The Early Stage of Olympic Education in Japan: “Olympic Kokumin-Undo” for the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games

Abstract

Almost 50 years ago, Tokyo hosted the first Olympic Games in Asia. It is commonly stated that the 1964 Olympics were the historical turning point for integration and return to a global community of Japan. For the Games, the national Olympic movement: “Olympic Kokumin-Undo was organized by Japan Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. This paper explored the framework of “Olympic Kokumin-Undo” from the view of beginning steps, seven pillars of the movement, spreading from Tokyo to local area of Japan and educational materials: Olympic Readers. By the way, the term of “Olympic Education” appeared firstly in the field of sport education and researches about the Olympics in the 1970s. As the international standard the International Olympic Committee created, OVEP: The Olympic Values and Education Program and published “Teaching Values: An Olympic Education Toolkit in 2007. This research is also following the theory of the educational values of Olympism from the toolkit. Therefore, this paper focuses and examines the details and characteristics of the program “Olympic Kokumin-Undo”, as Olympic education with the theory of OVEP. The conclusion is as follows. It is clarified that the council for the “Olympic Kokumin-Undo” was established on 22 June 1963, consisted of public and private organizations with related Ministries. From the 10th October to the 2nd November 1963, the festival of the year before the Olympic Games was held for promotion of the movement. And then, the official documents, notification which intended to spread the movement are sent from MESC to the local governmental bodies especially of education. With the basic principles; seven pillars, the practical movement was promoted. However, though there was a plan for continuing the movement as “National Movement for founding new Japan”, the plan was not implemented. MESC published 3 types of the Olympic Readers for all of Japan: for elementary schools, junior high schools and high schools. The contents were mainly a brief history of the Olympics, preparing the Tokyo 1964, episodes of famous athletes including disabled sports and the attitude for welcoming foreign guests. They are considered as the effective materials for promoting five values of OVEP especially “Respect for others” and” Joy of Effort”. In addition, especially in the one for high school, it seemed that MESC expected the young generations to promote the movement. In those days, almost 20 years after the WWII, Japanese people might have not familiar to communicate to foreigners. However, as stated in previous researches, Japan engaged to international community again as an opportunity to the Olympic Games. The “Olympic Kokumin-Undo” had contributed to cultivate the value of respect for foreigners and international understanding. Tokyo will host the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2020. This study should be precious and historical information for creating a new Olympic education program toward the Games. It is expected that the data would be utilized in the MEXT, the Tokyo Governmental office and the Tokyo Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games and Centre for Olympic Research and Education. And then, it leads to promote future Olympic movement internationally.