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Education and Democracy in Japan


5.
             Only two decades earlier, such translations of Western works would not have been allowed into Japan. The Tokugawa Shogun-corrupt, decrepit, and highly traditional-forbade Western influence and only opened the ports of Japan to Western trade after "gun-boat diplomacy." After the Shogunate's fall in 1868, Japan turned eagerly toward Western ideas. Emperor Meiji soon realized that, to combat the stinging embarrassment of Western patronization, Japan would have to quickly institute political, social, and military reforms. Nowhere was the combination of the three more apparent than in Japan's educational system. Emperor Meiji did not face an uphill battle for educational reform: a high respect for learning was embedded in Japanese culture. The preamble of the Fundamental Code of Education, passed in 1872, embodies the optimistic spirit felt by the Japanese about educational modernization: "Learning is the key of success to life, and no man can afford to neglect itHereafterevery man shall, of his own accord, subordinate all other matters to the education of his children."6 The Fundamental Code of Education made education not a matter for parental decision, but a child's right. Among the reforms initiated by the Fundamental Code of Education was a mandate that required every boy and girl to attend school for at least four years, starting at age four.7 Perhaps even more important than compulsory education was the de-emphasis on Confucian morality in favor of more "Western" subjects such as practical sciences and the "development of the individual." 8.
             Fifty years later, Japan's World War II experience proved disastrous, and, as McNamara and Blight argue, "The unconditional surrender of Japan made it possible for the United States and the West to force quick integration"9 of features of Western society, including the reorganization of Japan's schools.


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