From Life to Politics: The Air around the "Citizen's Political School" in Spring 1978

From Life to Politics: The Air around the "Citizen's Political School" in Spring 1978

In the late 1970s, when Japan's rapid economic growth reached a plateau, there were three overlapping trends in Japanese society. First, the development of pollution lawsuits and the tightening of regulations following the "Pollution Diet" of 1970 led to a culture in which experts and residents joined forces to hold the government and corporations accountable. Second, as a result of the first oil crisis in 1973, the country turned its course toward "stable growth." This led to a growing concern about prices, employment, local finances, and other issues close to home, and a stronger interest in "practical matters to protect people's lives" than in ideological confrontations. Third, after the student movement receded, the "residents' movement" and grassroots study groups spread, lowering the threshold for political participation.

Building on this ground, the "Citizens' Political School" appeared, with Jun Ui and Takeshi Nakamura as lecturers. The first session was held on April 22 from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. at the auditorium of the Urban Center, and the admission fee was 500 yen. The date, time, venue, sponsor, and participation fee were clearly stated in the event section, visualizing the attitude of "putting learning into practice.

In the spring 1978 issue of the magazine, the same "participation-type" projects appeared in parallel. For example, the "Politics Yose," featuring Rokusuke Naga, Komuro, and others, in which politics was discussed through laughter and song, was announced for April 27 at Honmokutei in Ueno for 1,000 yen per person, indicating that this attempt to share politics in everyday language had taken root as a cultural event.　There was also an announcement of a "Journalist Classroom" (starting in May, 6 months, 60,000 yen tuition) taught by Yoshio Kataoka, Rinjiro Sodei, Soichiro Tahara, and others, indicating that opportunities for citizens to learn journalistic skills were becoming marketable and institutionalized.

These simultaneous manifestations point to the fact that the center of gravity of interest at the end of the 1970s had shifted from "abstract systemic debates" to "sei-katsu-sha political techniques. Civic political schools were not "giving" specialized knowledge from above, but were commons for connecting to the experiences of the people involved and making them into a movement. Inexpensive and accessible hours, a public venue, and the "ease" of being listed in the same section of a magazine's event column - these factors lowered the bar for political participation and encouraged a back-and-forth movement between knowledge and practice.

What is even more important is the crossing of the border between culture and politics. The editorial structure of the paper itself, in which notices of performances, music, and movies are placed side by side with notices of political lectures and citizens' schools, embodies the 1970s sense that "politics is a part of the culture of daily life. The "circuit of laughter," like that of a political theater, releases tension, and the place of learning opens the circuit of practical work. The back-and-forth between the two prepared a decentralized and flexible line of defense for citizens in the face of the second oil crisis in 1979.