it [Japanese reactionaries’ revision of textbooks] is timed to coincide with working out a new five-year arms build-up plan for rearming the “Self-Defence Forces” with the latest attack weapons and equipment, intensification of provocative war exercises against the Korean and other Asian peoples and the stepped-up scheme for emerging legislation for overseas aggression...’. (Pyongyang (Rodong Sinmun), BP, 28.8.82) Vietnam • Another outcry over the ‘innumerable genocidal crimes’ of Japanese militarists during their five-year occupation of Vietnam. (IT, 9.9.82) · Hanoi continues to condemn the fabrication of history as part of Tokyo’s expansionist policy in Southeast Asia. (Bangkok (AP, 10.9.82), ST, 11.9.82) • The Nhân Dân (the official newspaper) during the 1986 dispute: the textbook problem is part of Japan’s strategy for becoming ‘an unsinkable aircraft carrier’ in cooperation with the United States. (AP, 8.7.86) The Soviet Union • Pravda comments on the textbook revisions and at the same time renews Moscow’s denunciation of Tokyo’s claim to the disputed Kurile islands or the Northern Territories. (TIM, 27.8.82) Thailand • Dr Ekavidyana Thalang (Director-General of the Technical Department): Both Thai Foreign and Education Ministries closely followed the international row, and the government would take action if Japan perverted Thai history. (BP, 1.9.82)


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Foreign Ministry spokesman Jetn Sucharitkul: The controversial revisions do not have a direct bearing on bilateral relations between Bangkok and Tokyo. ‘The Foreign Ministry had informed its ambassador in Tokyo to refrain from any protest over the textbook revisions.’ (BP, 2.9.82)

Malaysia • PM Mahathir Mohamad in an interview with Asahi Shimbun (26 August 1982): Japan should maintain the capacity to defend itself, but strictly within the limits of self-defence, the capacity beyond that level will arouse our alertness. I am convinced that Japan does not have any intention to use its military force for invading other countries. (AS, M.27.8.82, p.7) Singapore • Dr Tay Eng Soon (Education Minister): New history books would give young Singaporeans an insight into their historical and cultural roots; ‘among the significant events to be highlighted are WWII, the Japanese Occupation and the struggle for independence’. (ST, 22.8.82) Philippines • President Ferdinand E. Marcos: ‘Filipinos were not disturbed by Japanese revision of textbooks accounts...because they know other big powers, including the United Sates, “doctor histories”.’ ‘... some American books about the battles of Bataan and Corregidor [are] without any mention at all of the thousands of Filipinos who died’. (AP, 6.9.82) • President Marcos in an NBC programme during his visit to the US: Seriously concerned with US pressure on Japan to increase defence capability which might be a threat to a small Southeast Asian country like the Philippines. (AS, M.21.9.82, p.7) Indonesia • President Suharto expresses his concern over the US pressure on Japan to increase its military capacity during his visit to Japan in October 1982 in the aftermath of the textbook row. (Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies) (ed.), ‘1982 Nen no Indoneshia (Indonesia in 1982)’, in Ajia Chuto no Doko Nempo, 1983, p.383) *Note 1: The above countries appear in the order of those which showed stronger government reactions and in the same order as Table 6.1. *Note 2: Some officials’ comments were not necessarily made in their official capacity.


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Appendix 6.4 Public Reactions in Other Countries* Hong Kong Protest rallies organized by students (and teachers): · Hundreds gather at Hongkong University, burning mock Japanese history books and a mock flag symbolising the country’s militarism. Students declare a one-day boycott of all Japanese goods in Hong Kong on the day of the Mukden Incident and the invasion of Manchuria (6 August). (ST, 7.8.82) • The Hong Kong Federation of Students (20,000 members) collect signatures in a petition (15 August). About 1,000 photo posters depicting a scene of the Nanking Massacre are put up across the city. (Hong Kong (AP, KNI), IT, 16.8.82) • The Hong Kong Federation of Students and the Professional Teachers’ Union organize an anti-Japanese rally to commemorate the fifty-first anniversary of the Japanese invasion of Manchuria (the police estimate 10,000 participants; others sources indicate nearly 20,000) (19 September). (Hong Kong (RTN, AP), BP, 19.9.82) Other incidents: • About 1,100 people representing trade unions, educational and social groups participate in a protest rally (29 August). (‘1982 Nen no Chugoku (China in 1982)’, p.189) • A home-made device explodes at a Japanese department store (19 September). (Hong Kong (RTN, AP), BP, 19.9.82) • The police step up security around Japanese businesses because of an antiJapanese riot by about 600 angry soccer fans and the discovery of a second bomb in a Japanese department store. (Hong Kong (UPI), BP, 21.9.82) Taiwan •

• •

•

•

An army veteran launches the first protest, marching alone outside the Japanese liaison office and telling bystanders his family’s horrendous experience at the time of Japanese aggression in China (early August 1982). (Taipei (AP,KNI), IT, 7.8.82) A group of college professors and students starts a sign-in campaign and launches the first mass protest. (8 August) A protest note with about 50,000 signatures of citizens is handed to the Japanese liaison office in Taipei. (Taipei (RTN, 5.8.82), ST, 6.8.82 and Taipei (AP, KNI), IT, 12.8.82). The protest note calls for the mobilisation of all the Taiwanese and overseas compatriots and for a boycott of Japanese products, if Japan failed to correct textbooks. (Taipei (AP), BP, 12.8.82) The protest note: The failure of the Japanese authorities to take corrective measures would suggest that Japan would like to inflame the relationship between


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the Chinese and Japanese people and that, as a result, stories of massive and cruel murdering by Japanese solders would be told for many generations by the elderly to the young. (Taipei (AP, KNI), IT, 12.8.82) Thailand •

The Chinese Journalists Welfare Association sends a protest letter to the Japanese Education Ministry, the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and several Japanese newspapers: the Association does not agree on the distortion of history, while praising Japan’s role in promoting democracy and world peace since 1945. (Tokyo (AP, AFP, 17.8.82), ST, 18.8.82 and BP, 17.8.82)

The United States • •

•

•

•

•

A group called ‘Alliance Against Japanese Distortion of History’ is established (17 September). (Tokyo (AP, AFP, 17.9.82), ST, 18.9.82) About eighty Japanese, Chinese and Koreans, many of them US citizens mill in front of the Japanese consulate in New York, with a post showing a smiling Japanese soldier piercing a baby with his bayonet. ‘US don’t arm Japan’ (17 September). (AP, 17.9.82) More than 500 Chinese and Korean Americans launch a protest rally outside the Japanese consulate in Boston (18 September). The Alliance which sponsored the protest demands the Japanese government to announce a concrete action plan and to make corrections before 1984 (the official schedule for corrections). (NYT, 19.9.82) Sources at the Japanese consulate: A letter and petition with nearly 2,000 signatures which the consulate received will be sent to Japan. (Boston (AP), BP, 20.9.82) Another protest demonstration organized by the Alliance (about twenty-five Asian-Americans), timed to coincide with Japanese Prime Minister Nakasone’s visit to the US in January 1983. (AP, 18.1.83) Dr Jane Hu (co-chairperson of the Alliance): ‘We just want to let the American people know and the prime minister will realise that the United States which champions human rights is concerned with truth.’ (AP, 18.1.83) ‘Think how Jewish people would feel if West German schoolbooks suddenly stopped mentioning the Holocaust.’ She asserted that the war which Japan started in Asia in the 1930s and 1940s ‘was like the Holocaust — the attempted destruction of an entire people’. (TWP, 18.1.83)

Singapore •

Dr Ow Chin Hock’s speech at his constituency’s National Day dinner: ‘Some Japanese felt that their national feeling and pride are at stake in this controversy, but they must not forget other people also have their own national feeling and pride.’ The Singaporean Education Ministry should ‘give greater emphasis to history as it will show the youth how to respond to crisis, to earn self-respect and build self-confidence and strength to face adversity’. (ST, 9.8.82)


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Indonesia •

One Indonesian parliamentarian, Mr Chalik Ali of the opposition Muslim United Development demands that the government check Japanese textbooks concerning prewar and wartime Indonesia. (Tokyo (Agencies, 6.8.82), ST, 7.8.82)

*Note: The above countries appear in the order of those which showed stronger public reactions.


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Appendix 6.5 The Number of Newspaper Articles on the Textbook Issue (1) Asian newspaper articles on the 1982 dispute (July to September 1982)*

*Note: The newspapers which were surveyed in the source are as follows (from the left of the chart): South Korea: Dong-A Ilbo (East Asia Daily), Chosun Ilbo (Korea Daily) and Korea Economic Daily; North Korea: Rodong Sinmun (Labour Newspaper) and Minjoo Chosun (Democratic Korea); China: Renmin Ribao (People’s Daily) and Guangming Ribao (Enlightenment Daily); Taiwan: Central Daily News; Hong Kong: Wen Hui Bao (Literary Gazette) and Gong Shang Ri Bao (Industry and Commerce Daily); Macao: Ou Mun Iat Pou (Maccau Daily News); Philippines: The Times Journal and Bulletin Today; Indonesia: The Indonesia Times, Kompas, Sinar Harapan and Suara Karya; Malaysia: New Straits Times Malaysia and Utusan Malaysia; Singapore: Nan Yang Shang Bao (South Sea Commercial News), The Straits Times and Xing Zhou Ri Bao (Singapore Daily); Vietnam: Nhân Dân; Thailand: Bangkok Post, The Nation and Siam Rat; Burma: The Working People’s Daily; India: The Hindu, The Times of India and Indian Express (New Delhi ed.); Sri Lanka: Daily News; Pakistan: The Muslim, The Pakistan Times and Dawn; Nepal: The Rising Nepal; Bangladesh: The Bangladesh Observer; and Australia: The Australian (Source: Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies, Tokyo), ‘Asian Newspapers on the ‘Textbook Issue’: Index to Articles July-September 1982’, Ajia Keizai Shiryo Geppo (Asian Economic Data Monthly), vol.24, nos.11 and 12, November/December 1982, pp.1-3, 102-9 and 118-30)


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(2) American and British newspaper articles on the textbook issue


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Appendix 6.6 Japan’s Partners Which country should Japan keep on good terms with? The United States 34%; China 19%; the Soviet Union 2%; and Korea 1% (Sources: A survey conducted by the Prime Minister’s Office of Japan, with some 3,000 adults being surveyed in June 1982 before the textbook dispute, KT, 5.10.82, p.3)

10 Bibliography:Hirano

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Select Bibliography 1. OFFICIAL RECORDS (PUBLISHED)* The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan Asian Affairs Bureau (ed.), Chugoku Geppo (China Monthly), Tokyo, July 1982 to December 1987 (inclusive). Director-General for Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau, the Minister’s Secretariat (ed.), Gaikoku Hodo Kisha no Mita Nihon no Sugata (Japan in the Eyes of Foreign Journalists), Tokyo, 1985. Domestic Public Relations Division, Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau (ed.), Nihon Gaiko ’83 — Nakasone and Abe Gaiko no Kiseki (Japanese Diplomatic Activities in 1983: The Footsteps of Prime Minister Nakasone and Foreign Minister Abe), Tokyo, 1983. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ‘ASEAN Shokoku ni Okeru Seron Chosa (Opinion Polls in ASEAN Countries)’, 1978–79, 1983, 1987 and 1992. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gaiko Seisho: Waga Gaiko no Kinkyo (Diplomatic Bluebook), the fiscal years 1973 and 1979–1990 (inclusive). Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau (ed.), Gaikoku Hodo Kisha no Mita Nihon no Sugata (Japan in the Eyes of Foreign Journalists), Tokyo, 1982. Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau (ed.), Nitchu Kankei Shiryoshu (A Collection of Documents on Sino-Japanese Relations), Tokyo, 1982. Articles published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan Fukagawa, Yasushi, ‘Doitsu no Sengo 50 Nen: Tai Porando Gaiko ga Motsu Imi (Germany’s 50 Postwar Years: the Implications of its Foreign Policy towards Poland)’, in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gaimusho Chosa Geppo (Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Monthly Research Report), 1995, no. 3, pp. 39–59. Ito, Tetsuo, ‘Dainiji Sekaitaisengo no Nihon no Baisho-Seikyuken Shori (Japan’s Treatment of Reparation Demands in the Post-WWII Period)’, in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gaimusho Chosa Geppo (Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Monthly Research Report), 1994, no. 1, pp. 77–115. Lee, Do-sung, ‘Japanese-South Korean Relations from the Viewpoint of Japanese People’, in Director-General for Public Information and Cultural Affairs Bureau, the Minister’s Secretariat, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (ed.), Gaikoku Hodo Kisha no Mita Nihon no Sugata (Japan in the Eyes of Foreign Journalists), Tokyo, 1985. The Ministry of Education of Japan Educational and Cultural Exchange Division, Unesco and International Affairs Department, Science and International Affairs Bureau, Course of Study for Lower Secondary Schools in Japan, Tokyo, Government of Japan, 1976 and 1983.


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Educational and Cultural Exchange Division, Unesco and International Affairs Department, Science and International Affairs Bureau, Course of Study for Upper Secondary Schools in Japan, Tokyo, Government of Japan, 1976 and 1983. Education Policy Documents Editing Committee (ed.), Rekidai Monbu Daijin Enzetsushu (A Collection of Former Japanese Education Ministers’ Speeches), Tokyo, 1984. Headquarters of Education Reform (ed.), Kokusai Rikai to Kyoryoku no Shinten — Kyoiku, Gakujutsu, Bunka, Supotsu o Toshite (The Development of International Understanding and Cooperation: Through Education, Academic Activities, Art, Culture and Sports), Tokyo, 1988. Ministry of Education, Kotogakko Gakushu Shido Yoryo Kaisetsu: Shakai-hen (Course of Study for Senior High Schools: Social Studies), Tokyo, 1979. Ministry of Education, Chugakko Shidosho: Shakai-hen (Course of Study for Junior High Schools: Social Studies), Tokyo, 1970 and 1978. Ministry of Education, Monbu Jiho (Education Updates), May, October and December 1982; January, March, June and July 1983; April 1984; May 1986; and April, August and September 1987. Ministry of Education, Monbusho: Education, Science and Culture in Japan, Tokyo, 1974. Planning Division, the Minister’s Secretariat (ed.), Monbusho Nempo (Annual Report of the Education Ministry), no. 108, 1980 and no. 109, 1981. Policy Division, the Minister’s Secretariat (ed.), Monbusho Nempo (Annual Report of the Education Ministry), no. 110, 1982; no. 111, 1983; no. 112, 1984; no. 113, 1985; and no. 114, 1986. Other publications by the Japanese government Defense Agency of Japan, Nippon no Boei (Defense of Japan), 1970, 1976–1986 (inclusive). Japanese Government, Kampo (The Official Gazette), No.15211 (22 September 1978), No.15744 (12 July 1979) and No.16475 (24 November 1982). Minutes of the Japanese Diet (Parliament) Plenary Sessions and the Diet Committees The House of Representatives Plenary Sessions: the 95th Session, 1 October 1981/ the 97th Session, 8 December 1982/ the 98th Session, 28 January 1982/ the 107th Session, 17 September 1986/ the 109th Session, 30 July 1987. Administrative and Financial Reform Committee: the 95th Session, 20 October 1981 (a joint meeting with several other committees). Audit Committee: the 91st Session, 18 April 1980/ the 94th Session, 21 July 1981/ the 96th Session, 10 August 1982; 21 September 1982 (the Session closed) / the 104th Session, 20 March 1986/ the 107th Session, 21 October 1986. Budget Committee: the 94th Session, 20 February 1981; 24 February 1981; 2 March 1981; 3 March 1981/ the 96th Session, 8 March 1982/ the 98th Session, 18 February 1983; 4 March 1983/ the 101st Session, 25 February 1984; 3 March 1984; 10 March 1984; 12 March 1984/ the 102nd Session, 6 February 1985; 25 February 1985; 7 March 1985; 8 March 1985/ the 104th Session, 20 February 1986; 6 March 1986/ the 107th Session, 6 November 1986. Cabinet Committee: the 96th Session, 29 July 1982/ the 101st Session, 21 June 1984; 28 June 1984; 26 June 1984; 3 July 1984; 10 July 1984/ the 104th Session, 6 March 1986; 10 April 1986.


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Education Committee: the 93rd Session, 15 October 1980/ the 94th Session, 25 February 1981; 10 April 1981; 15 April 1981; 17 April 1981; 15 May 1981/ the 95th Session, 23 October 1981/ the 96th Session, 19 March 1982; 26 March 1982; 7 April 1982; 9 April 1982; 30 July 1982; 4 August 1982; 6 August 1982; 20 August 1982; 27 August 1982 (the Session closed) / the 98th Session, 2 March 1983; 23 March 1983; 25 March 1983; 27 March 1983/ the 101st Session, 30 March 1984; 11 May 1984; 20 July 1984/ the 102nd Session, 29 March 1985; 17 April 1985; 24 April 1985; 5 June 1985; 14 June 1985/ the 103rd Session, 15 November 1985/ the 104th Session, 16 April 1986/ the 107th Session, 28 November 1986/ the 108th Session, 22 May 1987. Foreign Affairs Committee: the 96th Session, 30 July 1982; 9 August 1982; 20 August 1982/ the 103rd Session, 13 December 1985. Judicial Affairs Committee: the 96th Session, 19 August 1982. Okinawa and Northern Problems Committee: the 102nd Session, 17 April 1985. Science and Technology Committee: the 96th Session, 5 August 1982. The House of Councillors Plenary Sessions: the 97th Session, 9 December 1982; 10 December 1982. Administrative and Financial Reform Committee: the 95th Session, 11 November 1981; 20 November 1981. Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Committee: the 108th Session, 21 May 1987. Audit Committee: the 96th Session, 14 September 1982 (the Session closed); 16 September 1982 (the Session closed) / the 98th Session, 9 February 1983/ the 101st Session, 25 January 1984; 9 July 1984/ the 102nd Session, 12 December 1984; 15 June 1985/ the 104th Session, 23 January 1986/ the 107th Session, 21 November 1986. Budget Committee: the 94th Session, 10 March 1981; 19 March 1981; 24 March 1981/ the 96th Session, 11 March 1982; 18 March 1982; 30 June 1982/ the 97th Session, 21 December 1982/ the 98th Session, 12 March 1982/ the 101st Session, 22 March 1984/ the 104th Session, 28 March 1986; 31 March 1986/ the 107th Session, 10 November 1986/ the 108th Session, 7 May 1987. Cabinet Committee: the 101st Session, 31 July 1984; 1 August 1984 (a joint meeting with the Education and the Social and Labour Affairs Committees). Disasters Committee: the 96th Session, 11 August 1982. Education Committee: the 93rd Session, 23 October 1980/ the 94th Session, 24 March 1981; 31 March 1981; 28 April 1981; 7 May 1981/ the 95th Session, 22 October 1981; 27 October 1981; 5 November 1981/ the 96th Session, 30 March 1982; 29 July 1982; 3 August 1982; 5 August 1982; 10 August 1982; 19 August 1982/ the 98th Session, 22 March 1983; 24 March 1983/ the 101st Session, 26 April 1984; 19 July 1984/ the 102nd Session, 28 March 1985; 16 April 1985/ the 104th Session, 20 March 1986; 8 May 1986/ the 107th Session, 25 November 1986/ the 108th Session, 21 May 1987. Foreign Affairs Committee: the 96th Session, 19 August 1982. Judicial Affairs Committee: the 96th Session, 3 August 1982. Okinawa and Northern Problems Committee: the 102nd Session, 21 June 1985. Security Committee: the 96th Session, 10 August 1982. The Liberal Democratic Party Jiyu Shimpo (Liberal News) (January-August 1980 inclusive).


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Other official publications Council for Cultural Co-operation, Council of Europe, Final Report (provisional version) ‘Learning and Teaching about the History of Europe in the 20th Century in Secondary School’, Symposium ‘Towards A Pluralist and Tolerant Approach to Teaching History — A Range of Sources and New Didactics’, 10–12 December 1998, prepared by Henry Frendo (DECS/ EDUHIST/ 20/ SYM(98) 4.prov). The League of Nations, Special Supplement, No.11, ‘Resolutions and Recommendations adopted by the Assembly during the Fourth Session (3 to 29 September 1923)’, Official Journal. The League of Nations, Special Supplement, No.21, ‘Resolutions and Recommendations adopted by the Assembly during the Fifth Session (1 September to 2 October 1924)’, Official Journal. The League of Nations, ‘Work of the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation During its Seventh Session’, Official Journal, Annex 848, C.98(2), 1926, XII, pp. 569–73. General Headquarters, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (the Education Division of the Civil Information and Education Section (CIE)), Education in the New Japan, Volumes I and II, Tokyo, 1948. Tokyo Metropolitan Government (Liaison and Protocol Section, Bureau of General Affairs) (ed.), Education in Tokyo, Tokyo, 1979. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), ’2.9 Estimated numbers of out-of-school children by gender and region, 1999 and 2004’, Strong Foundations: Early Childhood Care and Education, 2006. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Trends and Projections of Enrolment by Level of Education by Age and by Sex 1960–2025 (as assessed in 1993). Note: The names of Japanese government agencies, bureaus, divisions and Diet committees are translated and original Japanese terms are omitted here.

2. NEWSPAPERS AND NEWS AGENCIES’ REPORTS China China Daily (June to December 1982 inclusive and May to September 1986 inclusive). Xinhua News Agency (June to December 1982 (daily edition) inclusive and JuneSeptember 1986 (weekly edition) inclusive, complemented by the electric version, up to December 2007). Japan Asahi Shimbun (Tokyo edition, January 1980 to December 1986 inclusive, complemented by the electric version, up to December 2007). The Daily Yomiuri (the electric version, up to December 2007). Mainichi Daily News (the electric version, up to December 2007). South Korea The Korea Herald (June to December 1982 inclusive and June to September 1986 inclusive). The Korea Times (June to December 1982 inclusive). Yonhap News Agency (the electric version, up to December 2007).


280

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Indonesia (ASEAN countries below) The Indonesia Times (June to December 1982 inclusive and June to September 1986 inclusive). Malaysia Malaysian Digest (June to December 1982 (bimonthly) inclusive). New Straits Times (June to July 1982 inclusive, August 1982 onwards not available). Philippines Bulletin Today (later renamed Manila Bulletin) (June to December 1982 inclusive and June to September 1986 inclusive). Singapore The Straits Times (June to December 1982 inclusive and June to September 1986 inclusive). Thailand Bangkok Post (June to December 1982 inclusive and June to September 1986 inclusive). Britain (non-Asian countries below) BBC Summary of World Broadcasts (January 1987 to December 1995). Financial Times (June 1982 to December 1995). The Guardian (July 1984 to December 1995). The Herald (December 1992 to December 1995). The Independent (September 1988 to December 1995). The Observer (October 1990 to December 1995). Reuters News (January 1992 to December 1995). The Times (June 1982 to December 1995). The United States The Associated Press (AP) (June 1982 to December 1995). New York Times (June 1982 to December 1995). The Washington Post (June 1982 to December 1995).

3. JAPANESE SCHOOL TEXTBOOKS Junior high school textbooks Kaitei Chugaku Shakai Rekishi (Social Studies for Junior High Schools, History: Revised Edition), Kyoiku Shuppan, 1997. Chugaku Shakai Rekishiteki Bunya (Social Studies for Junior High Schools, History), new ed., Kyoiku Shuppan, 1987. Chugaku Shakai Rekishiteki Bunya (Social Studies for Junior High Schools, History), rev. ed., Kyoiku Shuppan, 1984. Chugakko Rekishi Nihon no Rekishi to Sekai (Japanese History and the World for Junior High Schools), Shimizu Shoin, 1997. Nihon no Rekishi to Sekai Chugakko Shakaika (Social Studies: Japanese History and the World for Junior High Schools), Shimizu Shoin, 1987. Nihon no Rekishi to Sekai Chugakko Shakaika (Social Studies: Japanese History and the World for Junior High Schools), new ed., Shimizu Shoin, 1984.


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High school textbooks Koko Nihonshi A (Japanese History A for High Schools), Jikkyo Shuppan, 2007. Koko Nihonshi B (Japanese History B for High Schools), Jikkyo Shuppan, 2004. Koko Nihonshi A (Japanese History A for High Schools), Jikkyo Shuppan, 2003. Koko Nihonshi A (Japanese History A for High Schools), Jikkyo Shuppan, 1999. Koko Nihonshi B (Japanese History B for High Schools), Jikkyo Shuppan, 1999. Nihonshi B (Japanese History B), Jikkyo Shuppan, 1994. Nihonshi (Japanese History), rev. ed., Jikkyo Shuppan, 1987. Nihonshi (Japanese History), Jikkyo Shuppan, 1983. Nihonshi B (Japanese History B), Sanseido, 2004. Nihonshi A (Japanese History A), Sanseido, 2004. Shokai Nihonshi B (Detailed Japanese History B), Sanseido, 1999. Meikai Nihonshi A (Clear Japanese History A), Sanseido, 1998. Shokai Nihonshi B (Detailed Japanese History B), Sanseido, 1995. Meikai Nihonshi A (Clear Japanese History A), Sanseido, 1994 Koko Nihonshi (Japanese History for High Schools), rev. ed., Sanseido, 1988. Koko Nihonshi (Japanese History for High Schools), Sanseido, 1983. Shosetsu Nihonshi (Detailed Japanese History: Japanese History B), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2007. Gendai no Nihonshi (Contemporary Japanese History, Japanese History A), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2007. Shosetsu Nihonshi (Detailed Japanese History: Japanese History B), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2003. Gendai no Nihonshi (Contemporary Japanese History, Japanese History A), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2003. Gendai no Nihonshi (Contemporary Japanese History, Japanese History A), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1999. Shosetsu Nihonshi (Detailed Japanese History: Japanese History B), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1998. Shosetsu Nihonshi (New Japanese History: Japanese History B), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1995. Gendai no Nihonshi (Contemporary Japanese History, Japanese History A), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1994. Nihonshi (Japanese History), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1987. Shosetsu Nihonshi (Detailed Japanese History), new ed., Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1983. Hyojun Nihonshi (Standard Japanese History), Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1978.

4. REFERENCE BOOKS Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies) (ed.), Ajia Chuto no Doko Nempo (Annual Report of the Developments in Asia and the Middle East), 1980–86. Ajia Keizai Kenkyusho (Institute of Developing Economies), ‘Asian Newspapers on the “Textbook Issue”: Index to Articles July-September 1982’, Ajia Keizai Shiryo Geppo (Asian Economic Data Monthly), vol. 24, nos.11 and 12, 1982. Hosoya, Chihiro, Aruga, Tadashi, Ishii, Osamu and Sasaki, Takuya (eds), Nichibei Kankei Shiryoshu 1945–97 (A Collection of Documents on US-Japanese Relations, 1945–97), Tokyo, Tokyo University Press, 1999. Showashi Kenkyukai (ed.), Showashi Jiten 1923–1983 (Encyclopaedia of the Showa Period), Tokyo, Kodansha, 1984.


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History Education and International Relations 5. THESES AND PAPERS

Behrman, Cynthia, ‘The Mythology of British Imperialism, 1890–1914’, University of Boston doctoral dissertation, 1965. Benfell, Steve T., ‘Meet the New Japan, Same as the Old Japan: The History and Politics of Postwar National Identity’, USJP Occasional Paper 98–03, Harvard University, 1998. Lee, Kenneth Bok, The Postwar Reforms and Educational Development in Japan, 1945–1970, Ph.D. thesis at University of Southern California, 1974. Rose, Caroline, The 1982 Textbook Issue in Sino-Japanese Relations, Ph.D. thesis at University of Leeds, 1995. Tsurumi, Kazuko, ‘Japan and Holy War’, Institute of International Relations Research Papers, Series A-60, 1995. Watanuki, Joji, ‘Political Generations in Post World War II Japan — With Some Comparisons to the Case of Germany’, Institute of International Relations Research Papers, Series A-64, Institute of International Relations, Sophia University, Tokyo, 1995.

6. PAMPHLETS, BOOKLETS AND REPORTS Amakawa, Akira, ‘Japanese Reactions for Political Reform Under the Allied Occupation’, in Ian Nish (ed.), ‘The Occupation of Japan 194552’, London, London School of Economics and Political Science, Suntory Toyota International Centre for Economics and Related Disciplines (STICERD), 1991, pp. 1–22. Asai, Motofumi, ‘Gekihen-suru Kokusai Seiji to Nihon no Yakuwari: Ajia o Chushin-toshite (Sweeping Changes in International Politics and Japan’s Role: the Asian Region)’, in ‘Tokushu: Gendaishi no Kyoiku (Special Issue: Teaching Contemporary History)’, Gunshuku Mondai Shiryo, no. 146, 1993, pp. 64–73. Georg Eckert Institute, Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research Braunschweig (an English brochure) 1995 Ienaga, Saburo and Teruoka, Itsuko, ‘Naze Kyokasho Saiban o Tatakatta-noka (Why Have We Brought the Textbook Issue to Courts)’, Iwanami Booklet, no. 335, Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1994. Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, ‘The Restoration of a National History’, Tokyo, 1998. Kyokasho Kenkyu Senta (Textbook Research Centre), ‘Nihon no Kyokasho (Japanese Textbooks)’, 1991. National League for Support of the School Textbook Screening Suits (NLSTS), ‘Truth in Textbooks, Freedom in Education and Peace for Children: The 27 Year Struggle of the Ienaga Textbook Lawsuits’, Tokyo, 1992. Nikkan Rekishi Kyokasho Kenkyukai (the Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks), ‘Dai Sankai Nikkan Godo Rekishi Kenkyukai (The 3rd Joint Meeting for South Korean-Japanese History Textbooks Research)’, September 1992. Scruton, Roger, ‘World Studies: Education or Indoctrination’, London, Institute of European Defence & Strategic Studies, 1985. Suzuki, Yuko, ‘Chosenjin Jugun Ianfu (Korean Comfort Women)’, Iwanami Booklet, no. 229, Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1991. Teruoka, Itsuko and Kato, Shuichi, ‘Sekai ni Tsuyo-shinai Kyokasho Kentei (Textbook Screening Unacceptable to the International Community)’, Tokyo, Kyokasho Kentei Sosho o Shiensuru Zenkoku Renrakukai (National League for


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Support of the School Textbook Screening Suits (NLSTS)), Kyokasho Saiban Bukkuretto, 1992. Zainihon Daikanminkoku Iryu Mindan Chuo Hombu (The Association of South Korean Residents in Japan), ‘Kankoku Kokushi Hensan Iinkai no Nihon Kyokasho Kankoku Kankei Naiyo Bunseki: 24 Komoku/167 Kasho no Waikyoku (An Analysis of Historical Representations of Korea in Japanese History Textbooks by the Korean National History Compilation Committee (KNHCC): Distortions concerning 24 Historical Facts/167 Points)’, September 1982.

7. BOOKS, BOOK CHAPTERS AND ARTICLES Abiko, Tadahiko, ‘Shogaikoku tono “Kyoiku Masatsu” ni Kansuru Kisoteki Kenkyu: Nihon no Rekishi Kyokasho ni Miru Gaikoku Ninshiki (Basic Study on “Educational Friction” between Japan and Foreign Countries: An Analysis of Japan’s Recognition of Foreign Countries in Japanese High School History Textbooks)’, Nagoya Daigaku Kyoiku Gakubu Kiyo (Bulletin of the Faculty of Education, Nagoya University), 1987, vol. 33, pp. 91–8. Adams, Donald K., Education and Modernization in Asia, Reading, Massachusetts, Addison-Wesley, 1970. Adler, Emanuel and Barnett, Michael, ‘Taking Identity and Our Critics Seriously’, Cooperation and Conflict, vol. 35, no. 3, 2000, pp. 321–9. Aho, James A., ‘Heroism, the Construction of Evil, and Violence’, in Vilho Harle (ed.), European Values in International Relations, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1990, pp. 15–28. Aldrich, Richard and Dean, Dennis, ‘Historical Dimension’, in Richard Aldrich (ed.), History in the National Curriculum, London, Kogan Page, 1991, pp. 93–113. Alexander, Thomas and Parker, Beryl, The New Education in the German Republic, London Williams & Norgate, 1930. Ålvik, Trond, ‘The Development of Views on Conflict, War and Peace among School Children: A Norwegian Case Study’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 5, no. 2, 1968, pp. 171–95. Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and the Spread of Nationalism, rev. ed., London and New York, Verso, 1991. Angell, Robert Cooley, Peace on the March: Transnational Participation, New York and London, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1969. Article 19, Information, Freedom and Censorship: World Report 1991, Library Association Publishing, 1991. Bachrach, Peter and Baratz, Morton, Power and Poverty: Theory and Practice, New York, Oxford University Press, 1970. Bachrach, Peter and Baratz, Morton, ‘The Two Faces of Power’, in Roderick Bell, David V. Edwards and R. Harrison Wagner (eds), Political Power: A Reader in Theory and Research, New York, The Free Press, 1969, pp. 94–9 (the original article in American Political Science Review, vol. 56, 1962, pp. 947–52). Baerwald, Hans H. and Hashimoto, Akira, ‘Japan in 1982: Doing Nothing is Best?’, Asian Survey, vol. 23, no. 1, 1983, pp. 53–61. Barnard, Christopher, Language, Ideology and Japanese History Textbooks, London and New York, RoutledgeCurzon, 2003. Barrow, Robin, Plato and Education, London and Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976.


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Bartov, Omer, ‘Savage War’, in Michael Burleigh (ed.), Confronting the Nazi Past: New Debates on Modern German History, London, Collins & Brown, 1996, pp. 125–39. Bellamy, Richard (ed.), Antonio Gramsci: Pre-Prison Writings, Virginia Cox (trans.), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994. Benjamin, Walter, Illuminations, Hannah Arendt (ed.), Harry Zohn (trans.), London, Fontana Press, 1973. Berman, Maureen B. and Johnson, Joseph E., ‘The Growing Role of Unofficial Diplomacy’, in Maureen B. Berman and Joseph E. Johnson (eds), Unofficial Diplomats, New York, Columbia University Press, 1977, pp. 1–33. Bhabha, Homi K. (ed.), Nation and Narration, London and New York, Routledge, 1990. Booth, Ken, ‘Discussion: A Reply to Wallace’, Review of International Studies, vol. 23, no. 3, 1997, pp. 371–7. Boulding, Kenneth E., The Image, Michigan, University of Michigan Press, 1956. Brass, Paul B., Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison, New Delhi and London, Sage Publications, 1991. Breuilly, John, Nationalism and the State, 2nd ed., Manchester, Manchester University Press, 1993. Breuning, Marijke, ‘The Role of Analogies and Abstract Reasoning in DecisionMaking: Evidence from the Debate over Truman’s Proposal for Development Assistance, International Studies Quarterly, vol. 47, 2003, pp. 229–45. Buffet, Cyril, and Heuser, Beatrice (eds), Haunted by History: Myths in International Relations, Providence and Oxford, Berghahn Books, 1998. Burleigh, Michael, Ethics and Extermination: Reflections on Nazi Genocide, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997. Buruma, Ian, The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan, London, Jonathan Cape, 1994. Camilleri, Joseph A., ‘Rethinking Sovereignty in a Shrinking, Fragmented World’, in R.B.J. Walker and Saul H. Mendlovitz (eds), Contending Sovereignties: Redefining Political Community, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990, pp. 13–44. Camilleri, Joseph A. and Falk, Jim (eds), The End of Sovereignty?: The Politics of a Shrinking and Fragmenting World, Hans and Vermont, Edward Elgar, 1992. Carr, Edward Hallet, What is History?, 2nd ed., London, Macmillan, 1986. Carr, Edward Hallet, The Twenty Years’ Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, 2nd ed., London, The Macmillan Press, 1946. Carr, Edward Hallet, Nationalism and After, London, Macmillan, 1945. Cave, Peter, ‘Learning to Live with the Imperial Past? History Teaching, Empire, and War in Japan and England’, in Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (eds), History Education and National Identity in East Asia, New York and London, Routledge, 2005, pp. 307–37. Chapman, John W., Rousseau — Totalitarian or Liberal?, New York, AMS Press, 1968. Chatterjee, Partha, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories, Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1993. Chimoto, Hideki, Tennosei no Shinryaku Sekinin to Sengo Sekinin (The Responsibilities of the Emperor System for Aggression and the Postwar Period), Tokyo, Aoki Shoten, 1990. Clarke, Michael and White, Brian, Understanding Foreign Policy: The Foreign Policy System Approach, Hampshire, Edward Elgar, 1989.


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Cohen, Bernard C., Democracies and Foreign Policy: Public Participation in the United States and the Netherlands, Wisconsin, The University of Wisconsin Press, 1995. Cohen, Bernard C., The Public’s Impact on Foreign Policy, Boston, Little Brown, 1973. Cohen, Bernard C., ‘National International Linkages: Superpolities’, in James N. Rosenau, Linkage Politics, New York, The Free Press, 1969, pp. 125–46. Cohen, Yoel, Media Diplomacy: The Foreign Office in the Mass Communication Age, London, Frank Cass, 1986. Collingwood, Robin George, The Idea of History, London, Oxford University Press, 1946. Conner, Walker, ‘When is a Nation?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, 1990, pp. 92–103. Cox, Robert W., ‘Social Forces, States, and World Orders: Beyond International Relations Theory (1981)’, in Robert W. Cox, Approaches to World Order, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996, pp. 85–123. Crane, Diana, ‘Transnational Networks in Basic Science’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, pp. 235–51. Czempiel, Ernst-Otto, ‘Governance and Democratization’, in James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (eds), Governance without Government: Order and Change in World Politics, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 250–71. Dahl, Robert A., ‘Participation and the Problem of Civic Understanding’, in Amitai Etzioni (ed.), Rights and the Common Good: The Communitarian Perspective, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1995, pp. 261–70. Dahl, Robert A., Who Governs?: Democracy and Power in an American City, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1961. Dahl, Robert A., ‘The Concept of Power’, Behavioral Science, vol. 2, no. 3, 1957, pp. 201–15. Dale, Roger, The State and Education Policy, Milton Keynes and Philadelphia, Open University Press, 1989. Dahrendorf, Ralf, The Unresolved Past: A Debate in German History, A Wheatland Foundation Conference (September 1987), Gina Thomas (ed.), London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990. Dahrendorf, Ralf, Society and Democracy in Germany, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1968 (Gesellschaft und Demokratie in Deutschland, 1965). Davis, Kathleen Southwell, ‘The Problem of Textbooks’, in Arthur Hearnden (ed.), The British in Germany: Educational Reconstruction after 1945, London, Hamish Hamilton, 1978, pp. 108–30. Descombes, Vincent, Modern French Philosophy, L. Scott-Fox and J.M. Harding (trans.), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1980. Deutsch, Karl W., ‘External Influences on the Internal Behavior of States’, in R. Barry Farrell (ed.), Approaches to Comparative and International Politics, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1966, pp. 5–26. Deutsch, Karl W., Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundations of Nationality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Mass., The MIT Press, 1966. Dewey, John, Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education, New York, Macmillan, 1916.


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Dierkes, Julian, ‘Stability of Postwar Japanese History Education amid Global Change’, in Edward Vickers and Alisa Jones (eds), History Education and National Identity in East Asia, New York and London, Routledge, 2005, pp. 255–74. Dougherty, James E. and Pfaltzgraff, Robert L., Jr., Contending Theories of International Relations: A Comprehensive Survey, 4th ed., New York, Longman, 1997. Dray, William H., Philosophy of History, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall, 1964. Drifte, Reinhard, Japan’s Foreign Policy, London, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Routledge, 1990. Duke, Benjamin C., ‘Variations on Democratic Education: Divergent Patterns in Japan and the United States’, in James J. Shields, Jr. (ed.), Japanese Schooling, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1989, pp. 260–9. Elton, Geoffrey R., The Practice of History, London, Sydney University Press, 1967. Engelmann, Susanne Charlotte, German Education and Re-Education, New York, International Universities Press, 1945. Enloe, Cynthia, ‘Margins, Silences and Bottom Rungs: How to Overcome the Underestimation of Power in the Study of International Relations’, in Steve Smith, Ken Booth and Marysia Zalewski (eds), International Theory: Positivism and Beyond, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996, pp. 186–202. Etheredge, Lloyd S., Can Governments Learn?: American Foreign Policy and Central American Revolutions, Oxford, Pergamon Press, 1985. Farquharson, John E. and Holt, Stephen C., Europe from Below: An Assessment of Franco-German Popular Contacts, London, George Allen and Unwin, 1975. Feldman, Lily Gardner, ‘German Morality and Israel’, in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), The Federal Republic of Germany at Forty, New York and London, New York University Press, 1989, pp. 442–63. Festinger, Leon, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Tavistock Publications, 1961. Field, James A. Jr., ‘Transnationalism and the New Tribe’, in Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (eds), Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, Harvard University Press, 1970, pp. 3–22. Finley, Moses I., The Use and Abuse of History, London, The Hogarth Press, 1986. Fogel, Robert William and Elton, Geoffrey R., Which Road to the Past?: Two Views of History, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1983. Foucault, Michel, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972–1977, Colin Gordon (ed.), Colin Gordon, Leo Marshall, John Mepham and Kate Soper (trans.), New York and London, The Harvester Press, 1980. Frankel, Joseph, The Making of Foreign Policy: An Analysis of Decision-Making, London, Oxford University Press, 1967. Freire, Paulo, The Politics of Education: Culture, Power and Liberation, Donaldo Madedo (trans.), Massachusetts, Bergin & Gravey Publishers, 1985. Friedenberg, Edgar Z., ‘Current Patterns of Generational Conflict’, Journal of Social Issues, vol. 25, no. 2 1969, pp. 21–38. Fry, Michael C. (ed.), History, the White House and the Kremlin: Statesmen as Historians, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1991. Fujisawa, Hoei, Doitsujin no Rekishi Ninshiki: Kyokasho ni Miru Senso Sekinin-ron (German Views of History: How Their Textbooks Explain Their Responsibilities for the War), Tokyo, Akishobo, 1986.


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Fujiwara, Akira, Showa Tenno no Jugonen Senso (The Showa Emperor’s 15-year War), Tokyo, Aoki Shoten, 1991. Fujiwara, Kiichi, ‘Naze Kokumin ga Katararerunoka (Why Talk About the Poeple?)’, Rekishigaku Kenkyu (Journal of Historical Studies), March 2001, pp. 34–9 and 62. Fulbrook, Mary, ‘Nation, State and Political Culture in Divided Germany, 1945–90’, in John Breuilly (ed.), The State of Germany: The National Idea in the Making, Unmaking and Remaking of a Modern Nation-State, London and New York, Longman, 1992, pp. 177–200. Fulbrook, Mary, The Divided Nation, London, Fontana Press, 1991. Galtung, Johan, ‘Violence, Peace, and Peace Research’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 6, no. 3, 1969, pp. 167–91. Gellner, Ernest, Nations and Nationalism, Oxford, Blackwell, 1983. Gellner, Ernest, Thought and Change, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964. Gelpi, Ettore, Lifelong Education and International Relations, London, Croom Helm, 1985. Gerow, Aaron, ‘Consuming Asia, Consuming Japan: The New Neonationalist Revisionism in Japan’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 30–6. Giddens, Anthony, The Nation-State and Violence, Volume Two of A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism, Oxford, Policy Press, 1985. Giroux, Henry A., ‘Introduction’, in Paulo Freire, The Politics of Education: Culture, Power and Liberation, Donaldo Madedo (trans.), Massachusetts, Bergin & Gravey Publishers, 1985, pp. xi-xxv. Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah, Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, London, Little, Brown and Company, 1996. Gordon, Peter and White, John, Philosophers as Education Reformers: The Influence of Idealism on British Educational Thought and Practice, London, Boston and Henley, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979. Gourevitch, Peter, ‘The Second Image Reversed: The International Sources of Domestic Politics’, International Organization, vol. 32, no. 4, 1978, pp. 881–912. Green, Andy, Education and State Formation: The Rise of Education Systems in England, France and the USA, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1990. Groom, A.J.R. (Arthur John Richard), and Mitchell, C.R. (Christopher Roger) (eds), International Relations Theory: A Bibliography, London, Francis Pinter, 1978. Gunshuku Mondai Shiryo, ‘Tokushu: Kyoiku no Kokusaisei (Special Issue: Internationalising Education)’, Gunshuku Mondai Shiryo, no. 175, 1995. Guzzini, Stefano and Leander, Anna (eds), Constructivism and International Relations: Alexander Wendt and His Critics, London and New York, Routledge, 2006. Haas, Ernst B., When Knowledge is Power, Three Models of Change in International Organisations, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1990. Haas, Peter M., ‘Introduction: Epistemic Communities and International Policy Coordination’, in Peter M. Haas (ed.), Knowledge, Power, and International Policy Coordination, a special issue of International Organization, vol. 46, no. 1, 1992, pp. 1–35. Hall, Robin, ‘How Children Think and Feel about War and Peace—an Australian Study’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 30, no. 2, 1993, pp. 181–96.


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Halliday, Fred, Rethinking International Relations, London, The Macmillan Press, 1994. Halliday, Fred, ‘Three Concepts of Internationalism’, International Affairs, vol. 64, no. 2, 1988, pp. 187–98. Hammond, Ellen H, ‘Politics of the War and Public History: Japan’s Own Museum Controversy’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1995, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 56–9. Hanrieder, Wolfram F., ‘Comparability and Consensus: A Proposal for the Conceptual Linkage of External and Internal Dimensions of Foreign Policy’, in Wolfram F. Hanrieder (ed.), Comparative Foreign Policy: Theoretical Essays, New York, McKay, 1971, pp. 242–64 (the original in American Political Science Review, vol. 61, no. 4, 1967, pp. 971–82). Harle, Vilho, ‘European Roots of Dualism and its Alternatives in International Relations’, in Vilho Harle (ed.), European Values in International Relations, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1990, pp. 1–14. Harrell, Stevan and Bamo, Ayi, ‘Combining Ethnic Heritage and National Unity: A Paradox of Nuosu (Yi) Language Textbooks in China’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 62–71. Hassan, Hamdi A., The Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait: Religion, Identity and Otherness in the Analysis of War and Conflict, London and Sterling, Virginia, Pluto Press, 1999. Hawkins, John N., ‘The People’s Republic of China: Educational Policy and National Minorities—The Politics of Intergroup Relations’, in R. Murray Thomas (ed.), Politics and Education: Cases from Eleven Nations, Oxford and New York, Pergamon Press, 1983, pp. 125–48. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, Johannes Hoffmeister’s ed., Hugh Bar Nisbet (trans.), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1975. Hein, Laura and Selden, Mark (eds), Censoring History: Citizenship and Memory in Japan, Germany, and the United States, Armonk, N.Y and London, M.E. Sharpe, 2000. Hein, Laura and Selden, Mark, ‘Learning Citizenship from the Past: Textbook Nationalism, Global Context, and Social Change’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 3–15. Heuser, Beatrice and Buffet, Cyril, ‘Conclusions: Historical Myths and the Denial of Change’, in Cyril Buffet and Beatrice Heuser (eds), Haunted by History: Myths in International Relations, Providence and Oxford, Berghahn Books, 1998, pp. 259–74. Hicks, George, The Comfort Women, St Leonards, NSW, Allen & Unwin, 1995. Hill, Christopher, ‘History and Patriotism’, in Raphael Samuel (ed.), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity, Volume I History and Politics, London and New York, Routledge, 1989, pp. 3–8. Hill, Christopher J., ‘“Where Are We Going?” International Relations and the Voice from Below’, Review of International Studies, 1999, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 107–22. Hill, Christopher J., ‘World Opinion and The Empire of Circumstance’, International Affairs, vol. 72, no. 1, 1996, pp. 109–31. Hill, Christopher J., ‘Public Opinion and British Foreign Policy Since 1945: Research in Progress’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 10, no. 1, 1981, pp. 53–62.


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Hill, Christopher J. and Beshoff, Pamela (eds), Two Worlds of International Relations: Academics, Practitioners and the Trade in Ideas, London, Routledge, 1994. Hobsbawm, Eric, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990. Hobsbawm, Eric, and Ranger, Terence (eds), The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983. Hogan, Michael J. (ed.), Hiroshima in History and Memory, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1996. Holsti, Kal J., ‘A New International Politics? Diplomacy in Complex Interdependence’, International Organization, vol. 32, no. 2, 1978, pp. 513–30. Holt, Robert T. and Turner, John E., ‘Insular Polities’, in James N. Rosenau, Linkage Politics, New York, The Free Press, 1969, pp. 199–236. Hook, Glenn D., ‘The Erosion of Anti-Militaristic Principles in Contemporary Japan’, Journal of Peace Research, vol 25., no. 4, 1988, pp. 381–94. Howard, Michael, The Lessons of History, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1991. Hunt, David, ‘War Crimes and the Vietnamese People: American Representations and Silences’, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1998, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 72–82. Hunter, Janet E., The Emergence of Modern Japan: An Introductory History since 1853, London and New York, Longman, 1989. Hunter, Janet E. (ed.), Japan: State and People in the Twentieth Century: Papers Presented at the STICERD 20th Anniversary Symposium, 1999. Huntington, Samuel p. , The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, New York, Simon & Schuster, 1996. Huntington, Samuel p. , ‘Transnational Organizations in World Politics’, World Politics, vol. 25, no. 3, 1973, pp. 333–68. Hurst, Paul, ‘Critical Education and Islamic Culture’, in Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 189–201. Hybel, Alex, ‘Learning and Reasoning by Analogy’, in Michael Fry (ed.), History, the White House and the Kremlin: Statesmen as Historians, London and New York, Pinter Publishers, 1991, pp. 215–38. Ienaga, Saburo, ‘The Glorification of War in Japanese Education’, International Security, vol. 18, no. 3, 19931994, pp. 11333. Ienaga, Saburo, ‘Misshitsu’ Kentei no Kiroku: 80 Nendai Ienaga Nihonshi no Kentei (Records of Textbook Screening ‘Behind Closed Doors’: A Case of Ienaga’s ‘Japanese History’ in the 1980s), Tokyo, Meicho Kankokai, 1993. Ienaga, Saburo, Kyokasho Saiban (The Lawsuits on the Textbook Issue), Tokyo, Nihon-hyoronsha, 1981. Iggers, George G., Historiography in the Twentieth Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge, Hanover and London, Wesleyan University Press, 1997. Inada, Juichi, ‘Japan’s Aid Diplomacy: Economic, Political or Strategic’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 18, no. 3, 1989, pp. 399–414. Inoue, Kiyoshi, Showa Tenno no Senso Sekinin (The Showa Emperor’s Responsibility for the War), Tokyo, Akashi Shoten, 1989. Iram, Yaacov, ‘Education Policy and Cultural Identity in Israel’, in Colin Brock and Witold Tulasiewicz, Cultural Identity and Education Policy, London and Sydney, Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 202–19.


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(ed.), Political Theory and Political Education, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980, pp. 190–203. Yamazumi, Masami, ‘State Control and the Evolution of Ultranationalistic Textbooks’, in James J. Shields, Jr. (ed.), Japanese Schooling, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1989, pp. 234–42. Yamazumi, Masami, Nihon Kyoiku Shoshi (A Concise History of Japanese Education), Tokyo, Iwanami Shoten, 1987. Yomiuri Shimbunsha (ed.), Showa-shi no Tenno (The Emperor in the Showa Era), Tokyo, Yomiuri Shimbunsha, 1967–76. Yoshimi, Yoshiaki, ‘“Jugun Ianfu” Mondai no Rekishiteki Kyumei (Historical Research of ‘Military Comfort Women’)’, in Kokusai Kochokai Jikko Iinkai (Steering Committee of the International Public Hearing) (ed.), Sekai ni Towareru Nihon no Sengo Shori 1: ‘Jugun Ianfu’ to Kokusai Kochokai no Kiroku (Japan’s Postwar Compensation Issues as Questioned by the International Community Series 1: Records of the International Public Hearing on ‘Comfort Women’, etc.), Osaka, Toho Shuppan, 1993, pp. 107–22. Zaller, John, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992. Ziegler, Charles E., Foreign Policy and East Asia: Learning and Adaptation in the Gorbachev Era, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1993.

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aborigines, 42 Afghanistan, 41 Africa, 29, 41, 51, 57, 73–4, 82, 100ff., 173 Ainu, 149, 150, 243 Albanians, 80 Alliance Against Japanese Distortion of History, 168, 271 Allied Powers, 83, 91–2, 104, 243, 250 America/Americans (see United States) amnesia, 180, 232, 255 analogies, 8, 16, 36, 60, 65–6, 70, 155, 203 Anderson, Benedict, 40 apolitical approaches, 102, 110, 246 Arabism, 41 Ashley, Peter, 178 Asia, Asian countries (see also Japanese-Asian relations), 10–11, 18, 41, 57, 73, 134, 139, 141, 157, 166–71, 173, 181–2, 186–90, 210, 245, 247, 251–2, 254; and the Pacific, 51; Central Asia, 51; East Asia, 51, 100, 145, 157, 223; Great East Asia, 90; media, 169–70, 273; Southeast Asia, 188, 212; West Asia, 51, 100 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), 236; member countries, 18, 166–9 asymmetry; in the coverage of foreign and domestic news, 24; regional and disciplinary, 73, 226, 248 atomic bombs (bombs), 104, 177–8, 191, 246 authoritarian states, 3, 5, 21, 22, 25, 249

authoritarian-democratic continuum, 3 Bachrach, Peter, 23 Baratz, Morton, 23 Belgium, 85 biases, 3, 13, 60, 128, 257 Bitburg military cemetery (Germany), 149 Boulding, Kenneth, 34 Brezhnev, Leonid, 41 Britain/British (see United Kingdom) Brunei, 18 Bu, Ping, 223 bureaucrats, 4, 11, 73, 139, 156, 172, 183, 241, 244, 256 Burma, 18, 22, 273 Cambodia, 18, 211, 254 Canada, 59, 266 Carr, E.H., 7, 23, 76 categorization of outcomes, 66, 176, 191, 246 Catholic, 70 causality, 2, 67, 103, 110, 191, 246; causal connections/linkages, 2, 67, 165, 177, 246; causation, 67, 240 censorship, 72, 107, 111, 139, 192 Central America, 41 Central Council for Education of 1974 (Japan), 96 change, 30, 31, 48, 62–3, 67, 69–71, 77–8, 91, 102–103, 250 Chatterjee, Partha, 58 chauvinism, 70 childhood, 56 China, 1, 42, 59, 85, 173, 192, 199,

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200; and the textbook disputes, 13, 117–42, 149, 160ff., 181–90, 241, 247ff.; Chinese Communist Party, 34, 161, 223; Chinese education policies, 34; intergovernmental cooperation with Japan, 217, 222–4, 250; transnational cooperation with Japan, 216–17, 235; controversy over history with South Korea, 236 Cho, Dong-geol, 218 Cho, Kwang, 221 Chun, Doo-hwan (South Korean President), 184 church, the, 70, 75 CIS countries, 9 citizenship/citizenry, 13, 33, 42, 48, 211 Citizens Society for Considering the Textbook Problem, 165 civics, 39, 129, 260 Civil Information and Education Section (CIE), 91–2, 111 civilizations, 30, 53, 64, 100, 213–16 cognitive dimension of forming views, 6, 59–61, 172–3 cognitive dissonance, 64–6, 175, 176, 191, 246 Cold War, 12, 64, 95, 104, 145 Collingwood, Robin George, 56, 79 colonialism, 161, 196 colonies, 29, 57, 102, 141, 180, 212–13, 248; colonial history, 12, 202; colonial psychology, 29; colonial rule/administration/ operations, 32, 58 colonization, 13, 42, 173, 213, 263 ‘comfort women’ and as an issue, 85, 147, 172, 198, 218, 221, 224, 230, 232; in relation to syllabuses and textbooks (Japan), 128, 204ff., 210 communication, 6, 37, 49, 72, 74, 84; barriers, channels, methods, systems, 24, 37, 71–2, 76, 191; pattern of, 71, 182, 225–6, 231, 247–8, 257 communist countries/regimes, 33–4, 74, 166, 232 communities, 32, 37, 42–3, 68–9, 256 comparability of historical events, 207 compartmentalization, 75, 182, 231

conflicts, 9–10, 42–3, 61, 75–6, 148, 248, 256 Constitution (Japan), 12, 92–6, 104, 116, 148, 154, 181, 247 constructivism/constructivists, 9, 17–18 Course of Study (see curriculum guidelines) (Japan) Cox, Robert W., 1 cross-border influence/interactions, 6, 71–5, 182–6, 191, 207, 229, 248; in historical knowledge, 230–1; in historical scholarship, 225–6 culture (see also political culture), 34, 42, 68–70, 74–5; cultural assimilation, 149; cultural tradition, 66, 71, 182; cultural transmission, 70; cultural wealth, 30 curricula, 9, 16, 34ff., 53, 56, 85, 97, 147, 241, 253, 264; curricular problems, 40–1, 95–6; (national) curriculum guidelines, 12, 89, 96ff., 113–15, 139, 156–7, 241, 243 Czech Republic, 80 Dahl, Robert, 21, 23, 33, 63 decision-makers (see also the public), 21, 23, 62, 65, 69, 77, 148, 184, 189 decision-making, 7, 8, 13, 23, 62, 65, 76; vicarious, 62, 69 Defense White Paper (Japan), 110, 146, 242 democracies, 3ff., 22ff., 59, 69, 73, 76, 94, 249, 271 democratic institutions, 112, 144, 182, 247, 256 Democratic Justice Party (South Korea), 163 democratization, 21, 90, 104, 110 Deutsch, Karl, 72 Dewey, John, 49 Diet (Japan), 112, 120, 208; committees, 139, 142, 149, 164, 176 diplomatic relations, 126, 128, 250 domestic and external environments, 4, 11, 67–75, 118, 159, 203, 247; interplay/interactions between, 55–78, 178–90, 247–9

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Index domesticated, domestication, 71, 73 domestic environment, 5, 55–78, 178–90, 231, 240, 250 economics, 7, 74 education, 4, 31–8, 144–6; aims of, 31; and defence issues (Japan), 145–6, 148, 182, 242; and state formation, 32–3; area/issue area of, 7–9, 73–4, 184; at pre-university levels (primary and secondary), 2, 3, 25, 37, 39, 71, 74, 247, 251; boards of, 94ff., 109, 115, 235; centralization (in the education system), 32, 36, 243; control of, 3; functions/roles of, 16, 31ff., 48, 74–5, 144, 150, 242, 253; militaristic, 92, 189; political, 7, 33, 69, 90, 185; public, 3, 6, 7, 32, 35, 50–1, 69, 76, 89; standardization of, 95, 110; universal compulsory, 32 educational administration, 96 educational cooperation, 73, 185, 191, 210, 226, 248 educational environment, 6, 14, 20–44, 74, 109, 139, 143, 149 educational ideologies, 33 educational influence, 5, 35–7, 68, 146, 249 educational institutions, 3, 7, 15, 32ff., 49, 73, 111, 144, 146, 207, 242–3 educationalists, 7, 11, 18, 32, 34, 49, 130, 216 educational laws (Japan), 94ff.; Board of Education Law, 94; Fundamental Law of Education, 92, 94; School Education Law, 94–5, 97 Educational Rights, 35 education policies, 6, 15, 34, 53, 90 , 94, 146; during the initial stage of the US occupation (Japan), 92–3 education politics, 7 education reform (Japan), 145; by the US, 90ff., 112, 115 education system, 3, 9, 31ff., 36, 41, 50, 73, 75, 243; state-run, 432; Japan’s, 88, 112, 130, 144, 189 education theory, 47–8 Egypt, 12, 31

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elections, 21, 44, 69, 76, 197 Elton, Geoffrey, 26, 39 emperor, emperor system (Japan), 148, 172, 177, 191, 197, 244, 246; in relation to textbooks, 204ff. empires, 41, 59, 86 empiricist approaches, 28–31, 150 England/English (see United Kingdom) Enlightenment, 29, 50 environment; operational, 23, 65; psychological, 23 ‘epistemic communities’, 9 epistemological issues/questions, 25, 64 Etheredge, Lloyd, 65 ethnic, 43, 58, 59, 80; backgrounds/origins and descent, 36, 42; communities/societies, 37, 42; inter-ethnic, multiethnic, 10, 16, 58, 75; majorities/minorities, 36, 42, 75 ethos, 9, 26 Europe, 28, 32, 38, 73, 84–5, 100–102, 173, 181, 228, 230, 238; Council of, 73, 85; Eastern, 33, 51, 74; European countries/powers/states, 49, 101–102, 134, 141, 209, 215; Western, 44, 51, 74; Western European Union (WEU), 85 European Cultural Convention, 84 European Cultural Cooperation, a Council for, 85 European Union (EU), 60 evidence, 26–8, 39, 56, 61, 67, 91, 140, 232 explaining, interpreting and assessing, 34–5 external environment, 4ff., 11, 55–78, 178–90, 240, 247, 249–51 external impact / influence / interference / pressure, 71–2, 101, 165, 185–6, 192, 200, 210, 229–30, 248–9 external relations, 2, 11, 61, 77 facts, 1, 25–8, 40, 65, 141; historical, 40 families, 57, 62, 69, 70, 75, 89, 174, 178–81, 190–1, 247, 252, 256, 270

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Farquharson, John, 60 Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), Germany, 28–9, 80, 83, 85, 112, 148, 156, 203, 207–10, 238, 254; East Germany, 232; German East Africa, 41; German education, 50, 111; German empire, 34; German historians, 12, 39, 203, 209, 233, 254; German-Jewish history, 52; German-Polish arrangements/exchanges, 85, 128, 211; Germans, the, 34, 39, 83, 174; German schoolbooks/textbooks, 12, 271; Nazi Germany, 34, 232; Third Reich, 208, 209; Weimar , 50 Fichte, 50 fictions, 26, 27, 141, 228 Field, James, 9, 86 ‘Fifteen Years War’, 212 finance, 74, 84 forced labour and as an issue, 147, 180, 230; in syllabuses and textbooks, 132, 142, 153, 204ff., 263 forces (see also social forces), 3, 18, 21–3, 29, 50–1, 68, 70–1, 76, 110, 177, 181–2, 247; socio-economic and political, 36, 146; political, 21 23, 36–7, 146 foreign policy, 8, 65, 76, 202; domestic sources of, 8; decisionmakers/making, 8, 23, 62, 65 Foreign Policy Analysis, 8 France, 28, 57, 80, 85, 203, 263, 267; French, the, 33, 39, 209, 233; French Revolution, 39, 89 Franco-German, 60; a common history textbook, 209; educational cooperation, 209–10 Frankel, Joseph, 23, 65, 66, 82 freedom, 22, 25, 39, 89, 92, 111, 113, 170, 192, 263, 265; of speech, expression and education, 3, 15, 139; religious/cultural, 147 Freedom of Information Act (United States), 47 Freire, Paulo, 34 Fujisawa, Hoei, 12, 211, 235 Fulbrook, Mary, 207 Fundamental Code of Education in 1872, 89

G8, 61 generations, 77–8, 256; gap, 174; generational change/shifts, 78, 207; generational effect, 37, 63, 77 geography, 40, 43, 74, 85, 89ff., 98, 129, 234 Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research, 74, 85, 233 German Historical Institute London (GHIL), 233 Germany (see FRG) Ghana, 41 globalization, 57, 71 government, the; and society, 31, 171; and the public (see the public); government influence, 4, 10, 20ff., 38, 106, 117, 131, 138–50, 241, 243 government reactions (except China and South Korea), 166–8, 268–9 Gramsci, Antonio, 34, 50 Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, 93, 134, 141, 188 Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, 34, 53 Green, Andy, 32, 49 guest workers, 71, 80 guilt (war-guilt), 180, 207–208 Haas, Peter M., 9 Hawkins, John, Thomas J. La Belle and Peter White, 75 hegemony, 34, 38, 74, 144, 150, 242; Gramsci’s concept of, 50 Hein, Laura and Selden, Mark, 13 Hill, Christopher, 39 Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 104, 177 Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, 181 historians, 4–7, 24–31, 39, 70, 91, 97, 143, 149, 150, 241; Historikerstreit (historians’ debate), 207–208; political responsibilities, 31 historic enmity, 13 historical consciousness, 10 ‘historical issues’ (see issue of history) historical knowledge, 2, 5, 26–7, 42, 60, 64, 66, 77–8, 90, 143, 149, 202, 230–2, 242, 255, 257

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Index historical presentations / narratives, 10, 12–13, 25–7, 143, 241, 256 historical record, 30, 139–41, 185, 248 historical research / studies, 24–8, 38, 67, 143–4, 146, 208, 228 historical scholarship, 26, 28, 225–6, 227, 231 historicism, 29 historiography, 25ff., 141, 143–4, 150, 207, 241, 253; development/history of, 28, 32 history; academic, 39, 65, 147; as a pattern, 67; classroom, 39–40, 42, 44, 147ff.; defined, 1; issue of, 12, 13, 170, 183, 185, 191, 202, 216, 223, 228ff., 248–9, 254; local / communal, 62, 98, 110, 243; national, 29–30, 38ff., 150, 185, 226–7, 242, 255; normalization of, 208; official, 42, 75; use and abuse of, 1; teaching, 10; world, 40, 89, 98ff., 147, 186, 215ff.; writing, 4–6, 24–31, 140–4, 150, 241 ‘history card’, 202, 254 history education, 1–6, 15, 20, 38–44, 56, 117, 146–9, 210, 217, 231–2, 242, 250; at pre-university levels, 2, 25, 39, 67, 146, 251; comparison between Germany and Japan, 208–10; ‘consequences’ of, 11, 55, 117, 159, 160, 171, 190, 244; history curriculum and guidelines (Japan), 88–106, 143, 147; history curriculum (France and Germany), 208; modification of history curriculum (South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan), 125, 167, 185, 238, 243; influence of, 11, 44, 78, 159, 160, 250; intrastate aspect of, 149, 242; instrumental/utilitarian views of, 43, 147; issue of, 7–10, 126, 210, 253; potential of, 43; ‘process’ of, 20, 149; research centre on, 137 history education and international relations, 10, 77, 208, 240; connection/link between, 2, 4, 11, 14, 15, 159, 171, 240, 249, 249–52; link perceived by Asian countries, 186–90, 251–2

305

history textbooks (see also textbooks), 85, 230; diplomatic disputes over Japanese, 117–50, 159–191; Japanese, 10–14, 89–106, 210, 241, 245, 250; Japan-ROK (ROK-Japan) joint research on, 217, 220–2, 229; Japan, South Korea and UNESCO, 236; a joint study group on, 211, 225ff.; screening results of, 262–5 ‘history war’, 141, 248 Holocaust, 27, 52, 156, 184, 203ff., 233, 271 Holt, Stephen, 60 Hong Kong, 18, 125, 166ff., 188, 270, 273 Hu, Jintao (Chinese President), 222 Hu, Yaobang (Chinese Communist Party Chairman), 181 human rights, 61, 65, 82, 92, 104, 147, 271 Human Rights (Sub) Committee of the United Nations, 85, 194 Huntington, Samuel, 74 idealism, 49, 50 ideas, 9, 34, 62, 84, 97, 230, 231, 245 ideational level, 9 identities, 9, 10, 13, 26, 62, 79, 244; collective, 42, 43, 59, 147, 173, 254; cultural, 58; ethnic, 58, 80; family, 179; national, 29, 57ff., 72, 75, 78, 89, 145, 171–2, 179, 231, 255 ideological engineering, 70 ideologies, 13, 31–2, 33, 70–1, 86, 96, 146, 189, 207, 212, 242; ultranationalistic and militaristic, 92, 93 Ienaga, Saburo, 11, 96, 113, 154 Iggers, George, 27 images, 24, 34, 42, 58–9, 65, 77, 173–4, 177, 180, 244–6, 254 immigrants, 33, 80 immobilism, 192 Imperial Rescript on Education of 1890, 89, 96, 111, 112 independence, 29, 58, 89, 101ff., 141–2, 185, 231, 248, 269; movements, 29, 35, 37 India, 12, 18, 29, 101, 194, 216, 273; East India Company, 29

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indifference, 174, 191, 245 individuals (see also states and society), 33, 39, 47ff., 57, 60–2, 68–9, 71–2, 75, 82–3, 101, 232 indoctrination, 33–4, 38, 49, 74, 175 Indonesia, 18, 125, 167ff., 194, 211, 269, 272–3 Industrial Revolution, 100 influence, 2, 5–6, 21, 23, 231, 241–6, 249; assessment of, 2, 171; external / foreign / transnational, 71–5, 182, 247–9, 250–1 information, 8–9, 23–4, 36–7, 72, 84, 89, 139, 241; definition of, 23; declassification / freedom of, 46–7, 115; policy, 28 information processing, 65; dual-track (thinking), 65, 177, 191, 246 inside/outside dichotomy, 57 institutional norms, 42 integration, 17, 43, 74, 75, 191, 231, 249 intellectuals, 30, 37, 82, 111, 165, 185, 207, 212, 214; organic and traditional, 51 intelligence activities / service, 8, 70 interactions (see also cross-border interactions, domestic and external environments, national borders/boundaries and state borders / boundaries), 1, 4, 9, 71ff., 191, 193; global, 72, 84 interdependence, 8, 72ff., 85, 200 interest groups, 72, 84 intermediaries/intermediate actors, 5, 21ff., 44, 138, 140, 149, 241–3, 253 International Committee of Historical Sciences (ICHS), 215 Internationales Schulbuchinstitut of the Kant-Hochschule, 209 internationalization, 73, 96, 210 International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo, 189; in syllabuses and textbooks, 204ff. international political economy, 17 International Relations (IR), 7ff., 12 international relations, 2, 7, 9, 23, 72, 76ff., 93, 99, 137, 171, 227; defined, 4; management of, 78, 208, 252

International Research Centre for Japanese Studies (Kyoto), 216 international society, 100, 101, 104, International Society for Educational Information (ISEI) (Japan), 151 international treaties and agreements, 73 international understanding, 98; and international cooperation, 99, 104, 130, 185, 190, 231, 249 Internet, 15, 71 intersubjectivity, 9, 25 Iraq, 31, 41, 202 Ireland, 9, 70; Irish state schools, 41 irredentists, 42, 58 Islam (see also Muslim), 59, 60; Islamic states, 41 Israel, 31, 41, 42, 63, 203, 238; Israeli Ministry of Education and Culture, 53 issue-areas, 28, 72ff., 84, 147, 245, 250; awareness and understanding of, 60–1, 173 Italy, 28, 51, 80, 85; Italian historians, 39 Japan, 3, 36, 83, 198–9; and the textbook disputes, 10–12, 117ff., 159ff., 183ff., 189–90, 241–3, 247–52; Chief Cabinet Secretary, 124, 175; colonial policies/rule/ operations, 132, 137, 142, 161, 174–5, 194, 212; Education Ministers, 134, 137–8, 179; empire, 90, 214; Foreign Ministers, 126, 221, 222, 237; foreign policy, 145, 202; history education in, 88–109, 208–10; intergovernmental cooperation with China, 217, 222–4, 250; intergovernmental cooperation with South Korea, 217–22, 226–30, 250; national identity, 172; news media, 118, 163, 171; Japanese people’s attitudes towards the past, 11, 144, 159–60, 172–81, 197, 243–6; political climate in, 181–2, 247; prewar Japanese society, 111; Prime Ministers, 95, 121–6, 135–9, 145, 172, 176, 179, 180, 183, 196, 199,

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Index 202, 208, 210, 217, 220–2, 244, 254; transnational cooperation with China, 216–17, 234, 235; transnational cooperation with South Korea, 211–15, 225ff., 234–5; Western influence on, 89, 90, 101, 110, 244 Japan Association of Corporate Executives, 216 Japan-China (China-Japan) Joint History Research Committee, 222–4 Japan-China Cultural Exchange Association, 165 Japan-China Economic Association, 216 Japan-China Friendship Association, 165 Japan Communist Party (JCP), 115, 142, 164, 196 Japanese-Asian relations, 102, 147, 157, 210, 247–8, 251–2, 253–5; anti-Japanese feelings/sentiments, 125–6, 150, 169; Asian countries’ influence on Japan, 101; Japan’s influence on Asian and other countries, 101, 103, 110, 245 Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, 198, 232 Japanese uniqueness, 180 Japan-Korea Joint Studies Forum, 213–15 Japan-Korea Parliamentarians League, 164 Japan-ROK (ROK-Japan) Joint History Research Committee, 217–22; textbook sub-group (sub-panel), 221–2, 229 Japan Socialist Party (JSP), 142, 164, 176 Japan-South Korea Historians’ Conference (Nikkan Rekishika Kaigi), 215 Japan-South Korea Joint Research Book series, 214 Japan-South Korea Joint Study Group on History Textbooks, 211–13 Japan Teachers’ Union, 119, 180, 193, 216 Jewish beliefs about the Arabs, 80 Jewish Consciousness, Programme of, 53

307

Joint Commission on the Promotion of Research on the History of JapanSouth Korea Relations, 215, 217 Keating, Paul, 175 Keio University, 213 Kennan, George, 255 Kenya, 31 Keohane, Robert, 8, 72, 74, 84 Kim, Dae-jung (South Korean President), 217 Kim, Il-sung (North Korean leader), 194 Kim, Yong-sam (South Korean President), 236 Kimijima, Kazuhiko, 225, 230, 234, 238 Kitaoka, Shin’ichi, 222, 237 knowledge, 7, 9, 16, 26–7, 36–8, 39, 64–5, 69–70, 73, 88–90, 143, 242, 257–8 Kocka, Jürgen, 254 Koguryo history, 236 Korea, 102; annexation of, 175; independence movements, 128, 142, 147, 153, 263, 265; North and South, 9 Korea-Japan Parliamentarians League (South Korea), 163 Korean Educational Development Institute, 200, 237 Korean National History Compilation Committee (KNHCC), 128, 151–2, 265 Korea University, 162, 213 Kratochwill, Friedrich, 9 Kuhn, Thomas, 16, 52 La Belle, Thomas, 75 language policy, 36 Laos, 18 Latin America, 51, 73, 102 leadership, 8, 35, 43, 148; political, 16, 228; psychology, 69 League of Nations, 72, 84 learning, 4, 8, 48, 56, 65–6, 77, 176, 225–6, 246, 257; blocked, 63–7, 176, 246; environment, 15; lessons from the past/historical lessons, 6, 8, 61–7, 75–8, 174–8, 187, 191, 245, 247, 255–7

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Lee, Kuan Yew (Singaporean Prime Minister), 188 legitimacy, 21, 22, 29, 35, 44 Lerner, Daniel, 64 Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) (Japan), 110, 122, 126, 145, 164, 172, 180, 182, 202, 245, 247 liberal internationalism, 74 Li, Zhaoxing (Chinese Foreign Minister), 222, 237 loyalty, 32, 59, 89, 93–4, 172, 244; civic, 43; national and supranational, 7 Lukes, Steven, 23 Luxemburg, 85 Macao, 18, 273 McEvoy, Siobhán, 70 macro level of collectivities (see also micro level), 68 macro-micro balance, 75 Mahathir, Mohamad, 167, 188, 269 Malaysia, 18, 31, 36, 125, 167, 169, 188, 194, 211, 269, 273 Manchurian Incident (in relation to syllabuses and textbooks), 91, 136 manipulation, 1, 23, 28, 37, 52 Maoism, 185 March First Demonstration, 136 Marco Polo Bridge (Logouqiao) Incident, 103, 170 Marcos, Ferdinand, 167, 269 Marxism-Leninism, 34 mass media, 3, 4, 15, 43, 45, 63, 118 May, Ernest, 70, 81 membership, 57, 61, 172 memories, 38, 56, 58, 62, 65, 77–8, 232, 242, 257; institutional, 69; war, 13, 57 Menon, Krishna (Indian Defence Minister), 196 Mexico, 12 micro-analysis and macro-analysis, 68 micro and macro continuum, 75 micro level of individuals (see also the macro level), 68 Middle East, Middle Easterners, 64, 73, 215

militarism, 145, 148, 160, 181, 187, 190, 243, 270; a revival of, 91ff., 144, 145, 157, 181–2, 199, 247 militaristic or nationalistic thinking, 182, 247 military training (youth schools), 90 Mitani, Taichiro, 218 Miyazawa Statement, 122, 126–9, 135ff., 153, 189 mobilization, 42–3, 90, 219, 263 modernist, 26, 140ff. Mommsen, Wolfgang, 254 moral; decisions / issues/ perspectives / positions/roles, 7, 25, 27, 34, 69, 207–208, 238, 256; questions of guilt and responsibility, 207; thinkers/philosophers, 7, 49 morals, 89ff., 96 Morgenthau, Hans, 23 motives, 9, 65, 72 Muslim, 60, 272; communities, 42 Myanmar (see Burma) myths, mythology, 66, 91, 212 Nanjing Massacre, 170, 207, 222, 262; in relation to syllabuses and textbooks (Japan), 132, 136, 154, 204ff. national anthems/flags, 57, 96, 145, 148, 157 national borders/boundaries (see also state borders/boundaries), 39, 73, 118, 216, 226; joint academic research across, 226 national characters, 33, 83, 145, 172 National Conference for the Defence of Japan, 131 national consciousness, 32, 43, 61, 72, 78, 99, 101, 103–104, 173 national dignity, 185, 231, 248 national goals, 43, 90, 109 national identities (see identities) national images, 173, 244 national interests, 24, 47, 148, 164 national pride, 58–9, 72, 171–2, 184 national referenda, 76 national security, 24, 28, 182 national solidarity, 42, 89, 144, 243 national spirit, 34, 90, 146

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Index nationalism (see also ultranationalism), 28, 44, 48, 57, 82–3, 145, 172, 178, 199, 209, 227, 244; and education, 84; civic, 58; ethnic, 59; nationalist history, 29 nationalities, 57, 72, 93, 148, 172, 183, 229, 247 nationhood, 32, 41, 89, 147, 189, 242 nation-states (see also states), 28, 44, 182, 185 neo-Nazi organizations, 80 Netherlands, 85 Neustadt, Richard E., 81 news media, 21, 22, 52, 63, 76; and education, 36–8; Chinese and South Korean, 147; Japanese, 118, 150, 163, 171; reactions (except China and South Korea), 167, 169–71; Western, 170 New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO), 45 New Zealand, 24 Nigeria, 12, 31 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), 74, 228 non-human resources, 8–9, 58 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 61 Northedge, F.S., 2 Northern Ireland, 9, 70 North Korea, 22, 120–2, 125, 133–4, 154, 166–7, 170, 188, 194, 214, 236, 268, 273 nuclear weapons, 104, 177, 246 Nye, Joseph, 8, 72, 74, 84 objectivity, 26, 140, 142, 143; objectivity and self-defence, 256; subjectivity-intersubjectivity, 9, 25 Okinawa, 154, 164; battle of, 149, 215; Okinawans, 149, 150, 243 Olympic Games, 61 Onuf, Nicholas, 9 Oppenheim, A.N., 7 organizational learning, 62 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), 61, 155 otherness, 59 outsiders, 30, 59

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Pacific War, 104, 149, 175, 245, 254 particularism, 29 past, the, 1, 13, 26–31, 38, 56, 58, 64, 76–8, 164, 174, 232, 245, 255–7; coming to terms with, 203–10, 253, 256; conception of, 40, 63, 64, 175, 191, 245; constraints of, 254; narration of, 1; scope of, 64; use and misuse of, 144 patriotism, 33, 39, 59, 89, 145, 148, 178, 179, 182, 185; and domestic support, 41–4 peace, 92, 94, 96, 104, 125, 208, 211, 213, 215, 253 peace-keeping operations in Cambodia, 254 perceptions, 1, 2, 7–9, 23, 56, 59–60, 251, 252; historical, 217ff., 226ff.; perception gaps between Japan and other countries, 160, 183–4, 191, 212, 218, 221, 229, 230, 248 Philippines, 18, 125, 167–8, 188, 194, 211, 269, 273 Plato, 31 Plumb, J.H., 29 Poland, 80, 85, 128; Polish, 12, 209 policy-making, 21 23, 72 political accountability, 23, 77 political climate, 27, 78, 146, 164, 181, 182, 191, 242, 247, 252 political culture, 29, 66, 75, 176, 246, 252, 254; approach, 67–71, 82, 178–82, 191; and education, 70–1, 74, 75, 182, 231 political economy, 7, 17, 51, 74 political science, 7 political sociology (see also sociology), 7, 68 political systems, 40, 66, 68, 78, 140, 147, 192, 248 politicization, 72, 256 politics, 7, 8, 42, 69, 74ff., 85, 253, 255; and education, 32, 37 politics of education, 7, 31 Popper, Karl, 16 positivism, 25 postmodernism, 25–8, 64, 140ff., 150, 241, 242 postmodernist approaches, 25–8

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postwar compensation, 147, 202, 204ff., 218, 230 power, 3, 7, 21, 23, 28ff., 33, 48, 78, 91, 107, 109, 144, 180, 188; concept of, 23, 241; exercise of, 22, 26ff., 143, 242ff.; holder of, 13, 28, 29, 30, 35, 78, 110, 143, 144; over (public) opinion, 7, 22–4, 28, 76, 139, 243; political, 23; sources of, 27, 28, 143, 241; use and misuse of, 29–30 power relations, 5, 16, 24–8, 31, 34, 117, 131, 139, 143, 149, 241, 253 prearrival characteristics, 1, 2 propaganda, 22, 27, 34, 76, 143; war, 43 psychological dimension of forming views, 56–9, 171–2 ‘psychological national defense’, 72 psychology, 7, 69; colonial, 29 public, the, 1ff., 20–4, 28, 36, 42, 241; analytical capacities of, 75; decision-makers (policy-makers) and, 4, 69, 77, 175, 240, 253; the government and, 1, 4, 20, 21, 24, 44, 76, 250; interactions with the external environment, 71; news and, 60 public dispositions, 2; formation of, 2, 11, 56–67, 159, 171–8, 243–6 public opinion (opinion), 3, 5, 56, 59, 75, 76, 139, 176, 241ff., 268; climate or mood of, 63, 76, 174; divisions of, 207; foreign, 186, 231, 249; formation of, 5, 23, 68, 149, 181, 191, 241, 243, 247; and foreign policy, 76; influence of, 21, 76; influence over, 24, 35–8; leaders, 21, 76; market, 21; mass, 7; mass production of, 38; polls, 68, 76, 172, 180; shaping, 6, 22–4, 28, 241; suppression of, 37 public reactions, 21, 76; to the textbook disputes in China, South Korea and Japan, 160–5, 170–1; to the textbook disputes in other countries, 168–9, 170–1, 270–2 public support, 21, 43, 44, 52, 148, 150, 160, 242 Pye, Lucian, 68

rationality, 48; (non-) rational analysis/argument/reasoning, 65, 66, 177, 182, 246; rationalist, 29 rearmament (Japan), 12, 145 reasoning, 59, 65, 66 reconciliation (conciliation), 228, 255; postwar, 60, 230, 253 refugees, 71 relativism, 26, 39, 143 religion, 70, 92, 215; civic, 33 Richter, Melvin, 7, 69, 156 Richter, Werner, 50 Risse-Kappen, Thomas, 9, 85 Robertson, Walter S., 95 Roh, Moo-hyun (South Korean President), 220 Rose, Caroline, 12 Rosenau, James, 9, 35, 68, 84 Rousseau, 33 Ruggie, John, 9 Russo-Japanese War, 101, 102, 213, 219 Rwanda, 10 Samuel, Raphael, 39 San Francisco Peace Treaty, 95 Scholte, Jan Aart, 69 schoolbooks (see textbooks) schooling, 4, 33ff., 49, 51, 60, 68–9, 89, 254; access to, 36; influence of, 6, 63 school system (Japan), 91; establishment of, 88, 109 secessionists, 58 Second World War, 194, 203, 234; experiences of, 174; in relation to syllabuses and textbooks (Japan), 100–101, 103–106, 118, 246; Japanese government’s view, 176 self and others, 245 Self-Defense Forces (Japan), 116, 146, 148 self-preservation, 74 Shinto/State Shintoism, 89, 92, 132, 142 Shoeps, Julius, 52 Singapore, 18, 31, 125, 167ff., 185, 188, 194, 243, 248, 269, 271, 273 Sino-Japanese relations, 103, 129, 139, 183, 222–3, 245, 254;

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Index normalization of diplomatic relations, 85, 123, 183, 194, 200; Sino-Japanese Joint Declaration, 222; Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, 119, 126, 127, 151, 176, 190, 196, 222; Sino-Japanese Treaty of Peace and Friendship, 222 Sino-Japanese War (1894–95), 102, 173, 213, 219 Sino-Japanese War (1937–45), 132, 136, 154, 174 Skjelsbaek, Kjell, 74 Smith, Anthony, 68 social engineering, 31 social forces, 34, 38, 57, 256 socialization, 6ff., 38, 58, 69; political, 33, 38, 48, 69, 74, 144, 145, 148, 150, 179, 182, 242 social sciences, 1, 56, 213 Société des Professeurs d’Histoire et de Géographie de l’Enseignement Public, 209 society (see also the government), 16, 17–18, 22–3, 64, 71, 74–8, 255–7; acceptance in, 24, 33; civil, 228; desired, 33; exposure to the external environment, 71, 182, 225; the family and, 70; hegemony, 34; the individual and, 68–9; institutions in, 70; multicultural/ethnic, 42; organic theories of, 49; self-identity, 26; various forces in, 3, 36, 38, 70, 76, 146 Society of Asian Women, 165 sociology, 7, 68, 69, 214 Song, Min-soon (South Korean Foreign Minister), 221 South Africa, 10, 82 South Korea , 10, 172, 192, 194; and the textbook disputes, 10, 11, 13, 117–38, 214–17, 150–4, 160–5, 184ff., 241, 243, 247ff.; antiJapanese feelings/sentiments, demonstration, 126, 161; controversy over history with China, 236; intergovernmental cooperation with Japan, 217–22, 226–30, 250; public protests and campaigns in 1982, 162–3;

311

transnational cooperation with Japan, 210–16, 225ff., 234 South Korean-Japanese Joint Communiqué of 1965, 127, 190 sovereignty/state sovereignty, 30, 141, 153, 231 Soviet Union, 33, 41, 59, 96, 122, 166, 167, 267, 268, 275; and Eastern Europe, 33 spatial and temporal dimension, 30 Stalin, Joseph, 41 state apparatus/system, 22, 32, 33 state borders/boundaries (see also national borders / boundaries), 8, 37, 72, 249, 257; communication across, 71, 76, 247; cooperation across, 226; interactions across, 4, 8, 56, 67; potential tension, 247 state surveillance, 22 states, 4, 21, 26, 28, 30, 34, 43, 50, 145, 256; awareness of, 146, 242; formation of, 28ff., 35, 40, 57, 58, 144, 243; the individual and, 39, 49, 50; new states and old states, 30, 41, 57; relations between / among, 5, 6, 30, 61; rise and fall of, 89 Steedman, Carolyn, 39 stereotypes, 60, 72, 245; autostereotypes and heterostereotypes, 60, 173; national, 60, 173, 191, 245 subjectivity, 9, 25–8 Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), 91–4 Taiwan, 18, 85, 121, 123, 125, 133–4, 166–8, 185, 188, 194, 248, 268, 270–1, 273; Taipei government, 166, 167, 243 Takashima, Nobuyoshi, 12 Tang, Jiaxuan (Chinese State Councillor), 237 Targ, Harry, 59 teachers, 4, 25, 36–7, 89, 91–3, 96ff., 114–15, 139, 203, 209ff. teachers’ unions/organizations, 96, 164, 165, 234 teaching; content of, 2, 3, 10, 14, 31, 38, 40, 101, 104, 117, 119, 138,

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144, 241, 249, 251; guidelines, 3, 96, 99, 101 territories/national territories, 30, 40, 42, 57, 58, 74, 102, 141, 147, 212; territorial boundaries, 57; territorial disputes/issues, 44, 220; territorializing, 42, 147 Textbook Authorization Research Council (TARC), 107, 108, 115, 123, 129, 132, 136, 147, 152, 156 textbook dispute in 1982, 118–30 textbook dispute in 1986, 131–8 textbook issue, 10–12, 18, 136, 149, 157, 166ff., 227, 247, 251, 253; analysis of, 138–49, 171–90 textbook policies (during the US occupation of Japan), 92–3 textbook publishers, 96, 105ff., 155, 200, 211 Textbook Research Centre (Japan), 107 textbooks / schoolbooks (and teaching materials), 38, 85, 143, 151, 186, 209, 230, 251; adoption of (Japan), 92, 109; as the main teaching materials, 107, 114; authorization in practice, 138ff., 146, 149–50, 190, 222, 253, 262–5; authorization and selection of (Japan), 10–12, 95, 106–10, 115, 249, 260–1; Japanese, 88–97, 113, 116, 152, 177; Japanese and US recommendations, 234 Thailand, Thai, 18, 122, 125, 167–70, 211, 268, 271, 273 them and us, 59 theories, 1, 7, 8, 23, 26, 34, 48, 215; political, 7, 8; theorizing, 48 Thomas, R. Murray , 35, 48, 51 time, 1, 30, 64, 77, 78, 256 Toriumi, Yasuhi, 221 totalitarianism, 49, 101 tradition, 33, 49, 51, 59, 64, 66, 69ff., 182, 212 transnational (educational) cooperation, 185, 210–16, 226 transnationalism, 8, 9, 74, 86; transnational contacts / interactions, 1, 9, 172, 257; transnational forces/influence, 9,

251; transnational relations, 1, 240, 255 trust, 59–60, 72, 164, 227, 251; and mistrust of foreign countries and peoples, 59, 171, 172, 244; mutual trust, 254 truths, 25ff., 140ff. Turkey, 60; Ottoman Turks, 60; Turkish, the, 80 ultranationalism, 91ff., 144, 172, 243, 244 underlying mechanisms, 67 uniqueness and comparability, 207 uniqueness of history/historical events, 67, 207 Unit 731, 161, 230; in relation to textbooks (Japan), 154, 204ff., 210 United Kingdom (UK), 24, 29, 46, 85, 142, 166, 167, 212, 267; British, the, 39; British education system, state schools, 32, 41; British empire, 233; British government, 39; British history, 29; Britishness, 80; Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), 46–7; British foreign policy, 46–7 United Nations (UN), 7, 35, 45, 61, 85, 93, 194, 254; Security Council, 254 United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), 45, 51, 72, 85, 236 United States (US), 23, 41, 47, 57, 69–70, 112, 166–9, 188–9, 194, 203, 271; American Indians, 42; American Independence, 89; Americans, the, 2, 29, 33, 39, 234, 252; Americanization, 33; occupation (of Japan)/ occupying forces, 90ff., 144, 177, 243; Revolution, 29; schools, textbook selection process, 41, 115; US Education Mission, 92ff., 112; US foreign policy/global strategy, 65, 81, 145; US-Japanese relations, 12, 95, 104, 110, 145, 244; US-Japanese security dialogue, 145, 148, 150, 182, 199, 242, 247 universalism, 29 ‘unobservables’, 9, 56

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Index

313

values, 9, 23, 26, 34, 84, 141–4; valuefree/value judgements, 142–3; value systems, 24, 34, 71, 141, 182 vantage points, 1, 25, 104, 141, 147 vicarious experiences, 38, 63, 67, 77, 146, 174 victims, war victims, 126, 140–1, 160–1, 162, 165, 171, 185, 202, 223, 255 Vietnam, 18, 41, 70, 121, 123, 125, 166–7, 211, 234, 268, 273 Vietnam War, 41, 81 views about home and foreign states, 6, 56–61, 171–4

Warwick, Donald, 9, 62 Wendt, Alexander, 9 Western influence (on Japan), 89, 90, 101, 110, 244 White, Hayden, 27 worldviews, 2, 8ff., 63, 249

Walzer, Michael, 8, 62, 69, 71, 83 war films/stories, 13–14, 42, 147 war reparations, 173, 245 wartime history, 12; attitudes towards/handling/understanding of, 180, 202, 245

Zhao, Ziyang, 183 Zhou, Enlai (Chinese Premier), 196 Ziegler, Charles, 66 Zimbabwe, 41 Zionism, 41

xenophobia, 70, 80 Yamazumi, Masami, 12 Yasukuni Shrine, visits to, 148, 181, 202, 247 Yoshimi, Yoshiaki, 198, 203, 232 Yugoslavia, former, 9, 36

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