What is Japanese Tradition?
By Umehara Takeshi [Debate continues in Japan on how to address what is widely felt to be a long-continuing economic, political, and social malaise. One set of prescriptions would be to return to the values of the prewar era, in particular those of the Meiji Constitution and Rescript on Education (1889 and 1890), believed by some conservatives to be “more” Japanese than the Constitution and Fundamental Law of Education that were adopted under the US occupation and came into operation in 1947. Here, Umehara Takeshi, one of Japan’s best-known scholars of philosophy and religion and himself a prominent conservative, takes issue with such a view. Japan Focus] Nowadays some people argue that the Fundamental Law of Education [1947] should be revised, because it does not spell out respect for Japanese tradition, and after that the constitution too should be revised. It is unclear how these individuals perceive tradition, but it seems that they see the Imperial Rescript on Education [1890] as
