「特定の政党の利害に関する事業」解釈の二重基準と公民館の政治的中立性

抄録

Article 23 of the Social Education Act provides regulations restricting the activities of Kominkan. But in most Kominkan it has been applied to their users, i.e. citizens as well. Especially problematic is the abuse of the regulation that is spelled out in the first sentence of Paragraph 1, Item 2, which prohibits Kominkan from engaging in “activities connected to the interests of a specific political party”. This regulation has been interpreted as excluding all political activities from Kominkan and has infringed user’s human rights. That shows a fatal absurdity of applying regulations for public facilities to citizens whose human rights should be guaranteed.

In this connection, I will focus on an attempt to eliminate this absurdity by giving a user-specific interpretation of the regulation, which allows political activities, instead of denying its application to users. This means adopting a de fact double standard. Because the strict interpretation on prohibiting political activities is still maintained and applied to Kominkan.

I first verify the logic behind the application of this regulation by referring to a survey that was carried out in 18 cities in the Tokyo Tama area in order to determine the actual situation in local Kominkan. Then, by analyzing an administrative notice and the results of two court cases, I clarify the logical structure and the features of the double standards that are revealed. Finally, I consider the significance of this double standard.