Mass Organizations

...Fourth, the Japanese people are plainly not aware of the extent of the Communist danger...

...Ex-Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi blamed the trouble on international Communism...

...In the meantime, the Leftist intellectual leaders of the June disturbances have crystallized into a distinct group, if for no other reason than because, so long as they continue to be at odds with the official Japanese Communists, they have no choice but to support the Japanese Socialist party...

...On the surface, perhaps, the pattern of mass action may have seemed like an abortive Communist type of revolution...

...Mass Organisations By Kazuo Kuroda Mobs of Ranting Japanese factory workers and fanatical students shocked United States and Japanese public opinion by besieging the car of White House Press Secretary James C. Hagerty and Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II near the Tokyo International Airport on June 10, 1960...

...Protecting the labor movement was considered one of the main pillars of democratization policy...

...He has repeatedly refused JTU officers’ demand to see him "for negotiations," and he has publicly denounced the JTU for its Leftist tendencies...

...They deplored the fact that the party apparently missed an opportunity to take really effective action, and while this does not necessarily prove the weakness of Japanese Communism, it does bring into focus the growing belief that a comparable opportunity is unlikely to present itself in the near future...

...On January 24, 1960, the "rebel" Right-wing Socialists formed the Democratic Socialist party, under the leadership of Suehiro Nishio...

...In the June disturbances, Zengakuren certainly played a conspicuous role as the radical spearhead and Zengakuren students fought the police, but Sohyo was undoubtedly the organization core of the National Council, as well as a powerful influence in the councils of the Socialist party, which is also financially dependent on it...

...In this connection, one should remember that Socialist party Chairman Inejiro Asanuma, then Secretary General, declared in Peking in January 1959: "American imperialism is the common enemy of Japan and Red China...

...At the moment, Japan’s labor leaders, both in Sohyo and the more moderate Zenro (Japanese Trade Union Congress), pay lip service to the need for transforming their groups into real industrial trade union organizations, but it is as difficult as ever to change the pattern so firmly established under the occupation...

...In fact, the Council claimed to represent virtually every opposition movement to ratification of the new U.S.-Japanese Security Treaty, then pending in the Diet...

...The Sohyo-Zenro rivalry is more deep-rooted than some foreign observers imagine...

...Nevertheless, Sohyo’s fundamental weakness must not be overlooked...

...Yet, it would be inaccurate to regard Japan’s mass organizations simply as thinly disguised Communist fronts...

...Both in terms of organizational and financial contributions, therefore, Sohyo’s role looms large...

...In view of this, it is significant that the Government, which has for two years been trying to reform the educational system, has met with opposition from the Japanese Teachers Union...

...In Japan’s postwar democracy, the Zaibatsu financial corporations have been decentralized and the power of the bureaucracy curtailed...

...They started the anti-Communist "democratization" movement within the National Railway Workers Union in October 1947 and later formed the Democratization League...

...Zengakuren’s so-called "main-current" faction, also critical of the JCP, finds itself in the same situation...

...Leftist charges of "police brutality" notwithstanding, the police failed to resort to any really effective measures...

...Zengakuren is the largest student organization in Japan with a membership of about 290.000 students, or half the total number of college students...

...This time, the mobs fought police riot squads, destroyed an entrance gate to the Diet and, in the general confusion, trampled a young girl to death...

...In a relative sense, therefore, the power of Sohyo, with its 3.5 million members and its Leftist political orientation, has been great...

...It, therefore, represents a large segment of voters and its views certainly deserve the attention of the majority Liberal Democratic party...

...The influence of Marxist thought was evident in some mass organizations affiliated with the National Council Against Revision of the Security Treaty, and some of the propaganda against the Japanese Government and the United States was probably Communist-inspired...

...hence there would be no further need to worry about possible Communist influence...

...These statistics demonstrated that the ratio of Communists in the teaching profession, though far from dangerous, is relatively high...

...Likewise, the Japanese Teachers Union has charged that the new program of moral education means a revival of the prewar prototype known as shushin, and widely regarded as instrumental in inculcating militarist and ultra-nationalist ideas in Japanese youth...

...The fact is, however, that the majority of Japanese students do not share the Communist outlook of the Zengakuren leadership, which acts more as if it were a group of professional revolutionaries than a group of students...

...It is also true that in comparison with craft or industrial unions, Japanese organizational structure is weaker...

...The Kremlin cannot create a disturbance in Japan at will, and this is clear both to the men in Moscow and to Japan’s security officers...

...Zenro has placed more emphasis on workers’ economic welfare and shown more appreciation of the Government’s policies of cooperation with the West, and of increasing Japanese industrial productivity...

...In retrospect, the subsequent critical situation can be attributed to a variety of factors...

...These four principles represented the very essence of the neutralist position...

...By October 1946, there were three nation-wide labor federations: the General Federation of Trade Unions (Sodemei) with 1 million members, the Congress of Industrial Labor Unions of Japan (Sanbetsu) with 1.5 million members and the Japanese Congress of Labor Unions (Nichiro) with 150.000 members...

...In May, when he saw U.S...

...neutralism...

...Sohyo may gradually change its political coloration, but it is too early to make any such definite predictions...

...He has made it clear that the normal scope of JTU’s activities does not include the right to review textbooks and raise objections to administrative decisions...

...and "an overall peace settlement with all the former Allies including the Communist nations...

...The Liberal Democratic Government of Japan apparently considers the nagging of the Japanese Teachers Union in excess of the democratic right of criticism...

...The books are not to favor any political party or religious creed...

...Moreover, its position is more complicated and certainly made more complex by financial dependence upon Sohyo...

...opposition to U.S...

...As the League grew stronger it broke away from Sanbetsu to form the National Federation of Industrial Labor Organizations (Shin-sanbetsu...

...But the small gain of the Socialists in the recent elections does not support their stand...

...Many Japanese parents have had misgivings about entrusting their children to teachers in some localities for fear that their Leftist influence might get through to the youngsters...

...One of the first things American occupation authorities did at the end of World War II was to abolish legal restrictions on labor organization in Japan...

...But for his intervention, the strike might have caused the overthrow of Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida’s Government, which Japanese labor at that time regarded as its principal enemy because it had refused to raise the wages of Government employees which, in turn, generally set the wage levels for virtually all other workers...

...The Communist party failed in the elections...

...These are published by private firms but must conform to standards promulgated by the Ministry of Education on December 12, 1958, which require publishers to comply with the aims of education as defined by the Basic Law on Education and in the teachers’ guide...

...True, some ordinary citizens without Communist or other Leftist ties joined the ranks of the political demonstrators...

...First, Kishi obviously underestimated the effectiveness in action of the mass organizations, as well as the role of the press and other media...

...In anticipation of the peace settlement with the United States in 1951, Sohyo, at its second convention, adopted what it called the "four principles" of peace, including: "opposition to Japanese rearmament...

...After General MacArthur’s intervention, criticism of the ultra-Leftists gained ground both inside and outside the labor movement, which now seemed to look toward the moderates for leadership...

...This new trend was accelerated by the outbreak of the Korean War and the subsequent "purge" of Communists from Japan’s key industries...

...Prime Minister Kishi was clearly correct in seeking to terminate the endless Diet "debates" on the Security Treaty because it was evident that the Socialists were repeating old arguments in an attempt to delay the proceedings as long as possible...

...Because of its flirtation with these Leftist intellectuals, this means that the Socialist party presently leans more heavily to the left than the Communist party, which is, of course, contrary to the prevailing view which regards the Socialist party as right of the Communists...

...In January 1947, Sanbetsu planned a nation-wide general strike for February 1. At the last moment, General Douglas MacArthur intervened and banned the strike...

...Sohyo leaders try to justify their political preoccupations by saying that their efforts on behalf of higher wages cannot be successful without surmounting political obstacles...

...In September 1959, Director Goiichiro Fujii of the Public Safety Investigation Agency testified before a Committee of the Japanese Diet that there are 3,000 Communist party members in the Japanese Teachers Union...

...Amid the prevailing food shortages and acute inflation, organization of labor progressed rapidly...

...The workers involved were subsequently identified as members of a trade union at a large steel mill near the airport, and the students as members of Zengakuren, Japan’s Leftist National Federation of Student Self-Government Associations...

...Though a considerable number of students did take part in the June disturbances, it is still true that the majority is plainly apathetic and does not take the student movement as seriously as an outsider might...

...It represents some 500,000 teachers in Japan’s public primary and junior high schools...

...Sohyo continued to drift further to the Left, an evolution closely associated with the personal leadership of Minoru Takano, a Left-wing unionist and Sohyo’s Secretary General...

...But this can hardly excuse or justify the use of mass organizations as an instrument of pressure on the parliament, since such moves clearly overstep the reasonable bounds of parliamentary democracy...

...Most of those who think along these lines and are...

...In October, those intellectuals who were JCP members began to bolt the party because they believed that it had degenerated into a bureaucratic clique and had lost its revolutionary elan...

...Japanese unions had undertaken several large-scale "struggles" but none had met with success, due presumably to the weakness of a disunited labor front...

...Still, a small quantity of goods consigned to Sohyo has continued to arrive and such trading may bring Sohyo some profit...

...In Osaka, Zenro has succeeded in organizing a new "democratization" movement in the National Railway Workers Union, an important member union in Sohyo...

...At its third convention, in June 1952, Sohyo advanced the theory of a "third force," which meant having Japan assume a position of non-alignment in the cold war...

...Communist participation in the Council certainly made that organization seem to be a Communist front...

...At that point the Japanese Government decided to ask for "postponement" of President Eisenhower’s scheduled visit to Japan...

...which total 5.651,308...

...As expected, this attempt got nowhere, though the council held several sessions...

...According to the same agency, the total number of Japanese Communists was 47,000 in March 1960 out of an estimated national population of 93,330,000...

...It should be remembered that all Japan, countryside as well as cities other than Tokyo, remained calm at the time...

...In retrospect, the June disturbances thus appear to be not only the logical consequence of sustained Leftist propaganda but also of the general complacency of the Japanese Government and of the level-headed majority of Japanese people...

...Only five days later, the same mob action was repeated on a larger scale near the Diet building in Tokyo...

...In this context, it is worth noting that Sohyo is now acting as a sort of trading firm vis-a-vis Communist China...

...Acting through Zenro, Democratic Socialists are trying to enlarge their labor support...

...Moreover, since there is reason to believe that the June disturbances not only surprised the West but Communist leaders in Moscow and Peking as well, this newly formed Leftist group may well be able to count upon Russian and Chinese support in one form or another...

...But these sums are small compared to what Sohyo itself can raise through its regular financial channels...

...Postwar economic difficulties, characterized by material shortages and inflation, encouraged ultra-Leftist tendencies...

...In the June disturbances, for instance, the Socialists and other Leftists in the National Council Against Revision of the Security Treaty justified their actions by claiming that they represented the true sentiments of the people, contrary to ex-Prime Minister Kishi’s statement that "the voice of the voiceless" had supported his stand...

...On the other hand, the flow of money from the mainland to Japan is a real possibility, for Japan’s security forces cannot watch all the diversified routes from the Asian continent...

...As a matter of fact, police authorities even refused to give assurances to Kishi concerning the safety of President Eisenhower were he to visit Japan at that time...

...Certainly, many students usually critical of Zengakuren also joined the mob action and fought the police...

...About 2,000 of these are members of the Japanese Communist party...

...others—1.231,452...

...Wada publicly stated at the time that he was "honestly astounded" by the Millard proposals and openly deplored Millard’s "lack of knowledge of Japanese labor affairs...

...Shin-sanbetsu, however, did not join Sohyo, electing to remain independent...

...Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education has made it clear that the new program is designed to develop democratic values...

...What, then, is the precise role of international Communism in the June disturbances...

...These teachers are in the main employes of local governments and, as such, the law forbids them to strike, so that the Japanese Teachers Union is not a labor union in the full sense of the word, but it has attracted attention nevertheless because of its leadership’s Leftist inclinations...

...The fact that Kishi was overbearing and overrode the Socialist opposition—which did result in a substantial measure of popular antagonism—was certainly unfortunate but does not really discredit the ultimate wisdom of his policy...

...In this connection, the role of the Japanese Teachers Union has attracted some well-deserved attention...

...Nevertheless, it is now 15 years since the end of World War II and 13 years since the organization of the Japanese Teachers Union in 1947...

...Zenro—779,713...

...Shin-sanbetsu—42,714...

...Subsequently, moderate elements began to assert their leadership...

...Sohyo’s present leadership, including Chairman Kaoru Ohta and Secretary General Akira Iwai, actually represents a more moderate position, but Sohyo’s history clearly demonstrates how deeply Leftist tendencies are ingrained in the organization and how close its thinking is to the Communist line...

...At this juncture, in July 1950, various anti-Communist secessionist groups banded together to form the Sohyo labor federation with more than 3.5 million members and the tacit support of the American Occupation authorities...

...It hoped to apply daily mounting pressure against the parliament where the Government party, the Liberal Democrats, had an invincible majority...

...How, then, did Sohyo achieve its present position...

...Some of those young students undoubtedly played a prominent role in the June disturbances and their affiliation with Zengakuren is a well-established fact...

...In the November general elections campaign, the Socialist party tried to present neutralism as a policy designed to maintain friendship with both the United States and the Soviet Union...

...The Ube Kosan Nitrogenous Chemical Workers Union, parent union of Sohyo Chairman Kaoru Ohta, has been split between Sohyo and Zenro...

...Until his recent assassination, Asanuma persistently refused to retract or modify that statement...

...This contradictory policy can be explained by the Socialist party’s dependence upon the Leftist mass organizations rather than by suspected commitment to the Red Chinese...

...it was not anti-American, because Leftist leaders wanted to assure American non-intervention and also because the U.S...

...Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II in Tokyo, the Ambassador urged him to do just that, a suggestion which he not only declined—but followed with similar remarks subsequently...

...military bases in Japan...

...thus splitting the Socialist forces as well and making the Sohyo-Zenro rivalry all the more intense...

...On the other hand, it has accused the Ministry of militarism for suggesting that reference might he made to Japan’s increased international prestige as a result of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95 and the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-05...

...In the last Cabinet of ex-Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, Education Minister Takechiyo Matsuda tried to be patient with the JTU, but in the present Cabinet of Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda, Minister Masuo Araki has decided to take a stronger line...

...The type size, paper quality and maximum price are all prescribed...

...Since both Sohyo and Zenro have the same organizational structure, and both support the Socialist party (a situation no longer true), there can be no obstacles to a merger save perhaps the vested interests of the union leaders...

...In their radicalism, these "angry young men" do not even recognize the authority of Communist orthodoxy...

...Occupation authorities seemed all too powerful...

...These examples show how unusually emotional the atmosphere in Tokyo was at the time...

...The mob scene near the Diet building was designed to give the impression that all Japan was aflame, but it was nothing more than a storm in a small Leftist Tokyo showcase...

...Marine helicopter which took them to the American Embassy in Tokyo...

...Organization Director of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, for instance, when he visited Japan in 1958, urged Zenro to bury the hatchet and to work for unification of the labor movement...

...In some underdeveloped countries, students may be destined to assume political leadership, but Japan clearly does not require guidance by immature students...

...According to Haruo Wada, Secretary General of Zenro, Millard made the following points: • In the preceding two-year period...

...Though tear gas was used for the very first time in the annals of Japan’s police force, the police did not really want to alienate the people...

...Despite their confused notion of neutralism, the Socialists believed that they could count upon the support of broader segments of the people precisely because of the party’s purported detachment from Communism...

...This weakness lies in its organization, which is based on the principle of "organization within an enterprise...

...The same kind of miscalculation had, previously, forced Kishi to withdraw a bill revising the Police Duties Execution Law—a piece of legislation designed to strengthen the powers of the police...

...C. H. Millard...

...Still, their main and real difficulty arises out of their organization weakness...

...Sodomei took a Right-wing position, Sanbetsu represented the Left-wing, Nichiro was in the center...

...On the contrary, the majority of sensible Japanese must try to guide the students and other Japanese of good will who are under the spell of Leftist radicalism...

...Communist China unilaterally severed official trade relations with Japan two years ago, using a minor incident as a pretext...

...The role of Communism, however, was more conspicuous than in the June 1960 disturbances...

...Zenro, not to be confused with Nichiro, is a rival labor federation generally more sensible politically, but its numerical strength is small, as the figures for organized labor in Japan show: Sohyo—3,597,429...

...In the struggle for union leadership, they had acted like anti-Communists, but their thinking remained Marxist...

...Because of the well-organized international Communist machinery and its methods of concealment, evidence to substantiate this theory has been difficult to obtain...

...While they admit their "defeat," they attribute their failure to indecisiveness on the part of the Japanese Communist party (JCP...

...The 1947 demonstration was directed against the Japanese Government...

...The trouble, of course, is that the Teachers Union has its own way of interpreting the concept of "political neutrality...

...While there is a Zengakuren faction committed to Communist party orthodoxy, the majority has rebelled and is now being denounced for its alleged "Trotskyite" deviation...

...Perhaps, if Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda’s bold financial policies succeed in inducing a prosperity based on cooperation with the United States and other Western nations...

...The essentially anti-Communist origin of Sohyo created the impression that Japan’s labor movement was now firmly opposed to Communism, but it soon became clear that some of the moderate leaders had never really faced the Communist problem...

...six of the 10 principal Sanbetsu officials were Communists...

...These Zenro moves, however, should not be overestimated...

...The two U.S...

...The ordinary student remains in this Communist-dominated organization primarily because of political party apathy and immaturity...

...Nevertheless, he persuaded Zenro to call upon Sohyo, Shin-sanbetsu and the independent unions early in 1959 to form a preparatory council for an overall merger...

...Its opposition to the U.S.-Japanese Security Treaty is not new, nor is it illogical that the Japan Communist party should now be trying to support Sohyo as the core of a unified labor front, since they know that whether Sohyo leaders like it or not, it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish Sohyo’s position from the Communist one...

...A widely held theory has it that Moscow and Peking smuggled a huge clandestine fund into Japan, with which Japan’s mass organizations allegedly paid off workers and students for participating in the demonstrations...

...Part of this fight has centered on the new textbooks to be used in primary schools in 1961...

...Sohyo’s Ohta has said, "We have 3.500,000 members and if 50,000 or so must go, let them go...

...There is, indeed, nothing intrinsically improbable about the idea that Sohyo has been successfully infiltrated by Communists...

...In reality, however, it is foolish to overestimate the influence of international Communism in Japan...

...This is equally true of the concept of parliamentary democracy, toward which there is also a peculiarly sentimental attitude in Japan, which results in a wide feeling that the opposition Socialist party deserves special consideration precisely because it cannot muster a majority...

...The sentimentalist in Japan is inclined to condone even this sort of tactic without understanding its ultimate implications...

...It is significant though that there is now widespread frustration among those Leftist intellectuals who were once most enthusiastic about the "anti-Pact struggles," some of whom personally joined the mass demonstrations in June...

...Though most Japanese labor unions are exposed to the danger of degenerating into company unions, it is unfair and incorrect to regard them as employer-dominated...

...On one hand, it has criticized the Ministry of Education for discouraging descriptions of peasants’ uprisings in the feudal period...

...therefore, in a sense more Communist than the party itself, have formed the Gendai Shiso Kenkyu Kai, or Contemporary Thought Study Group, which was born on September 3 and now serves as their base of operations...

...officials had to be rescued by a U.S...

...The party now commands 145 seats in the 467-seat Lower House of the Diet and 72 seats in the 250-member Upper House...

...For the time being, however, these inclinations being what they are, any such attempt is bound to meet with strong resistance from management groups...

...In such circumstances, Japanese labor federations cannot be as effective in determining wages as, say, the American AFL-CIO...

...A Russian ballet troupe which visited Japan recently openly pledged the proceeds from some of its performances for use by the National Council Against Revision of the Security Treaty...

...Though the students remained in the background, Marxist influence was already evident then...

...For lack of another student organization of the same scope and in view of the political leanings of the Japanese Teachers Union, a casual observer might conclude that most Japanese students are ultra-Leftist...

...The so-called February 1, 1947, strike, though it did not attract much international attention, may be regarded as the prototype of the disturbance of June 1960...

...Their simple lack of experience with the harsher realities predisposes them to a kind of sentimentalism which has little connection with reality...

...Sohyo leaders have their own vested interests and it is easier for them to assume a radical political posture than to try to undertake genuine reforms within the federation...

...If an association of employes of a single firm is left alone, its bargaining position remains weak, and precisely to offset this disadvantage unions have formed labor federations like Sohyo...

...The February 1, 1947, strike seemed to be a turning point for the Japanese labor movement...

...At this convention, Sohyo also rejected a proposal to join the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU...

...A merger could lead to Japanese participation in the ICFTU...

...Hence, the sense of frustration...

...Transformation of Japan’s unions into industry-wide organizations would be a salutary change, if it meant a reduction in the excessively political inclinations of organized labor...

...There is a kind of vicious circle here which is hard to break, with the result that in the near future Sohyo cannot be expected to undergo any fundamental changes in its organizational structure and political orientation...

...Moreover, it would be a mistake for observers to assume that the Zengakuren leaders follow the leadership of the Japanese Communist party...

...Third, it is perhaps unfortunate but true that the Japanese police was simply not able to handle this kind of situation...

...Realistically viewed, this means that while the success of the secessionist movement, even on a small scale, has hurt Sohyo, there is little likelihood that a landslide will take place in Zenro’s favor in the near future, which means that Sohyo will retain its preponderance and Japan’s labor movement will remain Leftist in orientation...

...The postwar generation educated by these Leftist teachers has now reached college age...

...These mass demonstrations were organized by the National Council Against the Revision of the Security Treaty, a united front of opposition including the Socialist party, Sohyo (General Council of Japanese Trade Unions), the Communist party, Zengakuren, and a host of other Leftist groups...

...Second, the press and other mass media, especially in the initial phases of the crisis, failed—either out of inability or unwillingness—to present an accurate picture of the situation...

...Nevertheless, due to this peculiar situation, wage levels in Japan continue to vary from one enterprise to another and these differences are particularly notable between larger and smaller enterprises...

...Probably there is a clandestine flow of funds, but Sohyo alone is able to raise substantial sums simply by asking its 3,500,000 members for nominal contributions...