Organizer: Timothy S. George, Harvard University
Chair: Andrew Gordon, Harvard University
Discussants: Margaret A. McKean, Duke University; Michael J. Seth,
University of Hawai'i, Manoa
To understand the history of democracy in postwar Japan, one must of course consider citizen action along with elections and the constitution. In addition, this panel seeks to conceive citizens' movements and democratic action broadly, to include right-wing or conservative movements, and put them into historical context.
Timothy George compares two stages in the Minamata disease incident. From 1956 to 1959, the actions by the weak and isolated victims resembled peasant rebellions seeking benevolence from acknowledged superiors. The period from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s was a historical moment when citizen participation in politics was possible and virtuous. The differences between these two periods illustrate changes in the relationship of citizens to corporation and state.
Kenneth Ruoff offers a corrective to the view that all democratic action in postwar Japan has been progressive and left-wing. Right-leaning groups such as the Jinja Honcho and Izokukai adopted the democratic methods demanded by the times. The movements to restore Foundation Day and to establish the Era Name Law employed many of the same techniques used by progressive citizens' movements.
Franziska Seraphim traces the participation of organizations across the political spectrum in the construction of memories of World War II. Placing citizen organizations rather than politicians and leftist intellectuals at the center of public reassessments of the war brings up questions concerning the viability of national memory and the blurring of left-right distinctions, and the responsibility of the state to its citizens and to the world community.
Compensating Minamata Disease Victims
Timothy S. George, Harvard University
Citizenship and democracy in Japan are continually redefined and resolved in a social context as much as in legislatures or courts. Minamata disease is the central symbol of a historical moment from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s when citizen participation in politics was possible and virtuous.
Mercury poisoning through seafood contaminated by the Chisso factory's effluent was discovered in 1956. The actions of the isolated and weak victims resembled Edo-period peasant rebellions, seeking benevolence from acknowledged superiors. The 1959 "solution" provided only "solatium" payments to victims. Chisso continued discharging mercury, and the government continued its growth-first policies.
Certified patients sued Chisso in 1969 and won compensation in 1973. Others demanded and won certification. and carried on "direct negotiations" with Chisso. Citizens' groups appeared nationwide to support the victims. The media took up the cause, making Minamata a symbol of the costs of high growth and of a new type of citizen activism.
This presentation looks at Japan's postwar democracy by explaining the striking differences between the above two stages of the Minamata incident. One explanation for these differences is high growth itself, which gave Japan the luxury to compensate victims of that growth. Another is the development of the New Left, and a third is the rise of citizens' movements. Finally, the appearance of other pollution diseases, especially the "second Minamata disease" in Niigata, shocked citizens into action and suggested possibilities for those in Minamata. The result was a changed relationship of citizens to corporation and state.
Reviving Imperial Ideology: Citizens' Movements from the Right
Kenneth J. Ruoff, Columbia University
Progressive citizen movements are not the only citizen movements to have shaped postwar Japan. Groups such as the Jinja Honcho and Izokukai (with extensive local networks) have honed their skills in organizing grass-roots support. Democratic movements from the right played an important role in the restoration of Foundation Day (Kenkoku kinenbi; Kigensetsu in the prewar era) as a national holiday in 1966 and the passage of the Era Name Law (Gengoho) in 1979.
In 1954 an Asahi shinbun journalist wrote: "The people who wish to reestablish Foundation Day are like a well-rooted weed. No matter how much they are stepped on, they keep putting out sprouts." This journalist skeptically cited the manifesto of the newly-formed Society to Promote the Establishment of Foundation Day. The Society, responding to criticism that the movement to reestablish Foundation Day was only a reactionary attempt to restore the emperor system from above, sought to foster national grass-roots support to force politicians to answer to popular will.
By the 1970s, scholars recognized democratic mass movements from the right as a new phenomenon. More than 100 mass member organizations joined together in 1978 to "realize the passage of the Era Name Law." This coalition nurtured a wave of popular support that resulted in 46 of the 47 prefectural assemblies passing resolutions urging the Diet to pass the Era Name Law. This paper addresses right-leaning movements between 1954 and 1979 by focusing on the Foundation Day and Era Name Law movements.
Remembering Lessons of World War II
Franziska Seraphim, Columbia University
Throughout the postwar years but increasingly in the 1980s and 90s, citizen organizations across the political spectrum actively participated in the construction of memories of World War II. They did so through publications, protest and community service relating to specific legacies of the war as they touched issues of present concern. Gensuikyo supported A-bomb victims and campaigned against nuclear weapons in the 1950s and 60s, Chukoku kikoku koji teichaku sokushin yu no kai assisted Japanese war orphans left in China to relocate in Japan in the 1980s, and Ajia minshu horitsu junbi kai helped former Korean "comfort women" press their claims for compensation by the Japanese government in the 1990s.
While personal tragedy continues to form the predominant mode of remembering the war, terms such as responsibility and atonement for the past have recently entered the public vocabulary as political tools in ways that not only question the viability of a national memory but also demonstrate the blurring of ideological borders between the political Left and Right. At stake are questions of the responsibility of the state towards its citizens and within the international community, as part of a larger debate over Japan's present and future.
This presentation places citizen organizations in the 1980s and 90s at the center of public reassessments of lessons of the war, a process which is commonly associated only with government politicians and left-wing intellectuals. Conversely, the issue of the war impelled citizen groups to define and redefine their respective political agenda.