The History of Education in Japan (1600 – 2000)
Routledge Studies in Educational History and Development in Asia Series

As one of the most rapid and earliest nations to achieve "Western modernisation", much of Japan?s success stems from its fruitful literacy history during the Tokugawa shogunate as well as later influences from Western educational ideals and consequent economic and democratic conflicts in Japan. This book seeks to enlighten readers on how education and schooling contributed to Japan?s particular process of modernisation and industrialisation. These historical insights can be applied to crises in formal and systemised education today, and form the basis of potential solutions to controversies faced by formal education in Japan and other nation-states. A book that bridges the international information gap in Japan?s history of education will be immensely valuable to historians of both international and Japanese education.

Introduction (Masashi Tsujimoto)

1. Formation and Growth of an Education-Based Society: 1600 - 1868 (Masashi Tsujimoto)

2. Ideals of Self-Reliance and Personal Advancement: Modern Education in the Meiji Era 1868 - 1911 (Terumichi Morikawa)

3. New Education and Taisho democracy 1900s to 1930s (Yoko Yamasaki)

4. Launch of the Schooling Society: the 1930s to 1950s’ (Hajime Kimura)

5. Development of Education from High Economic Growth to Low Growth: 1960s and 1970s (Toshihiko Yoneda)

6. Neoliberal Education Reform from the 1980s to 2000s (Satoshi Takahashi)

Conclusion: Toward Continuing Conversation in Transnational Networks (Yoko Yamasaki)

Masashi Tsujimoto is Emeritus Professor at Kyoto University, Japan.

Yoko Yamasaki is Professor at Mukogawa Women’s University, Japan.