研究ノート

Citizenship Education in Japan- Current Situation and its Limitations at StakeMari Nagasue

INTRODUCTION
Citizenship education programs have been flourishing in the European Unionand the United States, and attracting scholars’ attention from various different
fields. Citizenship education is not only a new educational curriculum but isrooted in the changes of social structures from the late twentieth century.
Recently in Japan, an amendment was passed to lower the voting age from 20
to 18, and the importance of citizenship education has been attracting more
attention.
It has only been about twenty years since Japan had introduced the conceptof cit i z en s h ip e duc at ion . The t er m “cit i z en s h ip” c ou ld h ave va r y i ng
interpretations, from a legal status belonging to a country to one’s social andpolitical standing within a community, which includes an array of different
political, ideological, and philosophical perspectives with diverse goals, practices,
and approaches. Although the interpretations, implementations, and perspectives
vary, the core objective of citizenship education is to nurture good democratic
citizens. (Schugurensky and Myers, 2003). Educational policies promoting
citizenship education for democracy has been an area of increasing concern inJapan, since the level of social and political participation among young adults isstill very low. First, historical developments are analyzed to understand how theJapanese citizenship education concept was established. Then, Gert Biesta’s
concept regarding the functions of education is introduced, and how they relate
to citizenship education in Japan. Subsequently, a recent case study conducted
through interviews of Japanese high school students is analyzed to see how
citizenship education is actually perceived by the students, followed by adiscussion to investigate the reality of citizenship education through the highschool students’ standpoint. This article targets the inconsistencies the three289

研究ノートactors (official discourse, teachers, and students) of citizenship education
experience in what is expected in theory versus its inapplicability in the actualclass room, and aims to investigate what factors are affecting the effective
implementation of citizenship education, and what is creating the divergence
between the conceptual framework and the actual scene of practice in highschools.

DEV ELOPM ENT OF CITI Z EN SH I P EDUCATION I N
CONTEMPORARY JAPANWhen the new Course of Study was published for the first time after the
WWII in 1947, a new social studies course was introduced, which was based on
the American model, especially those of progressive Virginia Plan andCalifornian Plan. (Nagai, n.d.). It was determined then that in the newly
established Japanese education, politics and education must be kept separate.
This separation of politics and education was practiced not only in the
curriculum but also in pedagogy, and political neutrality in education wasstrongly reinforced. (Arai, 2019).
In 1947, social studies became an extended, integrated subject, which had theobjectives of citizenship education to foster social recognition and raise “good”
citizens who would be the deliverers of Japanese democracy. The government
educational guidelines back then did not possess any legally restraining power,
hence the teaching contents were left to the discretion of the teachers. Teachers
designed the course contents by paying attention to the students and theircommu na l /reg iona l circumst a nces , a nd t he acqu isit ion of k nowledge,
understanding, and ability was learned from solving social problems that wererelated to the students’ everyday life. (Naganuma et al, 2012). However, this newmodel caused a great confusion in the field of education, and was highly
cr it ici zed by pol it ica l a nd educat iona l ci rcles , as wel l as va r ious
nongovernmental educational organizations for ignoring the reality of Japanesesociety and blamed for a decline in academic ability. (Nagai, n.d.).
In the revision of 1958, and the subject of social studies was subdivided into
categories, and later on, the subdivided politics and economy and the field ofsocial studies were reorganized into civics education. Additionally, thegovernment curriculum guidelines gained a legally binding strength, which
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Citizenship Education in Japandisabled the teachers to use their own discretion in designing civics courses. In
such field of social studies and civics education, the emphasis was more set onsocial recognition to learn about the ways in which the society is organized, andthe opportunities for pragmatic approaches were very scarce. For example, inthe field of politics, students recognized the mechanisms of a democratic systemand became aware of social rules, but a chance to get involved with the actual
rule making or learning political skills was almost absent. (Inoue, n.d.; Matsuno,1997). Nevertheless, the post-war Course of Study opened the first step towards
the introduction of citizenship education in Japan, and its foundation wasformed. Since the 1950’s, reforms in educational guidelines have been taking
place almost every ten years, and there has been a shift from the Americans
style of social studies which emphasize on life principles, empiricism, andsynthetism to more Japanified model, which stresses systematisms, andintellectualism. (Nagai, n.d.)
Considerations on CITIZENSHIP EDUCATIONIn the 1980’s, a special education council was founded in order to revise thepost-war education. In its response, the education council highlighted what waslater known to be Shingakuryokukan (New Vision for Academic Ability), which
focused more on the children’s spontaneous activities and experiences rather
than the traditional way of packing up knowledge. In the New Vision for
Academic Ability policy, cultivating the students’ own will to learn, ability tothink, power of judgment, and expressiveness were emphasized, and theteachers’ disposition of instruction shifted to supporting children rather thancoaching.
The prosperous bubble economy in the 1980’s and its termination in the early
1990’s also marked some influence in the nation’s educational policy. In 1996, theKeidanren (Federation of Economic Organizations) issued a policy statement
consisting of five recommendations for education, administration, and home, andseven actions for the corporate, business world, which expressed the essential
talents that are desired for building an attractive country. (Keidanren, n.d.).
Keidanren advocated that during such times of recession after the economic
bubble burst, talents needed are those who can be the independent actors
possessing high self-responsibility and strong creativity.
In addition to the advocacy by Keidanren, the Central Education Council also291

研究ノートissued a report in 1996, promoting Ikiru Chikara (Zest for Life) policy. In thisreport, the Central Education Council denied the conventional method ofmemorization, and favorably listed the abilities for initiatives, judgement,
creativity, and problem solving skills as the alternative. Zest for Life policyemphasized on fostering abilities and dispositions to find a task by oneself, learn
and think independently, judge with subjectivity, act autonomously, and solve
problems with efficiency in a rapidly changing society. Zest for Life Policy
continues to be one of the major concept in the Course of Study in the 2000’s.
Shingakuryokukan, the 1996 policy statement issued by Keidanren and Ikiru
Chikara not only promoted autonomy, aggressiveness, creativeness, and theability to judge which are considered to be essential for career education, butthey had also demonstrated that very similar characteristics are desirable andnecessitated for raising democratic citizens from the educational council’s pointof-view and for fostering strong actors in the economic workforce from the
Keidanren’s standpoint. This indicates that from both educational and economic
views, reforms in education were indispensable for the better preparation ofyoung citizens for the development of democracy and strong economy.
-HINDRANCE ON CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION POLICY MAKINGTwo ministries are in charge of developing educational policies in Japan. One
is the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW), and the other is the
Ministry of Education, Culture, Science, Sports and Technology (MEXT). As
Parmenter et al indicate, the two Ministries lack effective coordination, and in
response to their inefficiency, the Cabinet issued the “Seishonen Ikusei Seisaku
Keikaku” (Youth Development Policy Plan) in 2003, which became the pillar forpolicy measures in the Ministries, and the foundation of citizenship education in
Japan. (2008). The Youth Development Policy Plan focuses on four significant
areas; social independence, assistance for youth in particular need, youth asactive members of society, and motivation to create an atmosphere for free andopen discussion. (Parmenter et al, 2008). The respective Ministries invent
policies based on the Youth Development Policy Plan, however, MHLW executes
social security policies while MEXT formulated policies regarding education.
Although both Ministries create policies based on the same plan, MHLW
concentrates on areas primarily out of schools whereas MEXT focuses
predominantly in schools. As Parmenter et al signifies, this lack of coordination
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creates an issue that there is no combined structure of citizenship educationembracing both school and community, the lack of integration makes school andcommunity separate issues in the field of citizenship education.
An economic perspective THE CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION DECLARATION
OF 2006
The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) issued “Shitizunshippu
Kyoiku Sengen (The Citizenship Education Declaration)” in 2006, which shed amajor light for the first time to the concept of citizenship education in Japan. In
this declaration, the importance of nurturing new abilities in order to respondto the increasing globalization was stated. The importance of the individual,
creativity, and self-expression, simultaneously with the exercising of rights andobligations to be actively engaged in a diverse society was mentioned in thefirst lines of the declaration to clarify the qualities needed for a continuous
development of the society. Since the previous education did not prepare thecitizens well nor provide them an opportunity to acquire knowledge and theskills to put it into practice, the declaration asserts that it is vital to raise
independent, self-reliant, autonomous citizens. (Ministry of Economy, Trade andIndustry, 2006a)
Although the declaration was published from the Ministry of Economy, Tradeand Industry, it demonstrates that citizenship education increasingly occupied
high interest in Japan, and the issuance of Citizenship Education Declaration
was a symbolic example. It was written from the educators’ and educational
researchers’ point of view, and it showed that abilities desired for fostering good
economic citizens had many common characteristics required for democratic
citizenship education. This Citizenship Education Declaration looks as though it
is promoting democratic citizenship education in Japan, however, it should not
be forgotten that METI’s main concern is the economy. Moreover, for METI to
go out of its realm and advert to educational aspects indicate that from METI’s
point-of-view, the existing system was not suitable in producing independent
workers and active consumers who will be the dynamic actors of the Japanese
economy. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that the desired characteristics andconditions for cultivating democratic citizens and autonomous economic
participants have great similarities, both having a goal to prepare young
citizens as active participants in the society through individual’s interactions
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研究ノートwith the others in the community.
For the first time in “The Citizenship Education Declaration,” the term
“citizenship” has been defined as “the qualities to actively engage with diverse
persons in a society, which is constructed by various values and cultures, withthe purpose to protect oneself, plan self-fulfillment, and to contribute to therealization of a better society.” (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry,
2006a). As the Japanese society is moving towards what is refer to as the“mature society” with high economic standards, it mentions the upsurge ofcomplications due to numerous disparities, such as income, occupations,academic ability, and health, which can lead to situations where people cannot
cope with diverse values and alienate themselves from the society. (Ministry of
Economy, Trade and Industry, 2006a). The declaration endorses the need for
citizenship education, which can provide an opportunity to foster the abilities tofind the issues in communities, participate in solving the matter in every stagesof planning, consideration, decision-making, implementation, and evaluation,
protect oneself while building an appropriate relationship with other persons,lead a fruitful life with a job, and contribute to forming a better society. In
addition, these abilities cannot be attained without participating in diverse
environments, such as family, communities, regions, school, work, and othercommunities. The declaration explains the urgent need for citizenship education,
but also elucidates that citizenship education must not oblige the citizens forvoluntary work or foster citizens who are convenient only for the country or
the society. It stresses that what is important are the endowments to actively
engage in social decision making and processes of administration, and exercise
individual rights and fulfill duties.
In order to expand the citizenship education, the declaration claims thatproceeding with a classroom education alone without having a tangible
opportunity in social participation is not effective. Therefore, together withoffering the opportunity to learn, securing a place for actual practices isessential to propagate citizenship education. With regards to providing an
opportunity to learn, citizenship programs and teaching materials ought to beoffered to both school age youth and Shakaijin (a fully-fledged member of thesociety in the sense of working adults) through schools, regions, home,organizations, places of employment and distance learning.
The significance of social participation is also augmented in the declaration,
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Citizenship Education in Japanand the places of substantial occasions must be secured. Especially in Japan,
opportunities for young children and minors to participate in the society is
considered inadequate, and it is extremely important for them to take part indecision making processes and actual practices before becoming adults. In theschool educational system, not only the subject of citizenship education but also
school events and student council are good possibilities of experiencing theconcept of citizenship in real action.

CASE STUDY: Reactions and Reflections of Senior High SchoolStudents
A series of group interviews were conducted with the total of 21 senior highschool students in 2020, to investigate what their perception of citizenshipeducation is, and how their real life experiences reveal effectiveness or
discrepancies of the existing educational policies and classroom education. Theinterviewees ranged from 16 years to 18 years of age at the time of interview,
all physically attending the first to third year of senior high school. Theinterviews were conducted in small groups anonymously to protect the privacyof the individual students.
First, a series of questions were asked to see if the students were interested
in civics education as a school subject. The responses showed just about half ofthe students (48%) were interested. Students’ opinions revealed a lack of interestin the school taught courses, and the main reason of unconcern came from themanner of instruction rather than the actual contents. Examples of the students’
responses included, “ Teachers are not ma king the course interesting”,“Vocabulary used is too difficult”, “It’s taught in a hurry and skipping too many
sections makes it harder to follow”, “Cannot understand the relations with othersubjects”, and “Cannot see how what has been taught is connected to oureveryday life.” From the students’ responses, it is possible to speculate that
there is a problem between the amount of contents and time constraints inclassroom teaching, and also a lack of connection between what is taught inclass and its application in the students’ daily lives.
S econd ly, t he st udent s were a sked about cit i zensh ip educat ion a ndparticipation in the community. Students were asked if they have ever heard of
the word, “Citizenship Education” or “Sovereign Education (Shukensha Kyoiku)”,295

研究ノートand 95% answered that they are aware of the terms. However, when they wereasked about the practical examples associated with the two terms, most wererelated to electoral participation. Students were also asked about participationin community activities, and if they are interested in taking part. 38% of thestudents were interested in participating in some sort of community activities,
while 38% answered to have very little interest or no interest at all, and 24%
responded with “don’t know.”
Despite their level of interest towards community activities, all of the students
answered positive involvement in communal actions through school projects.
These activities included picking up rubbish in public areas, acting as safety
guide flaggers at local road intersections, volunteering for conversations at
nursing homes for the elderly, collecting PET bottles and other plastic products
for environmental issues, and so on. Since participation in these projects werecompulsory, all of the students took part in groups, but the activities were
preset by the schools or was originally introduced by former students but had
become customary.
Besides school projects, only two students had responded to be taking part incommunity activities. One of the students, who has been volunteering as a fundraiser for a dog shelter, mentioned that since her family dog was originallyadopted from a dog shelter, she is very much interested in doing something forthe cause, but school work, extracurricular club activities, and studying foruniversity entrance exams do not leave her enough time to participate in thefund-raising as much as she would like to.
In addition, 81% of the students responded that they have not searched forany community participation outside of school, and 48% had answered they are
not sure what exactly is meant by “community involvement.” The primaryreason behind this low motivation was the time. As the student volunteering at
the dog shelter replied, most of the students answered back that even if theyfind a cause that they are much interested in, they do not have the time toparticipate, unless they give up studying or participation in club activities, andthey cannot afford to allocate the time since they are about to take theuniversity entrance exams.

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Citizenship Education in JapanDISCUSSION
The advantage of the interviews taken for the case study was that since it
was organized outside of schools, the students were free to discuss any matterwithout fearing the eyes of the teachers or having to worry about how their
responses affect their grade performances. However, there were no doubt
limitations to the interviews conducted for the case study. Since the sample size
was only 21 students, their responses are not enough to represent the students
nationwide. Additionally, due to the spread of COVID-19, no further physicalinterviews were made possible in order to avoid forming clusters or having
close physical contacts. However, their live experiences and opinions reflect how
the educational policy is conducted in school and received by the actual
students.
According to Gert Biesta’s three functions of education, it is clear that thecurrent Japa nese educat iona l system heavily relies on t he doma ins ofqualification and socialization. The students are provided with adequate
knowledge, skills and understanding at school (qualification), and take part inbecoming a part of existing social, cultural order (socialization). However, thelevel of autonomy and inactivity indicate a difficulty in subjectification.
Yusuke Arai of Nihon University analyzes that the current Japanese
education emphasizes heavily on the functions of qualification and socializationin order to sustain political neutrality, which is a requirement by the Basic
Education Act of Japan. (Arai, 2019). Arai notes, “the political education
provided at school is aimed at conferring information and knowledge on theexisting political system as a sovereign citizen and at fostering attitudes towardand motivation for participation in politics.” (2019, P.70) Although it is obligatory,
it is challenging to maintain political neutrality, and thus adding a tremendous
pressure on actively engaged teachers. In 2015, MEXT issued supplementaryteaching materia ls on t he forma l polit ica l pa rt icipat ion . However, t hesupplementary teachers’ guide repeatedly emphasized the politically neutral
position, and stressed that they are to refrain from communicating their own
opinions or making comments on political issues. (Arai, 2019). Such pressure on
the teachers and their restrictions on making political remarks in theirteachings make the class culture prone for the students to remain neutral or
not to express their free opinions. Moreover, some teachers argue that in the297

研究ノートneed to rear students’ ability to make decisions based on specific grounds, it is agreat contradiction that the teachers are banned from expressing their own
opinions. (Moronaga, 2015).
In addition to the binding of political neutrality in education, teachers arepressured to prepare the students for university entrance exams from theparents, schools, and students themselves. However, civics education in mostcases is not considered as a main subject of entrance exams to the institutions
at the next level. This indicates that majority of high schools cannot assign too
much class time for citizenship education, because it is not directly related tothe passing of entrance exams. On top, the allocation of marks for social studies
at university entrance exams is low. Also, although there are some descriptive
questions, most of the exam problems have fixed answers which require pure
memorization, hence creatively answering to open-answer questions is notconsidered a priority, especially for high competition universities. (Kawaguchi etal, 2017). Furthermore, students are taught how to take the entrance exams inthe most efficient way in cram schools that they are accustomed to valuing
efficiency over taking time to acquire critical thinking ability.
Professor Tsuyoshi Fuji of Meiji University articulates that one of the major
problems is for the Japanese teachers to feel too nervous about dealing with
political issues in classrooms. It is derived from the notion that politicaleducation is culturally a taboo in academic settings, and the teachers aresupposed to maintain a neutral position when it comes to discussing politics.
Thus, teachers are experiencing confusion when it comes to introducing
citizenship education in schools. (Fuji, n.d.). Nevertheless, Professor Fuji argues
that Japan is very behind when it comes to citizenship education world
standards, and there is an urgent need to catch up very quickly. Teachers must
be aware that they are only one of the many factors for the students to makedecisions. And once the students have developed an adequate level of political
literacy, teachers do not have to worry about overwhelming them with biased
opinions or too much information. (Fuji, n.d.).

CONCLUSION
From comparing the different policy guidelines issued by several government
institutions and councils, it was clear that the respective demands require298

Citizenship Education in Japan

similar characteristics of creativity, autonomy, expressiveness, ability to judge,
solve problems and self-reliance. These characteristics are essential forincreasing subjectification of the students, as well as for fostering political
literacy for nurturing active citizens. However, despite all the official discourses,
teachers are incapable of implementing effective classroom teaching, due tolegal and cultural constraints. Additionally, students are torn between what sortof education they need in life and what they are required to do for their future(i.e. passing university exams), and the case study revealed that there is a great
confusion. Hence, the official discourses, situations of the teachers andcircumstances of the students all have disparities in between and they arehovering effective citizenship education. The gaps in between the threeparticipants of education must be narrowed in order to identify what kind ofJapanese society the new curriculum wants to implement through citizenshipeducation. Moreover, the standardized testing for universities which require
intensive memorization, and the culture of accepting such exam standards mustchange, in order for the school culture to accept a more expressive, autonomousclassroom learning. Limitations of citizenship education in classrooms is caused
not by the curriculum itself but the lea rning environment . Therefore,
curriculum development must take into account such factors and introduce a
new way to be more effective, otherwise making citizenship education acompulsory subject is not going to make any difference. It has become clearthat effective implementation needs more than a top down discrete nationalguidelines and must incorporate bottom up demands and opinions from theteachers and the students to eliminate the discrepancies in all participants. It
may be difficult for the citizenship education in Japan to transform drasticallyin a short period of time, however, Japan is at the junction to consider theimportance of independent actors and autonomy in education as well as insociety, which hopefully will alter the traditional school culture and contributeto the further development of more effective democratic citizenship education in
the future.

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研究ノートAbstract

Citizenship Education in Japan- Current Situation and its Limitations at StakeMari Nagasue

Citizenship education programs have been incorporated in school curricula
aggressively in many countries since the late 1990’s. Japan has been following
the world trend and emphasizing the necessity of citizenship education byintroducing educational reforms to intensify the school programs related to
citizenship education. With the most recent educational reform, Japan has set
an objective to strengthen the citizenship education by making it a compulsory
subject for high school students, beginning in 2022.
This article explores the situation of the existing citizenship education
program in Japanese high schools, and analyzes its limitations from thestudents’ point of view. The focus is set on the historical development, and what
exactly is projected by the current citizenship education within the frameworkof the functions of education. Additionally, the article tries to elucidate the
obstacles that are hindering the implementation of the citizenship education
programs. This article identifies and explains that the existing discrepancies
between the official policies, teachers’ positions, and students’ class room
experiences are behind the difficulties of executing citizenship education
program in current Japan.

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