E-Journal of Philosophy of Education:
International Yearbook of the Philosophy of Education Society of Japan, Vol. 4, 2019

Reconsidering the Intersection of Politics and Education:
East Asian Perspectives
Shigeki IZAWA
Nagoya University
Masaki TAKAMIYA
Osaka University of Health and Sport Sciences
Hektor K. T. YAN
City University of Hong Kong
Cheuk-Hang LEUNGThe Chinese University of Hong Kong
Ren-Jie Vincent LIN
National Taiwan University of Sport

Reconsidering the Intersection of Politics and Education
Shigeki IZAWA
Nagoya University
In this roundtable, we would like to further our understanding of political influenceson education and reconsider the politics of education by inviting young educational
philosophers from East Asia. Modern society has fabricated opportunistic fiction
regarding the political neutrality of education. However, education has never been
politically neutral because it has never been able to escape from the political influencesof the times. Instead, the histories of many countries worldwide reveal that education hasbeen used directly or indirectly as a tool to support an existing political regime.

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The same can be said regarding the acceptance of educational philosophers such as
Comenius, Rousseau, and Dewey and their impact on educational theories and practices
in Japan (Sohma et al. 2016). Specifically, the acceptance of John Dewey’s educational
ideas in Japan—which have continued to inspire, stimulate, and promote the theoreticaland practical development of Japan’s postwar education—has been directly influenced
by the acting political regimes in different periods (Kamidera 1959). Dewey’s theories
have been interpreted as a progressive or child-centered form of education within theaforementioned context, and they have been interpreted indifferently regarding politics
to the point of excluding political issues altogether. This seems to imply, paradoxically,that education has not been unrelated to politics.
Further, the relationship between politics and education has always been contentious.
Political intervention in the “internal matters” regarding official knowledge and thecorresponding curriculum is one example that is clearly evidenced by the developmentof the Japanese course of study and the content of history textbooks. Forty-two historicalfigures were designated as mandatory learning for elementary school children when thecurriculum was revised in 1989, and that list remained unchanged after the latest revision
issued in 2017. Selecting the persons to be included in the list caused considerable
controversy at the time. Specifically, Togo Heihachiro is widely known as the famous
Japanese fleet admiral who lifted Japan to victory in the Russo-Japanese War. Despite hisfame, his inclusion as one of the forty-two leading figures to be studied sparked furious
debates (Nakano 2005: 102; cf. Murai 1997: 113-128). Years later, memories of thecontroversy have faded, and the list has managed to garner widespread acceptance.
Nevertheless, this has remained a very political issue as it sharply questioned not only ourhistorical awareness but also the political dynamics related to the representation of thenation’s history.
After the revision of Japan’s Public Office Election Act, young people over the ageof eighteen gained the right to vote. New guidelines have established the relationshipbetween politics and education from the perspective of political education such as
citizenship education. They shifted the focus regarding educational issues to the kinds ofcontent that should be taught and learned. However, the concept of political education
does not imply that the world of education must be replaced by an arena of politicalstruggles. Further to the debates over how to teach and learn politics, a method tomaintain a certain degree of distance from politics also needs to be reexamined. Likewise,
it is also necessary to evaluate the political nature of political education more critically.
The problem areas of politics and education have intersected many times and seem
destined to cross again. While sociopolitical philosophy considers the aims of education
Round TableReconsidering the Intersection of Politics and Education83

in relation to calls for participatory politics and profound discourse regarding global
capitalism, educational philosophy examines the new mode of politics with emphasis on
moral education or political education. Based on the contexts of educational philosophy
in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan, this session attempted to critically review theintersection of such politics and education while raising new challenges and methods toapproach their relationship going forward.
References
Sohma, S. et al., 2016, “Kyoiku Shisoshi No ‘Uramen’ Wo Tou: ‘Koten’ Wa DouYomarete Kona Katta No Ka (The 'Back Side' of History of Educational Thought:
How We Have and Have NOT Read the 'Classics of Education'),” Kindai Kyoiku
Forum (Forum on Modern Education), No.25, 2016, pp.166-172.
Nakano, S., “Shougakkou Rashii Rekishi-Kyoiku (Toward the Elementary SchoolHistory Education),” Shakaika Kyoiku (Social Studies), No. 555, 2005, Tokyo:
Meiji-Tosho, p.102.
Kamidera, H. 1959, “The History of Dewey Study in Japan: Mainly on PedagogicStudies,” in Nihon Dewey Gakkai (John Dewey Society of Japan), Dewey Kyouiku
Riron No Shomondai: Dewey Tanjyou Hyakunensai Wo Kinen Shite (Problems ofDewey’s Educational Theory: The Centennial Celebration for Dewey’s Birth),Tokyo: Toe-Shoin, pp.40-44.
Murai, A. 1997, Rekishi Ninshiki To Jyugyo Kaikaku (Perspective of History and LessonImprovement), Tokyo: Kyoikushiryo-Syuppannkai.

Money and Power in Bad Genius: a study in the politics of representation
Hektor K. T. YAN
City University of Hong Kong
Bad Genius (2017, directed by Nattawut Poonpiriya) is a Thai movie—a box office
hit in its home country as well as in East Asian countries such as China and Taiwan. Whileit can be seen as belonging to the genre of a heist movie, Bad Genius focuses on a groupof young college students who use a number of ingenious cheating techniques to beat theexamination system. Using this movie as the main example, this presentation looks atsome issues relating to the representation of education.
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To begin with, this paper makes the assumption that representations in general
involve the exercise of power. To make sense of this claim, I resort to the notion ofsymbolic annihilation: ‘Representation in the fictional world signifies social existence;
absence means symbolic annihilation.’ (George Gerbner and Larry Gross, ‘Living With
Television: The Violence Profile’ (1976), p. 182.) If the denial of social existence togroups such as women and ethnic minorities is a problem, one must also question thedominant way education is depicted in popular culture nowadays. For, schooling andeducation often receive negative portrayals in movies and the media. One may therefore
ask: ‘What are the effects on people’s understanding of education if education isconstantly discredited in various forms of representations?’
Education in Bad Genius is not depicted as a progressive measure that enhances
social mobility. Instead, education in the movie appears to have no intrinsic value: whilestudents see it as a mere means to obtain academic qualifications, teachers use education
as a tool to make money. The main character of the movie, Lynn, is an intelligent girl who
excels in the academic subjects. However, her need to fully develop her academic
potential hinges on factors other than her intelligence. As Lynn’s father has only a modestincome as a teacher, sending Lynn to a prestigious school becomes a financial burden to
her family. This lack of money also means that Lynn’s chance to succeed in the future
depends very much on obtaining a scholarship. As the number of scholarships are very
limited, the movie highlights the fact that bright students such as Lynn are constantly
under the pressure to obtain extra money.
Lynn’s financial difficulties eventually lead her to become part of a team of cheating
students. As the type of cheating undertaken by this team escalates into complex schemesthat involve large number of school pupils, the last section of this presentation centers on
cheating as a moral issue. Although the plan designed by Lynn and her friends succeeds
in allowing many examination candidates to obtain high marks, Lynn’s collaborator Bankis caught by the examination authority during the process and he is expelled from hisschool. Eventually Lynn decides to confess to the examination authority: she appears tohave realized that cheating is morally wrong and does not want to be involved in cheatinganymore.
During the roundtable discussion, the focus is mainly on the morality of cheating.
Although Lynn’s confession may resemble an affirmation of what is morally right, I try
to argue that Lynn’s confession does not manage to deal with the fundamental cause of
the problem, namely, inequality. Lynn’s confession does not change the imbalance ofpower that results from extreme wealth inequality: it only makes her situation deteriorate
further. From this perspective, one may say that instead of taking a critical stance towards
Round TableReconsidering the Intersection of Politics and Education

85the status quo, Bad Genius re-affirms existing inequality and power relationships.

Language Right and the Learning of Chinese in Postcolonial Hong Kong
Cheuk-Hang LEUNGThe Chinese University of Hong Kong
After the change of sovereignty to China in 1997, while the power of English
remains unchallenged – thanks to the neo-liberal economic structure, Hong Kong haseven witnessed a rapid change of its medium of instruction in teaching Chinese – fromusing Cantonese to Putonghua (Mandarin) in primary and secondary schools in recentyears. It raises concerns of further diminishing the language right of the linguistic majority.
Most people in Hong Kong are native Cantonese speakers (speaking Chinese in theform of Cantonese) and thus it is the majority language of the population. In theeducational arena, the medium of instruction in teaching and learning Chinese in primaryand secondary schools was Cantonese before 1997. But in recent years there has been a
new and dominant trend to switch to Putonghua (Mandarin Chinese) in schools,
especially in primary schools. In fact, Cantonese is widely seen as one of the Chinesedialects and de facto the minority language in the context of People’s Republic of China.
It gives pragmatic reason for schools administrators and parents to support the switchfrom Cantonese to Putonghua in learning Chinese in terms of future job opportunities
and economic returns of the students. And, indeed, political correctness should also takea role in contributing this situation, as the Chinese central government views the insert ofPutonghua into civic and educational arenas as part of the project of nation building ofChineseness.
In the field of political philosophy, language right is now the integral part of theoryof justice after the critique of liberalism from communitarianism and multiculturalism inthe past two decades. Maintaining language diversity has become essential issue ofjustice in contemporary democratic countries. People have the rights to use their own
language in the public domain and they should expect to attain similar economic
endowments through the use of their language in work place. It justifies the preservationof minority language and facilitate its use in public domains, government offices, andwork places.
However, language right is different from those conventional liberal rights, such asuniversal suffrage and religious freedom, for which individual citizen could exercise
E-Journal of Philosophy of Education: International Yearbook of the Philosophy of Education Society of Japan, Vol. 4, 201986

freely once their entitlements have been granted by the authority. Language right is rather
a form of cooperative justice. Language needs to be used in both private and publicdomains in order to sustain its economic and political influence. Nonetheless, there isalways unequal socio-political presence between majority and minority cultures.
Minority citizens thus at least bear social and economic costs of not being familiar withmajority language in the country.
When it comes to a post-colonial Hong Kong, the language issue becomes much
more complicated. Under the political pressure of China, nation-building is the prominent
objective for the regime to deploy public policy in Hong Kong. Education is the frontierof such cultural politics battles. Moreover, at the same time Putonghua has been earned
the status as the more ‘useful language’, together with English, in current economic
climate under the neo-liberal mind set. Upon such context, this presentation examined
linguistic justice beyond the two prominent normative models of language – the ‘nationbuilding’ and ‘language preservation’ under liberalism and explore the possibility ofapplying and reconstructing postcolonial theory with Hong Kong experience.

Ideology, Collective Memory and National Identity in Schooling:
The development of Taiwan history textbooks re-examined
Ren-Jie Vincent LIN
National Taiwan University of Sport
It is always controversial on teaching materials, textbook contents and pedagogiesof the subject of history in Taiwan due to its complicated transformation of the politics
over the past two hundred years. This research is mainly to re-examine the developmentof history textbooks in Taiwan after declaring the martial law of 1987, by the perspectiveof politics of education, with special reference to the concepts of ideology, collective
memory and national identity. Therefore, the key question is that how the national identity
was constructed in post-1949 Taiwan by shaping collective memories on history
textbooks and history teaching implemented by ruling authorities’ ideologies on differentperiods. In the beginning, I re-examine and reflect these concepts and rationales ofnational identity, collective memory and ideology by academic works of sociology. After
this, I do the literature review to explore the transformation of national identity in Taiwan
by the related publications and some surveys, such as Taiwan Social Change Survey.
Recently, I begin to expand a new job on this stage. I am collecting different editions
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87of history textbooks of primary and high schools from textbook archives and library of
the Center for Textbook Research, National Academy for Educational Research. Because
it is a huge job, it estimates that I need to spend several months to finish it. At the sametime, I will have my research definitions of national identity and collective memory byfocusing on some significant and concrete items, such as patriotism, Chinese andTaiwanese appeared in history textbooks.
On the next stage, I will search these items, sentences and stories, including
patriotism, ROC, China, Chinese, Taiwan and Taiwanese in history textbooks and thencode them. Then, I will apply the software of Nvivo 11.0 to categorize and generalize therelationship between these key concepts, and argue how government’s ideologies wereshown by history textbooks on different stages in post-1949 Taiwan. By the huge
influence of hidden curriculum by the history teaching, I will analyse how Taiwan’s
government shaped Taiwanese collective memory to highlight the national identity on
different stages by its ideology.
Because of the deeply complicated sovereign status and relationship between China
and Taiwan after 1949, the two ruling governments began to frame their people’s
collective memory and national identity by banking education in schooling, with specialreference to history textbooks and history teaching guided directly by government’sideology. Based on the research questions and aims, it could be easily found thesignificant influence of hidden curriculum from history textbooks and the history
teaching in primary and high school in Taiwan when I support my research report.
Simultaneously, it also could be understood the transformation of history textbooks
influenced deeply by Taiwan government’s diplomatic policies on China.

Conclusion
Masaki TAKAMIYA
Osaka University of Health and Sport Sciences
How are politics and education intersected? This roundtable considered the question
by using examples of Asian countries. Three approaches were contemplated to determine
the relationship of politics and education(T. Tamura, M. Matsumoto, & N. Otobe, et al,
Introduction to Political Theory, Tokyo: Yuhikaku, 2017.): (1) an empirical analysis ofpolitical influence in education, (2) inferring educational norms from oughtness in society,and (3) considering what politics in education actually comprises by regarding concepts
E-Journal of Philosophy of Education: International Yearbook of the Philosophy of Education Society of Japan, Vol. 4, 2019

88of conflict and opposition as politics in themselves. If we follow these distinctions, Dr.
Yan’s suggestion was based on the third approach, albeit with a modification to analyze
the politics of representation concerning education. Dr. Leung relied on theories of justiceand post-colonial theories to address language rights in Hong Kong. He analyzed thepolitics of language rights empirically based on normative theories while referencing
political theories beyond those normative theories. In essence, he presented a blended
method devised from elements of all three approaches. Dr. Lin’s contribution was based
primarily on the first approach by analyzing the history of educational politics throughTaiwanese history textbooks.
All three presenters considered politics within the context of educational phenomena.
However, when trying to determine how politics and education are interrelated, wecannot only question education from political perspectives, rather, we must also question
politics from educational perspectives. For example, we can ask how people become
political subjects from the perspective of human formation, such as the ways in whichpeople acquire the political literacy necessary for acquiring citizenship, etc. We should
question education in politics as well as politics in education.

Round Table