Pacifism and Article 24 of the Constitution of Japan

抄録

This paper explores the relation between Article 24 and the Pacifism of the 1946 Constitution of Japan. Article 24 is the provision for family-based rights but does not include a clause for the protection of the family. Activists who criticize the Pacifism of the Constitution have sought an amendment to not only Article 9 but also Article 24. Because they insist that the lack of a clause for a family’s protection causes the crisis of the family’s dissolution as well as Article 9 leads to the crisis of the state’s dissolution.

Besides, the insistence of a family’s protection has been supported not only in Japan but also in the United Nations since 1995. In the United States, protection of the family is commonly known as the family values movement by Christian Right, which emerged in the 1970s. The demand on family protection by the religious right has formed political powers both in Japan and in the United Nations.

This paper compares the issue of family protection in the United Nations with Japan. As a result, it concludes that the protection of the family in both cases means to protect “our” family and to exclude the “enemy’s” family. This line of reasoning is echoed by militarism thought, requires the nation, or “us,” to fight against an enemy nation, or “them.” The Pacifism of the Constitution of Japan declares that all the people of the world have the right to live in peace, free from fear and want. That is to say, the Pacifism of the Constitution denies the friend-foe way of thinking. Hence, Article 24 excludes the clause of the protection of the family and supports the Pacifism of the Constitution with Article 9.