戰後日本의 歷史認識과 象徵天皇制

Historical consciousness after World War Ⅱ and symbolic emperor system in Japan

The purpose of this study is to illuminate the relations between historical consciousness after World War Ⅱ and the continuation of symbolic emperor system in Japan. This study is based upon the idea that it is necessary to consider t he symbolic emperor system, which is to be continued after World War Ⅱ, to understand more fundamentally the incessant factors of the problems in Japanese historical consciousness which have existed for half a century. To summarise the relationship between historical consciousness and the symbolic emperor system, it comes out as follows: First of all, the symbolic emperor system, from the beginning, was closely related to the distortion of Japanese history. Japan, after her defeat, wished to immunize the responsibilities of the emperor and to continue the system. On the while, the U.S. wanted to prevent Japan from being communized. Therefore, the system came out of the political interest. As a result, due to the continuation of the symbolic emperor system, many parts of war responsibilities and war crimes have been ignored without historical judgment. And the system became a major obstacle in forming the subjective consciousness of war responsibilities. Secondly, the consecutive characteristic of the absolute emperor system by introducing the symbolic emperor system became a major factor in perverting and justifying the past history. Following the regulation of a new constitution the emperor lost political power and theological authority, however, he consistently had the basic function as a center of the unity of people. In addition, when the identical character Hirohito is continually related through the two different period of the Prewar and the Postwar by an ambiguous concept “the symbol”, the desire becomes stronger to hide the emperor’ war responsibilities and to justify the past history. Thirdly, the symbolic emperor system has been consistently making the ‘benevolent’ lord image and peace-loving image apparent. However, the symbolic emperor system, which was far from political power, was not enough to function as a center of the unity of people. The incessant reproduction of ideological equipments, such as Yasukuni Shrine, Hinomaru, Kimigayo, which had significant functions for the emperor’s government, came out of these necessities. Finally, although the generation of the emperor changes, the basic function in the symbolic emperor system which hides and perverts the dark past history hasn’t changed at all. The problem lies rather in the fact that after the new emperor was enthroned, the emperor system became far from political and social controversy. The deeper the new emperor who is not related to the history of war and intrusion goes into the people’s consciousness as symbol of ‘peace-loving Japan’ and democracy, the more incurable the perversion of the dark past history and the forgetfulness become.