ABSTRACT
In 1946 a new departure was set in historical education with the issue of the textbook Our Nation’s Path, prepared under occupation authority to replace the earlier ultranationalistic line centered on the Imperial House and mainly concerned with the deeds of statesmen and soldiers. An acute shortage of paper forced its surrender ‘for the time being’ to the Education Ministry, which in 1950 coordinated this activity in the Textbook Screening Research Council composed of academics and school administrators. A more positively reactionary trend appeared in 1955 in what is called ‘the First “bias in textbooks” Attack,’ an ‘ominous turning point’ marking the first coordinated onslaught on the educational scene by the education policy group of conservative Diet members. The phase of what one of Ienaga’s lawyers called ‘a golden age of Japanese justice,’ combined with low profile politics, was abruptly shattered in 1980 by the ‘Second “bias in textbooks” Attack,’ following that of 1955.
