ABSTRACT
As a first approach to the study of Internet use by civil society actors in Japan, this chapter deals with the use of the Internet by a variety of political actors involved in the so-called ‘textbook controversy’ in 2001. As a case study, this issue has a clearly limited scope, and the civil society actors were quite prominent. In addition, the controversy about the content of Japanese history textbooks, and one in particular, which flared up within Japan but also between Japan and Korea, had strong transnational aspects. It was therefore well-suited as an entry into the research topic since the Internet is particularly useful for activities that involve great distances, and thus reducing the networking costs that traditional media would generate. The issue was also sufficiently controversial that some actors could actually ‘win’ or ‘lose’. This outcome had to be decided within a certain time frame, making it easier to make judgements about the success of individual actors.
