81011854

open access

Version of Record

キョクジツキ モンダイ ニ ミル カンコク ナショナリズム ノ シンソクメン

Discourse Analysis on the Rising Sun Flag (Kyokujitsuki) in South Korea

国際協力論集

27(1)

21-46

神戸大学大学院国際協力研究科

2019-07-31

2019-08-09

The disputes between Japan and South Korea started escalating again in 2018. One of the major starting points of this escalation stemmed from an international fleet review held by South Korea in October near Jeju Island. For this event, South Korea’s navy had asked all 14 countries participating in the fleet review to display only their national flags and the South Korean flag on their vessels. This request was apparently aimed at preventing the Japanese destroyer from flying the Japanese military flag, generally known as Kyokujitsuki (Rising Sun Flag); in South Korea, many people see the flag as a symbol of Japan’s World War II aggression, and thus protested its use during the event near Jeju Island. However, Japan did not accept South Korea’s request and decided not to send any warships to the international fleet review. The flag has been used as the official Japanese military flag for the country’s Self Defense Forces, both of Grand and Maritime, since the 1950s. As strategically important allies of the United States in Northeast Asia, Japan and South Korea have not had military exchanges in decades, and the South Korean side in those exchanges never officially rejected the use of flags by Japanese forces. So, Japanese society was confused by the sudden change in stance against the Rising Sun Flag in South Korea, and military exchanges between the two countries had to be stopped. But why did the South Korean government suddenly change its stance and reject the Rising Sun Flag this year? This study explores this reason through a discourse analysis in South Korean society, finding several important elements in this instance that show new situations in the historical dispute between Japan and South Korea. In the discourse of Japanese-South Korean relations, the image of a flag is not necessarily connected to concrete events of the past, like the comfort women or forced labor issues during World War II, but more directly linked to the abstract image of the “evil Japanese empire.” This discourse is also not led by any influential civil society groups or elite activists, as we find was the case of the comfort women issue with the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. The development of the discourse is instead led by anonymous public opinion from the internet society, indicating there are no concrete or rigid goals of the movement, nor an exact definition of what the Rising Sun Flag is. This paper concludes that this situation shows how historical disputes typically develop in societies without victims. 74 years after the end of colonial rule and World War II, the victims of these events are passing away one by one, and the social groups and movements for these victims are destined to decline. However, Japan and South Korea failed to solve these disputes in the past, and the bad image of the “evil Japanese empire” remains in South Korea. As a result, old leading civil society elites lose their grip on the discourse without the victims around whom they gathered to guide their efforts. In such a society, all the people can do is exchange abstract images of past evils, but it is not easy for the people to find the exact goals of their movements without victims to be rescued, and the development of the internet has only escalated the situation. The discourse around the Rising Sun disputes shows that this situation after the deaths of victims is quite typical.

紀要論文