The Nan’yo Nichinichi Shimbun (daily newspaper in Japanese), which was published in Singapore for 28 years from 1914 to 1941, has been used in several academic books and papers, but it was never used after comprehensively understanding it. The purpose of this article is to organize the necessary prior knowledge for comprehensively using the Nan’yo Nichinichi Shimbun. I will summarize why the newspaper was able to be publisled so early in 1914, what the Japanese society in Singapore was like at that time, and what kind of research possibilities there are, including those in the surrounding areas. The aim is to explore the possibilities of research.

In the decommissioning of nuclear power plants, it is considered that dialogue between local citizens, the government, plant operators, and nuclear experts will lead to the resolution of social problems caused by decommissioning. However, in Japan, which recently began the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (1F) in 2011, the deepened social divide between the local community, the government, TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company), and nuclear experts is making dialogue difficult. With a mind to this issue, this article aims to clarify how citizens, government, operators, and experts whose relationships have been damaged can overcome social divides and have a dialogue.

This research focuses on “the space of dialogue” based on deliberative democracy and takes a dialogue project called “1F Community School (1F Chiiki-Juku)” as a case to discuss how to realize a dialogue within a divided society. As a result, it showed that mutual respect, which is a prerequisite for dialogue, was formed through the 1F Community School between the local community, the government, TEPCO, and nuclear experts who had difficulty in dialogue previously.

Regarding the mechanism of mutual respect formation, this paper highlights the function of deliberation called “social learning”. Compared to conventional theories of deliberative democracy, the social learning advocated in this study emphasizes not only mutual understanding but also trust building. Based on the experience of the 1F Community School, it was found that mutual respect can be formed through social learning that promotes mutual understanding and trust building at the same time.

Currently, the discussion about the decommissioning of 1F still has not been widespread in the local community. Considering that the decommissioning of 1F will continue for decades or hundreds, it is important to involve the wider local community in dialogue. The case of the 1F Community School demonstrates the possibility that the citizens, the government, the operator, and nuclear experts could overcome divergences and foster mutual respect through social learning. From this viewpoint, we believe that we have found a way to create a foundation for future effective dialogue and making a learning community regarding the decommissioning of 1F.

On 21 November 1903, five Japanese were arrested in Bangkok on suspicion of counterfeiting Siamese (Thai) government notes. They were Iwamoto Chizuna, Yamamoto Yasutaro, Wada Inosuke (pseudonym of Sakutake Toranosuke), Sasaki Tokumo and Takahashi Sanya. These Japanese had just manufactured counterfeit banknotes in Japan and brought them to Bangkok on 10 November of the same year.

These Japanese were complicit in a banknote counterfeiting masterminded by two privileged Thais, one was Prince Pongsa (Kromma Muen Bongsa Disornmahip,1861–1936), half-brother of King Chulalongkorn, the other was Nai Peng Srisararaks (1867-?). The latter was the eldest son of Chao Phraya Phasakorawong and Lady Plian,who were most prestigious aristocrats in Siam.

The roles of the Japanese suspects were as follows: Yamamoto was a close friend of Nai Peng, and as a result, liaised with Iwamoto (written as Ewamoto in Thai documents), who was well known in Japan; Iwamoto used his network to find competent counterfeiting technician and Japanese funder; Sakutake was a counterfeiting technician; Sasaki was in Bangkok to liaise with the Thai mastermind; and Takahashi was a fund provider on the Japanese side.

Economic development in Thailand has resulted in the need to circulate paper money as well as silver coins. Thailand started using government banknotes on 23 September 1902, but within six months, the above two privileged Thais plotted to counterfeit banknotes and approached the Japanese to manufacture them.

It was not until 15 April 1903 that Japan’s first law (Imperial Ordinance No. 73) punishing the counterfeiting of foreign banknotes and coins etc. was implemented, and before that there was no law in Japan punishing the counterfeiting of foreign banknotes. Therefore, in February-March 1903, when Yamamoto, Iwamoto and other Japanese joined the counterfeiting of Siamese banknotes, the risk of being arrested for counterfeiting Siamese banknotes in Japan was low. In addition, Japan had extraterritorial jurisdiction rights in Thailand at the time, so Japanese nationals in Thailand were protected by the consular court, and even if they committed a crime in Thailand, Japanese law would be applied and they would not be punished under Thai law. Thus, counterfeiting Thai banknotes was a low risk for the Japanese, and they may have casually joined the conspiracy.

Iwamoto Chizuna, who had been living in Kyoto after contributing to the welcoming of Buddha relic from Thailand to Japan in June 1900, was complicit in the counterfeiting of Siamese banknotes.

This banknote counterfeiting case has been little known until now. This paper is the first to reveal the correct facts of the case by using official documents and newspaper reports from both Thai and Japanese sides.

At the same time, this paper reveals certain aspects of Thailand’s political and economic society at the beginning of the 20th century. For example, the efforts of the first Japanese minister to Thailand, Inagaki Manjoro, to build friendly relations with Thailand, economic activities of the Thai royal family and upper nobility, Japanese consular jurisdiction, the Thai judiciary not independent of the King, and Criminal penalties by the King for royalty who committed illegal acts.

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The Battle of Okinawa (March–June 1945) is known as the only ground invasion of Japan’s home islands during World War II. The fighting engulfed the population of Okinawa’s largest island, where the Imperial Japanese Army, instead of protecting Okinawan residents drove many to their deaths. Today, the battle is represented in the public memory by forcibly induced “group suicides” and the army’s reputation as “more to be feared than the enemy.” But there is another Battle of Okinawa, where some of the smaller islands, sidestepped by American and British Commonwealth forces, were spared the agony of a land war but also lived under harsh military rule in fear of imminent death.

My research focuses on the case of Miyako Island in the southernmost part of Okinawa Prefecture. Allied combat teams did not invade Miyako during the battle. War casualties were relatively few, and there were no mass suicides. During the Okinawan war, some 30,000 Japanese troops were stationed on the island, exercising military control over 52,000 residents. In September 1945, following Japan’ surrender on August 15, the soldiers were disarmed but most remained on Miyako. They were not detained and forced into U.S. internment camps, as POWs had been on the major islands. Japanese supply ships no longer reached the island, which was now cut off from the outside world. The demobilization and repatriation of the Japanese garrison would not be completed until February 1946.

Until recently, it has been held that since Miyako was not invaded and there were no collective suicides, it avoided, relatively speaking, the devastation that afflicted Okinawans on the main island. Here, however, I turn to the utter isolation into which Miyako was plunged after the defeat. My focus is on how, during the roughly seven months between defeat and repatriation, the Japanese army transformed its defensive military operations into a different but in some ways equally severe struggle, the battle against hunger. That fight, I believe, illustrates vividly an important yet often neglected aspect of the nature of war.

Since Miyako was never invaded, many Japanese army records pertaining to the food situation immediately after the war have remained intact. I discovered many of those materials in the Center for Military History at the National Institute for Defense Studies, and in the Okinawa War Materials Reading Room in the Cabinet Office’s Okinawa Development and Promotion Bureau. These documents were hand-written on flimsy, ultrathin paper as the food crisis and lack of other vital supplies threatened the army’s physical survival, and deciphering them today requires a considerable investment of time and effort.

I analyze the records of these so-called food self-sufficiency operations from the following angles. First, what kind of planning for self-sustaining food production did the Japanese military initiate in the isolated conditions prior to Japan’s defeat? Secondly, how did the army manage to maintain military discipline during these campaigns? Finally, the army had been disarmed at the battle’s end. What conditions allowed it to preserve its organizational integrity while concentrating all energies on intensive food-growing and scavenging activities?

The data presented here are significant for understanding similar self-sufficiency policies that Japanese forces in other isolated Asian countries deployed as they struggled to feed themselves in the months after the surrender. At the same time, these materials will help clarify the social and psychological impacts of wartime occupations on the people subjected to military rule.