education

Japan Press Service Co., Ltd. is the only news agency providing information of progressive, democratic movements in Japan

Rightist textbook adopted for use by public junior high school in Tokyo

The Tokyo Metropolitan Board of Education on July 27 decided to adopt a civics textbook written by members of the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform that glorifies the Japanese war of aggression by distorting history. The textbook will be used from next spring at a junior high school integrated with Tokyo Metropolitan Hakuo High School.

The Children and Textbooks Japan Network 21 on the same day issued a statement of protest, demanding that the board of education retract the decision to use the textbook written in anticipation of the adverse revision of the Constitution and the Fundamental Law of Education by misrepresenting the content of the Constitution.

Despite the fact that 76 organizations submitted to the board their petition requesting it not to adopt the textbook and that last year the civic textbook was used in only 0.19 percent of all public junior high schools across the country, the five board members attended the meeting (one absent) unanimously agreed to the adoption of it without discussion. The Tokyo Teachers and Staff Union described the decision as "utterly unacceptable."

Last year, the Tokyo Metropolitan Board of Education decided to use the Society's history textbook at all four junior high schools that are integrated with Tokyo Metropolitan high schools including Hakuo and to use its civics textbook at some metropolitan government-run schools for disabled children.

The Tokyo High School Teachers Union and the Japan Lawyers Association for Freedom also staged a protest against the decision, emphasizing that the decision represents unjustifiable intervention in education by the Tokyo Metropolitan government under Governor Ishihara Shintaro.
- Akahata, July 28, 2006