oyed was due to the relative importance of their parents and the influence that they enjoyed.
Special provisions have been made to help kikokushijo get back in to the education system – both formally and also in terms of allowing them to ‘readjust’ to the system.
Control over the teachers – Nakasone reforms aimed to end the strength of the Japan Teacher’s Union (JTU)
Control over educational content through the controversial textbook authorization system
Not that controversial domestically, but internationally due to what is – or is not – written in some social science text books
Moral education
Fundamental Law of Education
Much is made of the authorisation and the possibilities of government abuse and many argue that the system is unjustifiable (Horio 1988b:173).
Opponents of the system believe that it is censorship and ‘improper control’, which is prohibited under Articles 21 and 23 of the
constitution and Article 10 of the FLE (see Horio 1988b:176).
Indeed, Herzog (1993:200) concludes: ‘If this is not censorship, I do not know what censorship is’.
However, it should be noted that the system is not peculiar to Japan, although it tends to be less subtle.
Howarth (1991:123–4) points out that such practice also occurs in the United Kingdom, where it is ‘rare to find accounts for classroom consumption, of Britain’s nineteenth-century opium trade and the misery it inflicted upon China. Our [British] invention of the concentration camp during the Boer War, African races dispossessed of their lands and some near genocidal attacks on indigenous populations in various parts of the world are equally hard to find in our [British] school books.’
The importance of the system is further emphasised by the fact that the textbook market is so large in Japan.
Sato (interview, 17 November 1997) believed that ‘publishing textbooks is one of the safest and most profitable things to do’.
In fiscal 1994, 177.96 million copies of nearly 1,500 different titles were published and distributed in Japan.
The budget for the free distribution of textbooks to elementary and lower secondary schools was ¥43.4 billion in the same year, which accounted for 136.15 million textbooks.
With textbooks at the compulsory level being provided free, it is understandable why the government would want to ensure that the quality of the product is satisfactory.
Need to remember that there is no problem with most books – just a small part of certain
history books, on the whole.
The system is still changing
Education in Japan is not merely about teaching of information, but also about developing the ‘whole person’ (kokoro)
This lecture has covered some of the more ‘nationalistic’ and ‘conservative’ areas of the reforms.
The next lecture will look at the areas of ‘liberalization’ and the areas that initiated the debate on education reform (e.g., bullying and ‘exam hell’)
Herzog, P.J. (1993) Japan’s Pseudo-Democracy, Folkestone: Japan Library.
Horio, T. (1988b) Educational Thought and Ideology in Modern Japan, trans. S. Platzer, Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press.
Howarth, M. (1991) Britain’s Educational Reform: A Comparison with Japan, London: Routledge.
Kobayashi, T. (1990) ‘Educational Problems of “Returning Children”’, in J.J. Shields Jr, Japanese Schooling, University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Roesgaard, M.H. (1998) Moving Mountains: Japanese Education Reform, Aarhus: Aarhus Universi
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