Politics, Memory and Public Opinion: The History Textbook Controversy and Japanese Society (review)

Sven Saaler began this book while serving as the head of the humanities section at the German Institute for Japanese Studies in Tokyo. More specifically, he conceived the idea for this project while helping to organize "Making History: The Quest for National Identity through History Education," a workshop hosted by the institute in September 2001. This workshop was, in turn, one of the many gatherings hosted by the institute in support of its research initiative on Japan in Asia, commenced in 1997 (pp. 7–8). Saaler is now an associate professor at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of the University of Tokyo. In his current monograph, he aims to provide insights into the ongoing controversy over history textbooks in Japan "by unveiling its backgrounds in politics and society, and by identifying the major actors and their respective motives and objectives" (p. 9).

Saaler has divided his book into three chapters. In the first chapter, he analyzes "the re-emergence of nationalist historical revisionism . . . since the 1990s, its role in the textbook debate in 2000/2001, and its significance in contemporary Japanese politics and society" (p. 11). His second chapter examines "official and other politically sanctioned interpretations of Japan's recent history in museums and monuments" (p. 12). In chapter three, which is largely based on public opinion surveys, he argues that "the views promoted by historical revisionists are by no means broadly accepted in Japanese society" (p. 127).

Readers will probably find chapter one most enlightening, as it presents a competent overview of the history and politics of the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform (Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho o Tsukuru-kai). Established in late 1996, the society has challenged existing junior high school textbooks that, in the society's view, have painted an overly negative picture of Japan's conduct of the Asia-Pacific War and have "neglected the culture and traditions that Japanese are duty bound to pass on to following generations" (p. 40). Saaler examines the politics of key individuals in the organization, such as Nishio Kanji, a professor of German studies at the University of Electro-Communications, and Kobayashi Yoshinori, a popular cartoonist. He also details how the society struggled to win government approval for its junior high school history and civic textbooks, which are much less critical of Japan's wartime actions. Whereas the government required an average of only 25 revisions when it reviewed junior high school history textbooks submitted by the seven existing textbook companies, it required the society to revise 137 items. The society's civics textbook also encountered rigorous scrutiny; 99 revisions of this text were requested, while other publishers were asked to make significantly fewer changes (p. 60).

Even after its textbooks were approved by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology in April 2001, the society encountered a series of harsh protests across the country. Lobbying organizations such as the Children and Textbooks Japan Network 21 (Kodomo to Kyōkasho Zenkoku Netto 21), founded in June 1998 by the activists who had supported Ienaga Saburō's lawsuits against the government, organized an effective citizens' movement to discourage regional district boards from adopting the society's textbooks (pp. 64–67). As a result, only a trifling 0.039 per cent of Japanese junior high schools used the society's history textbook (p. 66).

Although the society's history textbook was thus resoundingly rejected by educational authorities, the author also discusses the volume's spillover effect on subsequent editions of other junior high school history textbooks. Evidently as a concession to the society's conservative position, its competitors toned down their commentary on Japanese atrocities during the Asia-Pacific War. For instance, textbooks were more likely to omit controversial topics such as the military sex slavery and the numerical estimate of the death toll during the Nanjing Massacre. Saaler refers to Tawara Yoshifumi, the...