A philosophical analysis of the educational debates in Japan over patriotism and peace.

摘要

This dissertation is a historical and philosophical discussion of peace education and patriotic education using the case of post-World War II Japan. Two issues inform this debate: (a) whether or not it is possible for patriotic education and peace education to coexist and, (b) if so, what form peace education should take. In educational discussions in different countries, the relation between peace education and patriotic education is especially strained because peace education can be seen as conflicting with the issue of national identity. Education, especially in public schools, traditionally plays an important role in forming and sustaining a national identity. For example, national identity is a particularly sensitive issue in the United States as citizens are historically diverse immigrants (with exception to Native Americans). Because of this cultural diversity, it is therefore difficult to maintain a national framework. In other words, since society potentially breeds and maintains conflict, a larger, national identity is necessary to maintain public order. However, peace education demands overcoming geo-political and cultural constructs of national borders; if national identity is overemphasized, it breeds an exaggerated and exclusive loyalty to the country, blocking the development of reasonable internal criticism directed at a belligerent government. The fundamental issue is that the concept of peace from a specific viewpoint becomes one of anti-peace from other perspectives.;How then should peace education handle this chaos? The purpose of this study is to examine that all parties abstractly share the goal of order, one internal, the other external, and their concepts of peace encroach on each other.;After exploring these different educational goals, I examine whether such a conflict is inevitable or is driven by forces beyond educational justification. Several social and political factors inherent in this debate are presented and then explored to reveal what might be reasonably justified in terms of both patriotic and peace education.