Closed linguistic space: censorship by the occupation forces and postwar Japan

Originally published in the Japanese language as "Tozasareta gengokukan: senryogun no ken'etsu to sengo Nihon" by "Bengeishunju " in "1989"

Table of contents

Part I: How the United States prepared for censorship in Japan
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Wartime planning
Chapter 3: Censorship's justification
Chapter 4 Inner workings
Chapter 5 The language factor
Chapter 6: The basic plan

Part II: How the United States conducted censorship in Japan
Chapter 7: An invisible cage
Chapter 8: Press censorship
Chapter 9: Shared taboos
Chapter 10: Perspectives in a closed linguistic space
Chapter 11: War guilt
Chapter 12: The Tokyo trials
Chapter 13: Dissenting voices
Chapter 14: Germany and Japan
Chapter 15: Internalization
Chapter 16: The politicization of language

The United States postwar occupation of Japan likes to boast of having given the Japanese freedom of expression and freedom of the press. True, it freed the Japanese press from many wartime constraints. But at the same time, it imposed a large number of new constraints, replacing wartime censorship by the Japanese government with postwar censorship by the American occupation authority. Even before the war ended, planning for the occupation included a censorship and public relations effort that would work to "re-educate" the Japanese and fold them into the postwar American international order. Similar efforts were made in Germany, but the effort in Japan was far more sweeping and far more sustained. This book documents that history in detail with extensive references to primary resources held in U.S. archives and elsewhere. Was the occupation successful in reshaping the Japanese mindset? Citing not only the postwar Constitution but also, among other things, the widespread belief in the Tokyo Trials' validity, Etō argues doggedly that it was so successful that its pernicious influence persists even today. Yet the heart of this heavily researched book is its meticulous documentation of how this censorship was planned and enforced.