2024 Volume 98 Issue 2 Pages 3-27
After the assassination of former Prime Minister Abe Shinzō, the “cult problem” once again attracted public attention. Amid the media frenzy, discourse on the rights of children born into religious families spread quickly by use of the terms shūkyō nisei (a second-generation member who was born into a religious family) and shūkyō nisei mondai (issues related to these second-generation members). These highly effective and socially significant buzzwords contributed to the rediscovery of a latent problem in society. But what about their use as academic concepts?
In this paper, I look at the academic definition of the terms shūkyō nisei and shūkyō nisei mondai as defined by Tsukada Hotaka and examine whether or not these definitions can be established as academic concepts.
Furthermore, this paper discusses the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which can be used as a counter-concept challenging the idea that the religious freedom of a religious group or the parents is absolute. The Convention on the Rights of the Child can function as a basis for objections to such ideas. At the same time, considering other rights that relativize the religious freedom of children, it cannot be used as a basis to solve the problem all at once.
