Rethinking the Intersection between the New Left and Disability Activism: From Revolution to Liberation 山口和紀 障害学国際セミナー2025

以下は、障害学国際セミナーのために山口が事務局に送付した要旨。もしかすると変更の可能性ありますので、暫定版として掲載。
要旨は下記の障害学国際セミナーのページからリンクされると思います。

Cf. https://www.arsvi.com/a/20251025-26.htm

本報告に関する情報は本ホームページのこの頁にまとめてみています。
「障害者運動から障害学へ」　https://colevi.jp/archives/2107

とくに下記の事例を検討の題材にしたいと思っています。
◇山口和紀. (2025). 障害者運動と新左翼運動の一接点: 華青闘告発がもたらした影響の再検討. Core ethics, 21, 253-265.
https://www.r-gscefs.jp/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/21_%E5%B1%B1%E5%8F%A3%E5%92%8C%E7%B4%80%E6%A7%98%EF%BC%88%E8%AB%96%E6%96%87%EF%BC%89.pdf

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Rethinking the Intersection between the New Left and Disability Activism: From Revolution to Liberation

邦題：ニューレフト運動と障害者運動との接点の再考：「革命から解放へ」史論

KAZUNORI Yamaguchi
Graduate Student, Graduate School of Core Ethics & Frontier Sciences

This presentation examines how the Japanese New Left shaped the disability movement and how these links affected, or did not affect, the start of disability studies. It builds on my earlier research and reviews the idea that, after 1968, the New Left “broke apart” into minority struggles, such as those of women, ethnic groups, and people with disabilities. This idea, often called the “1968 paradigm shift,” is described as a move from the dream of revolution to the search for liberation. I ask how true this story is, and how disability activism adopted, reshaped, or resisted New Left ideas. I also show differences in how disability studies began in Japan, Britain, and the United States.

One case I focus on is the Kansai “Shōgaisha” Liberation Committee, which began after the Kaseitō statement of July 7, 1970. In that event, the Overseas Chinese Youth Struggle Committee criticized Japanese New Left groups for ignoring discrimination and immigration issues. Scholars such as Hidemi Suga and Eiji Oguma see this as a turning point when the idea of “substitutionism”—that others could fight on behalf of minorities—was rejected, and minorities began to speak and act for themselves. This moment foreshadowed the later slogan, “Nothing about us, without us.” I look at how disabled activists engaged with, transformed, or resisted New Left ways of thinking during this shift.

The findings show both links and tensions between the New Left and disability activism. New Left culture gave tools and energy for campaigns against institutions and discrimination. But activists with disabilities often distrusted political parties and the New Left as a whole, and stressed autonomy and self-representation. This mix of adopting and resisting New Left ideas shows how independence and subjectivity, central to many 1970s minority movements, were worked out in disability struggles.

In conclusion, the “1968 paradigm shift” is only partly correct. The disability movement cannot be separated from the legacy of the New Left. The stress on disabled people’s own voices grew in conversation with New Left debates and later helped shape Japanese disability studies. The path goes beyond activism, showing a move from New Left activism to disability activism, and from activism to scholarship. By following this shift, we see how debates about representation and autonomy entered the academic field, while leaving open tensions that remain as future research tasks.

This study stresses that its goal is not only to examine disability activism and disability studies, but also to trace ties between the New Left and both movements. This approach adds to the history of Japanese social movements and highlights cross-national comparisons. In the United States and Europe, New Left groups often supported disability rights, but in East Asia such ties were weaker. This gap shows why re-examining the Japanese case is important. Looking again at this path helps us rethink the history of disability studies, not only as tied to political changes of the late 1960s and 1970s, but also shaped by academic developments in the 1980s and 1990s.

(500words)