1998 Volume 65 Issue 4 Pages 354-362,422
The main purpose of this paper is to clarify the process of how the Fundamental Law of Education was introduced to Postwar Okinawa, and how it took root there at a time when Okinawa was politically separated from Japan and was under the American occupation(1945-1972). Under the strict restrictions of the Occupational policies that had as their background American Far Eastern strategy, the Fundamental Law of Education and other educational laws were not realized in content as they really were intended in Japan proper, but rather were modified and changed within the framework established by the United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands. Furthermore, the Code of Education for the Ryukyus, 1952, was administered by the Americans similar to other legal ordinances, namely as a colonial law. Inspired resistance by people of Okinawa, a democratic movement led by the teachers association in Okinawa and represented by Choubyou Yara, tried to deal legally with the four educational laws(the Fundamental Law of Education, the School Education Law, the Board of Education Law, and the Social Education Law). Boldly opposing the Americans this protest movement succeeded in achieving the implementation of the enactment of the Four Educational Laws based on the principle of Japan's educational legal system, 1958. The educational legal system and administration of Okinawa under the American Occupation was characterized by adversarial relationship based on the two different system of occupational Force's Government and the Okinawa Government. Unlike the other area of Japan proper, the Okinawa's Fundamental Law of education was developed under such characteristics as the following:1)the stabilization process under the American Occupation;2)civilian movement for legislation against the Occupation's administration;3)the local history that was handed down and spread to each island of Okinawa;and 4)a gap between the principle of the Fundamental Law of Education and reality.
