Singer The Red Flag Incident - The Clash of Ideas and Power in the Taisho Democracy Period (1908)

Singer The Red Flag Incident - The Clash of Ideas and Power in the Taisho Democracy Period (1908)

The Akahata Incident was an incident of repression that erupted in 1908 when socialists held a rally with a red flag in Tokyo. The red flag was internationally regarded as a symbol of the socialist movement and was seen by the Japanese authorities as a challenge to the national order. The authorities even mobilized the army to forcibly dissolve the rally and arrested many activists, including Koutoku Akimizu. Imprisonment and severe torture devastated the movement, forcing many of its participants into underground activities or exile. In the background were the financial difficulties that followed the Russo-Japanese War and the worsening labor problems that accompanied urbanization, and as social unrest spread, the state intensified its surveillance of dangerous ideas. In addition, the Security Police Law enacted in 1900 was strictly applied, and labor movements, assemblies, and associations were subject to restrictions. The Red Flag incident was the most symbolic example of
such repression, exposing the limits of free speech and political activity. Although the incident set the movement back in the short term, it also gave a broad impression of socialism as "an ideology in head-on confrontation with power. The movement of the proletarian movement that followed took this incident as its starting point, and developed in a composition of repression and resistance.