Censorship, Academic Factionalism, and University Autonomy in Wartime Japan: The Yanaihara Incident Reconsidered

The Yanaihara Incident is well known as an example of the wartime Japanese suppression of academic freedom. However, it remains unclear why Yanaihara Tadao had to leave the Imperial University of Tokyo. This historical reconstruction of the incident in the contexts of the pacifist movement among mukyōkai Christians, the mechanism and dynamic of censorship, and academic politics at the Faculty of Economics at the Imperial University of Tokyo reveals that while academic factionalism served as a catalyst for Yanaihara’s downfall, the tenure of the professor depended ultimately on the university’s president alone. The Yanaihara Incident epitomizes the practical difficulties of defending university autonomy.