The 1964 Tokyo Olympics As Political Games

Volume 7 | Issue 23 | Number 3 | Article ID 3165 | Jun 06, 2009 The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus The 1964 Tokyo Olympics as Political Games Christian Tagsold and, especially in Japan, the gold medal victory of Japanese women’s volleyball team, known as The 1964 Tokyo Olympics as Political the “Witches of the East.“ [2] Games However, this is a quite superficial and Christian Tagsold misleading image of the earlier East Asian Olympics. We now realize that the Seoul The 2008 Olympics in Beijing were the third Olympics may not have played such a decisive Summer Games to be held in Asia, and even role in South Korea’s democratization of the before the Olympic flame was extinguished in 1980s [1] and that the Tokyo Olympics had a the Closing Ceremonies, its legacy was being powerful political subtext not easily discernible debated. The impressive ceremonies, the in 1964. Subtle politics helped the ruling beautiful facilities, and the well-organized conservatives in Japan to revive and events captured the imagination of a world redeploy—even reinvent—key symbols of viewing audience. This has led some nationalism. This was not an easy task less than commentators to forecast that the Games will two decades after World War II, which had bring China greater international acceptance discredited state symbols, and just four years as a rising superpower with a human face. after the massive public protests against the However, the crackdown in Tibet, the protests renewal of the US-Japan Security Treaty. To against the Olympic Torch Relay, and other controversies that received widespread media pull it off so successfully a striking coup for the attention brought human rights issues to the conservatives, even more so because almost no forefront and left many doubts about China’s one—inside or outside Japan— raised a voice progress. against this revival of nationalism. The Olympics provided the perfect arena for their The divided reception of the Beijing Games coup and for a national reconciliation in the leads us to reflect back on how the two earlier mid-sixties, and this essay will explore their Summer Games in Asia were seen at the time, political agenda and the ways it was encoded in and the contrast is remarkable. The 1988 Seoul the Olympics Games themselves. Games are burnished by the view that they crowned the reemergence of democracy in the The prime mover in this revival of nationalist country; they were as political as the Beijing symbols was the Ministry of Education, which Olympics but met with far more positive had been a conservative beacon both prior to acclaim. And compared to Beijing and Seoul, 1945 and after Japan’s defeat in the Asia- the first Summer Games in Asia, those in Tokyo Pacific war. The promotion and regulation of in 1964, are still considered to have been amateur sports fell under the Ministry's comparatively apolitical, and little attention has purview. Although Olympic regulations been paid to the organizational background of stipulated that the Games were to be by cities the Games. Most remembered are the moments and not by national governments, the role of of sporting glory, such as the thrilling victory of the central government was paramount in Ethiopian runner Abebe Bikila in the marathon 1964. Tokyo itself simply could not shoulder the 1 7 | 23 | 3 APJ | JF infrastructural requirements of hosting the for the first time just a few days prior to the Olympic Games without extensive stateopening of the Games and which was at the support. The key role assumed by the Ministry time the fastest train in the world. The world- of Education was expressed by a political wide broadcast of the games in color and via cartoon that appeared in the Asahi Shinbun, satellite demonstrated the high technological which placed the Ministry in the middle of the standards of the games, although Japan in fact cauldron for the Olympic flame while the city relied heavily on assistance from America to and the Organizing Committee are trying to make this possible. make their points from opposite sides. The Shinkansen, which started its service weeks before the opening ceremony, and the highway from Osaka to Nagoya, also inaugurated shortly before the Games, were the new national symbols of Japan as rising economic power. The Ministry of Education in the middle of The most powerful example of the repossessing the cauldron for the Olympic fire of classical national symbols is the emperor discussion with the metropolitan (tennō) himself, who made the official government and the Tokyo Organizing proclamation to begin the Games at the Committee (Asahi Shinbun 1959, Month, opening ceremony on October 10. The IOC Page). requires that this role be performed by the head of state, in which capacity the tennō was The restoration of national pride that was clearly acting. Legally, though, this was a very staged in 1964 involved the deliberatecomplicated situation. The first article of the rehabilitation of classical national symbols, Japanese constitution of 1946 states only that especially the tennō (emperor), the hinomaru “the Emperor shall be the symbol of the State (Rising Sun) flag, and the army. The method of and of the unity of the people.” In Article 7, he their revival was to free them of their wartime is given many duties that are normally the associations and present them instead as privilege of heads of state, but nowhere does symbols of peace. This was made possible by the constitution explicitly state that this is his embedding them in the Olympic Games’ own role. Legally, it was then and remains unclear narrative and by introducing new national whether he or the prime minister is the head of symbols. The latter were mostly associated with state. [3] Interestingly, in the 1964 ceremony, the technical achievements of postwar Japan, the tennō was formally presented not as head such as the Shinkansen bullet train, which ran of state but rather as the patron of the Tōkyō 2 7 | 23 | 3 APJ | JF Olympics. This had been determined in 1962 by nefarious with using the hinomaru as a national the Organizing Committee and, behind it, the symbol when it complied with international Ministry of Education (and no doubt after standards in the most peaceful of world discussions with the Imperial Household arenas? The peak in the flag's image shift was Agency), in order to forestall any public debate its appearance on the uniform of Sakai about the emperor’s status as head of state. [4] Yoshinori, the final runner in the Olympic torch It is certain, though, that this subtle difference relay. Sakai had been born in Hiroshima was not clearly understood by the Japanese prefecture on August 6, 1945, the day the first public and the rest of the world. Only 19 years atomic bomb was dropped on the prefecture‘s after he had been narrowly spared from trial as capital. To be precise, it was not actually the hi a war criminal by the United States, the tennō no maru that shone bright on Sakai's white t- appeared in as head of state and as a symbol of shirt but rather the logo of the 1964 Games. peace. However, that logo was the red sun (albeit with in a slightly different shade), plus the five A very similar story can be told about the Olympic rings and the phrase “Tokyo 1964” hinomaru flag, which was not officiallybelow it. sanctioned as Japan's national flag until 1999. Nonetheless the flag had been in public use Because the narrative told by and through the throughout postwar Japan and served in the 1964 Olympic Games was clearly linked to Olympics as Japan's official flag. Nevertheless Japan’s own narrative in that era, it was highly its status was hotly disputed hotly in public for credible to the Japanese. Very few would have its strong connections to the country’s imperial questioned the necessity and logic of past. Thus, as the 1964 Games approached, an performing rituals to symbolize the rebirth of attempt was made to recreate the flag as a the nation, especially when those rituals were symbol of shared beliefs. A commission was set embedded in such a well-established and up to redesign the flag, whose colors and accepted context as the Olympic Games. When proportions had not been defined since 1945, the IOC broached the idea of playing a fanfare and a number of variations had appeared. [5] rather than the national anthem, the Tokyo The commission decided to use the Olympic Organizing Committee insisted on retaining standard for the flag size, which is a vertical to Kimi ga yo, which like the Hi no maru was the horizontal ratio of 2:3. This ratio diverged from de facto but not legally designated anthem.. the proclamation of 1870, which had set the ratio to 7:10. For the color of the sun disk (the The effectiveness of these new national literal meaning of “hinomaru”), the commission symbols to the general public was evidenced by distributed a public questionnaire that asked the results of NHK opinion polls, which showed respondents to choose the most apt shade from that, second only to the women's volleyball a scale of reds. The resulting flag could be seen success, it was the ceremonies and rituals that as a product of democracy andhad left the deepest impression on the Japanese internationalism. audience, including Sakai’s igniting the Olympic flame. [6] But it was not only the design process that altered the flag’s image; its prominent display This discussion of the symbols deployed would before and during the Olympics was even more seem to reveal fairly clear political intentions important.

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