뉴스레터

The year 2015 is coming to an end. Marking the 50th anniversary of the Korea-Japan Agreement and the 70th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japanese colonial rule, this historic year has raised the expectations of the public for a wind of change to blow through the restrained bilateral relations. With less than one month to go, do these expectations still hold? Since Korean President Lee Myung-bak's visit to Dokdo, Korea-Japan relations had never been worse. When the heads of the two states decided to attend the events in each other's country to mark the 50th anniversary of the Korea-Japan Agreement in June this year, it raised hopes for a new breakthrough in the bilateral relations. Finally, after many twists and turns, a summit between Korean President Park Geun-hye and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was held in November. But it did not make the pending 'comfort women' issue any easier to resolve. And there are doubts about the possibility of filling the gap in perception between the two countries at the director-level meeting.

In late August this year, when the future of Korea-Japan relations was uncertain, the Japanese middle school textbook adoption results became known. Korean and Japanese NGOs estimate that the adoption rates of the right-wing history and civics textbooks published by Ikuhosha (育鵬社) stand at 6.5 percent and 5.7 percent, respectively, a remarkable increase from the 2001 adoption rate of the distorted Japanese history textbook published by Fusosha (扶桑社) at 0.0039 percent. Content-wise, the coverage of the Dokdo issue is more extensive than before and included in all the textbooks, including history, civics, and geography. The coverage of the 'comfort women' issue had gradually decreased over the past fourteen years, and it completely disappeared from all but those textbooks by Manabhish (学び舎), a publisher that submitted their textbooks for approval this year. The civics textbook by Ikuhosha, which includes as many as twelve pictures of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, might as well be PR material of the Abe administration.

Japan's distortion of history in its textbooks is nothing new and dates back to 1945 (after the end of the war). But the issue did not come to the fore until 'Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform' was established in 1997. Why did they come to care about textbooks in general and history and civics textbooks in particular? Japanese right-wingers thought that there was a problem with education in Japan rooted primarily in a self-critical view of history with too much focus on the country's war responsibility. They believed that this view of history could never go hand in hand with the proud image of the Japanese people, and felt the need for textbooks that would inspire the Japanese people with pride in themselves and their country. For about twenty years from 1997 to 2015, the Japanese right-wingers have moved toward the goals they wanted to achieve, with some success. When Fujioka Nobukatsu founded Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, he said that he was looking at thirty years in the future.

Why the Increasing Adoption Rates of Japanese Right-Wing Textbooks Is a Problem

To right-wingers, the textbook is the most effective tool of controling the education of future generations. The increasing adoption rates of Japanese right-wing textbooks are not surprising under the Abe administration, which, since the beginning of 2015, has pushed ahead with the agenda of amending the Peace Constitution and passing security legislations to exercise the right to collective self-defense. While the textbooks by Ikuhosha were adopted by a total of 19 new areas this year, the existing five areas have switched to textbooks by other publishers. The increasing adoption rate of this year is explained by the fact that a large number of schools in the cities of Yokohama (横浜) and Osaka (大阪) has adopted the textbooks by Ikuhosha. The adoption process at the Education Committee of Yokohama is a typical example where the head of the local government made the decision on his own, ignoring the ranking list submitted by the schools and the selection committee. Korean and Japanese NGOs and the city of Incheon, in a friendly relationship with the city of Yokohama, asked the Yokohama Education Committee several times not to adopt the textbooks by Ikuhosha on the grounds that such textbooks would hurt the friendship between Korea and Japan, but their requests were denied. A Korean NGO hand-delivered a petition signed by 130,000 people (to the Yokohama Education Committee), but, again, it was rejected.

Why do we believe that the increasing adoption rates of Japanese right-wing textbooks is a problem? Most importantly, the right-wing textbook is the foundation of education for the security legislation that the Abe administration is pushing to pass and will make Japan 'a country that can go to war.' If the Japanese schools use the textbooks that are silent about Japan's colonial rule and war responsibility, teach about territorial issues by exclusively using the Japanese government's claims, including the claim that Dokdo is under the illegal occupation of Korea, and teach that Japan is entitled to exercise the right to collective self-defense, it will be unlikely for young Japanese and Koreans to find any common ground in the perception history.

Now, the Japanese right-wingers are preparing to move on to ethics textbooks. Expanding their sphere of influence to include ethics, which is at the heart of reforming the mind of the people, seems to indicate that they think their efforts have been successful to a certain degree in the areas of history and civics. If history education is armed with patriotism rather than mutual understanding and cooperation, it will only cause conflict and fail to create common ground. Given many risk factors in East Asia, including the divided Korea, the North Korean nuclear issue, and other security issues, the youths in this very region need a perception of history based on pacifism rather than nationalism. Considering history from the perspective of peace is the only way to ensure survival for you and me. The same goes for Korea.

Unwavering Commitment of Korean, Chinese, and Japanese NGOs

Amid the escalating tensions and confrontations in East Asia, there are people who strive for peaceful coexistence: members of Korean, Chinese, and Japanese NGOs. Every year since 2001 when the issue of Japan's distortion of history came to the fore, the members of Korean, Chinese, and Japanese NGOs have gathered together to host a forum about the perception of history and a history camp for the youths of the three countries. They value a history of coexistence in peace rather than confrontation or competition, and continue to conduct dialogues and make joint Korea-Japan or Korea-China-Japan history textbooks.

Additionally, they band together when history education in any of their countries is going in the wrong direction. Their activities are initiated voluntarily on the basis of mutual cooperation, not by the unilateral leadership of a certain party. Spending a long time together in continued solidarity and cooperation allows them to understand and learn from each other. The NGOs of the three countries tirelessly continue to contribute their time, effort, talent, and dedication to the activities toward peace. The more difficult the situation, the stronger their solidarity becomes, as they take one step at a time toward their goals. Their efforts contribute to closing the gap that has been widened by the conflicts and confrontations among their governments. There is still a long way to go. But the message from Japanese NGOs, “We will prevail by not giving up,” resonates with us and speaks for the NGOs of the three countries committed to overcoming conflict. The world may be tough but is still worth living in because there are friends who will be there for each other and build each other up.