ABSTRACT
Reinterpretations of existing data as well as case studies analyzing the influence of political, economic, and social forces on the formation of education and language policy are sorely needed. This case study of the early Japanese language schools in Hawaii is one attempt to meet such a need. It focuses on the political struggle of the Japanese immigrant community in the early twentieth century to maintain their autonomous Japanese language schools in the face of strong opposition from the Hawaiian Territorial Government, controlled by the haole elite. Educational officials, government authorities, and other leading members of the Territory of Hawaii set the stage for the legislative struggle that was to follow by a variety of both direct and indirect means. The institutional survival of the language schools and the opening of access to educational decision making were directly related to the politics of mobilization and participation by a subordinate group.
