The "Comfort Woman" Issue in Japanese Textbooks:
The Current Situation of Education and History Textbooks in Japan

Tawara Yoshifumi

From the mid 1950s to the mid 1980s, Japan's role in World War II;　especially its invasion of its Asian neighbours and the suffering this caused;　was not correctly described in Japanese history textbooks. This is because the Ministry of Science and Education's (formerly the Ministry of Education) textbook screening system forced textbook authors to delete or modify these descriptions. During the mid-80s, however, history textbooks in Japan began to improve. The two main factors behind this improvement are Ienaga Saburo's thirty-two year (1965-1997) legal battle against the Government's screening out his history textbooks, and international criticism, beginning in the early 80s, of the distortion of history brought about by this textbook screening system on the part of the Japanese government. Due to these two factors, the government and the Ministry of Education could no longer screen textbooks to the point of distorting history.

References to the Nanjing Massacre, for example, were included in all junior high school history textbooks (eight editions from eight publishers) by 1984, and all high school Japanese history textbooks (ten editions from eight publishers) in 1985. Furthermore, all elementary school social studies (history) textbooks (eight editions from eight publishers) started to include this issue in 1992. These improvements in history textbooks were all due to the efforts of writers, editors, and publishers, not of the government or the Ministry of Education.

The 1990s saw still further improvements, facilitated by:
1. The movement behind the Third Ienaga Textbook Court Case, which mainly concerned the treatment of the Japanese invasion of Asia (1984-97);
2. Increasingly active cooperation between Japanese and other Asian researchers, teachers, and people's movements during the late '80s;
3. Numerous lawsuits for post-war compensation, brought to Japanese courts during the '90s; and 4. The growing determination that developments in historical scholarship, closely related to the three factors mentioned above, should be reflected in history textbooks.

In 1994, references to the Japanese military's "comfort women" appeared in high school textbooks of Japanese history for the first time (19 editions from 9 publishers out of 20 editions from 10 publishers). The "comfort woman" issue was also included in textbooks for other subjects such as World History, Modern Society (civil studies), Ethics-and-Society (subject combining philosophy and sociology), Geography, Politics-and-Economics. All junior high school history textbooks (7 editions from 7 publishers) included accounts of the "comfort women" in 1997. Despite these improvements, it should be noted here that Saishin Nihonshi (Newest Japanese History), the revised edition of Shinpen Nihonshi (Newly Edited Japanese History), issued by a rightwing organization called "Nihon wo mamoru Kokumin-Kaigi" (the National Council for the Protection of Japan) (currently "Nihon Kaigi", or the Japan Council), cleared the screening for the first time in 1986. Neither its 1986 edition nor its 2003 edition contains any mention of the "comfort women" issue.

On the other hand, the mid-90s saw a growing conservative backlash against these improvements in the treatment of Japanese wartime aggression, particularly the appearance in textbooks of the "comfort women" issue. The leading force behind this backlash was the Liberal Democratic Party (hereafter the LDP). The LDP organised a "committee for the examination of history", assigning core members of the party to summarize issues concerning "The Greater East Asian War" (Asia-Pacific War). The committee's conclusions can be summed up into the following 4 points:
(1). The Greater East Asian War was not an invasion but a war for the liberation of Asia. Japan's war was therefore just.
(2). Tales of Japanese aggression, such as the "comfort women" system and the 'Nanjing Massacres,' are simply made-up tales, and not true. Japan, therefore, did not commit any war crimes.
(3). A battle to delete accounts of Japanese invasion and aggression from textbooks (an attack on biased textbooks) must therefore be waged.
(4). In order to imprint the version of history outlined in (1) and (2) above on the Japanese people, a national movement using scholars to revise history must be established.

In accordance with this LDP scheme, a movement began in the summer of 1996 to delete all mentions of Japan's war of aggression in Asia, the "comfort women," and the Nanjing Massacres from textbooks. Textbooks that treated these issues were systematically attacked as promoting a "masochistic view of history" or being　"biased" . This movement has progressed in various ways; through adopting opinions in line with this view at local councils; through propaganda promoted by certain mass media organizations; through rightwing intimidation of textbook publishers and writers. During this "National Movement" campaign, the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform (the Tsukuru Kai, hereafter SFTR) was formed in January 1997. This organization issued junior high school history and civil studies textbooks that distorted history and justified Japan's war of aggression in Asia. These textbooks got the stamp of approval from the Ministry of Education. In order to lend cooperation and support to the activities of the SFTR, in February, 1997, LDP MPs formed a group called "Young Diet Members for the Future of Japan and History Education." Key members of this group include Abe Shinzo, Japan's Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary today, and others who hold similarly important government posts.

In June 1998, the then Minister for Education Machimura Nobutaka stated in the Diet that, "History textbooks are biased. We are considering having publishers correct them before they are submitted for screening, as well as through the process of screening'. In response to this comment, in January 1999, senior bureaucrats of the Ministry of Education requested that managers of textbook companies make the content "more balanced" and rethink the line-up of authors. The screening of junior high school history textbooks for the next period began in April 2000, but prior to that, in December 1999, cabinet spokespersons telephoned the presidents of companies publishing junior high school history textbooks to inform them that "the 'comfort woman' issue must be treated with great caution."

Under this political pressure, four of the seven companies that until then had published textbooks containing references to 'comfort women' deleted them altogether on their own volition. Of the three companies that retained references to this issue, only one (Nihon Shoseki) recorded it accurately as follows; "young women were forcibly collected in many areas in Asia, such as Korea, and sent to the battlefield as 'comfort women' for Japanese solders". The other two removed the term "comfort women" and referred only to "women from Korea or Taiwan, as well as Japan, in inhuman facilities for comfort on the battlefield" (Shimizu Shoin), or mentioned "court cases brought by women seeking compensation for having been sent to comfort facilities, or by men who were drafted as Japanese solders…" (Teikoku Shoin). Furthermore, one company of the 4 that removed the term implied the existence of "comfort women" by saying that "many Korean women were sent to the battleground as well" (Kyoiku Shuppan), but was finally forced to change the word "battleground" to "factories". In addition, the number of junior high schools that actually used the textbook published by Nihon Shoseki was cut in half as a result of the forceful attack by the SFTR and other rightwing organizations, and is in the end the company was forced to stop publishing this textbook altogether in 2004. Among the senior high school Japanese history textbooks approved by the Ministry of Education in 2002 were some which had deleted their accounts of the "comfort women."

To sum up, pressure from the government and LDP the ruling party, and attacks by the SFTR and other rightwing organizations, have exercised a great influence on textbooks, compelling publishers, editors, and writers of textbooks to delete or falsify descriptions of Japanese aggression and victimization, in particular the 'comfort women'

The Japanese government and the Ministry of Science and Education is also attempting to introduce nationalism into the classroom. First of all, the government and the Ministry intend to revise the "Fundamentals of Education Act," sometimes called the "constitution for schools," introducing into it such nationalistic values as 'affection for the nation' or 'awareness of one's self as a Japanese.' This means changing the fundamental goals of education from the promotion of 'the dignity of the individual' and 'the perfection of the human character', to the development of "strong Japanese" with "nationalistic pride" and "awareness of themselves as Japanese," education which puts above all else the strategy and interests of the state, based on national strategies. Secondly, as means of gaining state control over children's minds, developing in them "love for the nation," A Record of My Inner Development ("kokoro no noto") has been published as a government designated supplementary Moral Education Reader (a de facto State-written textbook) without going through the proper legal procedure. The government has distributed this textbook to all junior and senior high school students (twelve million) since April 2002, forcing schools to use it. Third, on school report cards, pupils are now graded on three levels as to their 'patriotic attitude' and 'awareness as a Japanese' in 172 elementary schools in 28 municipalities of 11 prefectures. Fourth, the government has succeeded in making passed in the Diet the bill concerning the national flag and anthem. The flag (Hinomaru, which been used as a de facto national flag) and a song glorifying the Emperor, Kimigayo, which were symbols of Japanese aggression during the war, have now been legally designated as the national flag and national anthem, and are being forced on children, teachers, and citizens, in violation of the Constitution, which guarantees 'liberty of the mind.' Gender free passages in home economics textbooks are also being attacked as "a threat to the traditional values of the Japanese family (system)".

The Japanese government is now intending to pass emergency legislation on national security (a legal framework for war). This action is linked to the series of problems in the field of education, particularly the issue of textbooks and the revision of the Fundamentals of Education Act, stated above. The attack on history textbooks, the manipulation of children's and citizen's view of history through the promotion of textbooks produced by SFTR and others in order to make people believe that "Japan's war in Asia was just," and 'the ''Comfort women'　story is false." This is all part of a government strategy to use the education system to implant a narrow nationalism and loyalty to the state, and ultimately, to create a nation of people who will support a nation that can make war again.