Shokuminchiki Taiwan ni okeru Seinendan to Chiiki no Hen'yo (Youth Association and Transformation of Local Communities in Colonial Taiwan)

Abstract

Taiwan was a colony of Japan from 1895 to 1945. It is easy to imagine that both Japanese colonial policies and local Taiwanese1 responses significantly changed throughout the half-century of colonial rule. However, today the majority of Japanese have very little knowledge about the history of Taiwan. In fact, there is a vague, but popular, image that Taiwanese are favorable to Japanese in spite of the Japanese domination in the past. Some people quickly draw the conclusion that contemporary Taiwanese friendliness comes out of the ‘good’ colonial governance of the Japanese, but others are simply perplexed by the gap between the past and present of Japan–Taiwan relations. The post-World War II government and citizens of Japan have a great responsibility for this amnesia, but it should be noted that the people of Taiwan were also unable to develop historical studies of Taiwan until recently—although they managed to keep their colonial memories over the last 60 years. There was a paucity of historical studies on Japanese colonialism in Taiwan until the 1980s, mainly because the freedom of speech was restricted under marshal law, and there was only limited access to official documents published during the Japanese rule. Under marshal law, which was finally lifted in 1987, the government prohibited people from speaking Japanese in public and propagated the idea that Japanese colonial education ‘enslaved’ the people of Taiwan. Under such political conditions, it was hard to exchange different views and develop social scientific studies of Japanese colonialism. Moreover, people were reluctant to talk about their personal experiences during the Japanese period while there was such a one-sided view of Japanese colonialism, imposed by the Kuomintang government.