Organizer: Trent Maxey, Amherst College

Chair: John K. Nelson, University of San Francisco

Discussant: John Breen, SOAS, University of London

Interest in the intersection of commemorative devices, public memory, and current political developments in East Asia render Yasukuni Shrine a particularly salient object of analysis. Understanding Yasukuni to be a site wherein contested histories and genealogies converge, this panel proposes examining tensions and fissures present in Yasukuni, but which are overshadowed by a focus on the Pacific War alone. Created in the mid-nineteenth century to enshrine those who fought for the emperor during the Meiji Restoration, the shrine today generates heated controversy over how it commemorates the history and memory of the Pacific War. This panel seeks to examine some of the fissures and tensions Japan exposed by the Yasukuni Shrine from the Meiji period and relate them to contemporary controversies. The aim is not to undercut the salience of the Pacific War but to insist that the commemorative function of Yasukuni was fraught with tension and marginalization from its initial development onward. Trent Maxey will relate the genesis of the shrine to the contested relationship between Shinto and the state in early-Meiji Japan. Hiraku Shimoda will examine late-Meiji attempts to enshrine those from Aizu who died fighting against the imperial army. Behind those attempts stood contestable boundaries of imperial loyalty and national service. John Nelson will examine through his documentary film and talk the controversy fueled by the current Prime Minister's visits to Yasukuni. At the center of the controversy lies the divergence between domestic politics, revisionist history, and their impact on diplomatic and economic relationships between Japan, China, and Korea.

Trent Maxey, Amherst College

The current controversy over the Yasukuni Shrine has focused on the status of convicted "Class-A" war criminals enshrined therein as "Heroic Spirits." To diffuse tensions with East Asian neighbors, some political leaders in Japan have proposed removing the spirits of those war criminals from Yasukuni, thus ridding the shrine of its most prominent association with a war of aggression. Such suggestions have been rejected by Shinto priests at the shrine, who claim it would violate Shinto doctrine to remove once enshrined spirits. The evocation of Shinto doctrine within the highly politicized conversation concerning the status and role of Yasukuni today reminds us of the complicated history of modern Shinto and state attempts to appropriate it to its own ends. This paper will examine a key moment in the configuration of modern Shinto and the Meiji state’s attempt to appropriate ritual elements for its nation-creating needs. The so-called "Shrine Reform" undertaken in the mid-1880s represented an attempt to minimize the state’s relationship to Shinto while retaining Yasukuni, designated a "special shrine," as a ritual device for nation-formation. Examining the relationship between Shinto, the category of "religion," and the Meiji state at the inception of the Yasukuni shrine reveals a far more complicated and antagonistic relationship between Shinto and the state than the term "State Shinto" would suggest. Yasukuni thus has always contained the tension between a Shinto establishment keen to expand its public role and a state intent upon limiting and controlling it.

Hiraku Shimoda, Vassar College

Contemporary controversy surrounding Yasukuni Shrine arises partly from the politicized question of who belongs in Yasukuni. Should so-called Class-A war criminals and such be venerated in a state institution and honored by official visits? Who deserves to be commemorated as a "heroic spirit," and who does not? This paper considers this question from a historical perspective by examining past efforts to make the hallowed halls of Yasukuni more open to some unlikely claimants. Specifically, the paper introduces Meiji-era attempts to enshrine in Yasukuni the war dead from Aizu domain. Having fought – and lost – against the would-be Meiji government in the Restoration War, Aizu soldiers were officially declared "imperial rebels" and "enemies of the court." This stigma, however, did not stop some in Aizu from trying to gain admission into Yasukuni Shrine for their fallen comrades. Their challenges against the standards of Yasukuni and, by extension, the boundaries of imperial loyalty and national service, highlight the historical premise behind Yasukuni. These efforts to include the Aizu war dead challenged the politics of Yasukuni, which began its life in Choshu domain and only later grew into an imperial institution as Tokyo Shokonsha. For the keepers of Aizu’s past, Yasukuni was the linchpin of partisan commemoration politics that condemned their old domain to the fringe of national memory. Their marginal perspective invites us to reconsider Yasukuni’s political lineage and its historical claims.

John K. Nelson, University of San Francisco

Sixty years after the end of World War II in the Pacific, an enduring and unresolved legacy of the conflict can be found in the politics and policies surrounding Yasukuni Shrine. Created by politicians in the mid-19th century to foster nationalism and patriotic self-sacrifice as the building blocks of a new nation, the shrine survived the war only to serve Occupation policies of building a democratic nation. Today, however, the shrine has again become a lightning rod for controversy due to yearly visits by Japan's current Prime Minister. Protests from China and Korea have become major diplomatic issues, with tangible impacts upon business investment, cultural exchange, and long-term strategic planning for the security of East Asia. This presentation will focus on the meanings and motivations behind Prime Minister Koizumi's frequent visits to Yasukuni Shrine since 2001, the fallout from these visits, and examine various proposals to resolve this domestic and international conundrum about how to honor the spirits of the military dead.