Newsletter

On the 6th of April in 2015, the Japanese government announced its middle school textbook screening results. Eighteen social studies textbooks (8 history, 4 geography, and 6 civics textbooks) had passed the screening. Our concerns were confirmed as a higher number of these textbooks than before turned out to include the description that Dokdo was 'an inherent territory of Japan' but under the illegal occupation of Korea. These textbooks also still had the old problem of presenting Korean history, from ancient to present, in ways that are distorting or misleading. Their interpretations of the inscriptions on the Gwanggaeto Stele and the 1965 Korea-Japan Claims Agreement are such examples. And the controversial, distorted history textbook by Ikuhosha (育鵬社) had been adopted for use in schools in the cities of Osaka and Yokahama, bringing its adoption rate up from 3.75% in 2011 to 6.3%.

A conference to address the problem of Japanese textbooks' distortion of history was held on the 30th of August in 2015, hosted jointly by the NAHF and Asia Peace & History Education Network. At this conference, the Japanese middle school social studies textbooks that had passed the government screening of 2015 were examined and problems with their content related to Korean history were analyzed in depth.

Distortion of History Spreads Beyond the Textbooks

Here is a summary of the presentations at the conference. First, Takashima Nobuyoshi (高嶋伸欣), Professor Emeritus at the University of the Ryukyus (琉球), said in relation to the Abe administration's education policy: "It is worth noting that Japanese government officials are beginning to resist, delaying the implementation of the Abe administration's policy of including ethics in the regular curriculum." He also said that some, although not many, private schools were known to have adopted Manabisha's textbook which covered 'comfort women.' Lee Geun-woo (Professor at Pukyong National Univ.) said, taking Jiyusha (自由社) and Ikuhosha as example: "While textbooks are subject to government approval, guidebooks for teachers are published at the publishers' discretion and, therefore, have less restrictions and more room for distortion of history." The participants agreed on the need to analyze guidebooks for teachers as well as textbooks from now on.

Seo Bo-kyeong (Professor at Korea Univ.) made a comment on specific textbook content, saying: "The Japanese textbooks present an image of ancient history where Wa continued to exert influence on states in the Korean Peninsula, notably Gaya, and Baekje and Silla, within the framework of the investiture system with China placed at its center. Seo added that unless and until a new logic to replace this old one were introduced and established, it would be difficult to expect a correct change in the Japanese textbooks' descriptions of the many states in the Korean Peninsula. Wang Hyeon-jong (Professor at Yonsei Univ.) said: "It is necessary to demand more accuracy in the Japanese textbooks covering the modern history of late-19th-century Japan and describing the Meiji Restoration and the Meiji state's aggression of other countries in the course of its development." For example, the textbook by Ikuhosha describes the Russo-Japanese War as something that "gave hope for independence to the Asian and African peoples who were suffering under pressure from the powers and colonial rule, with the fact that the Japanese people, also non-Caucasian like them, had defeated Russia, a country with the world's largest army." A similar claim is also found in the Abe Statement released on the 14th of August in 2015, which reads: "The Japan-Russia War (Russo-Japanese War) gave encouragement to many people under colonial rule from Asia to Africa." Evidently, Japan's distorted perception of the Meiji period did not remain within their textbooks but has shaped its government's official perception of history. In other words, the problem of the Japanese textbooks' perception of history is coming out of the realm of textbook.

East Asian Researchers Sharing their Perceptions

One thing worth noting about this conference is that the participants included the representatives of Indonesia and Malaysia, countries that were once under Japanese occupation. It had been decided that scholars and activists in Southeast Asia would be invited to the conference so that we could hear their thoughts about the controversial Japanese textbooks by Ikuhosha and Jiyusha where, unlike in other textbooks, Japan's aggression of Southeast Asia as well as the Russo-Japanese War is called 'the Great East Asian War' and described as a war for the liberation of Asia.

Professor I Ketut Surajaya at the University of Indonesia said: "Japanese textbooks fail to describe historical facts about Japan's colonial rule of Korea from a sufficiently balanced point of view." According to his explanation, Indonesia is not as interested in Japan's historical issues as is Korea because most Indonesian textbooks are focused on the international conflict between Japan and the Western powers, and devote more pages to covering Dutch colonial rule of Indonesia. He also said that Indonesia, unlike Korea, was inclined to view the Russo-Japanese War as a war between the white and yellow races. He made a comparison between Korean research papers and Japanese textbooks in terms of their perception of history. As it turned out, the Korean papers that he used were written by a deceased historian named Lee Ki-baek. It seems necessary to promote our new and more recent research findings.

Lupeichun, Deputy Secretary-General of The World War II History Society of Malaya, explained the situation of Malaysia, a multiracial and multi-religious country. The Malay people comprising 70 percent of the population, as he explained, are not stricken with a victim mentality because they were treated well by the Japanese military during Japanese occupation and suffered little damage as a result. As he pointed out, this has also influenced Malaysia's government-designated textbooks to avoid being harsh in addressing Japan's war responsibility. He has been a critic of Japan's historical revisionism. His column criticizing the Japanese Prime Minister Abe's statement, in terms of a dangerous shift to the right and the revival of militarism, appeared in Nanyang Business Daily (南洋商報) in a series of four installments.

This conference was very significant in that the Japanese textbook's descriptions of Korean history were analyzed in depth and that the problems found in them were addressed far and wide. The results of the conference will be compiled into reports and used when making a request to correct the distorted descriptions. The seriousness of the Japanese textbooks' distortion of history lies in that it gives future generations a wrong perception of history and causes them to misunderstand and distrust others and express an unnecessary sense of superiority, and this will make it difficult to forge desired ROK-Japan relations and Northeast Asian relations. Working toward resolving the Japanese textbook issue is important if we are to build a future of mutual respect and cooperation.