Author: Miguel Zulaica y Mugica, Institut für Allgemeine Erziehungswissenschaft und Berufspädagogik (Department of General and Vocational Education), Technische Universität Dortmund (Dortmund University) - ResearchGate

Abstracts:
- »The article deals with a conflict in the politics of memory about the “Comfort-Women”-Statue, whose official title is Statue of Peace. The focus is on the attempts to erect the statue in Germany and the diplomatic interference that accompanied these attempts. The thesis is pursued that this conflict reveals a fundamental misunderstanding in the horizon of a national politics of memory, in which the difference between civil society controversies and state-organized collective memories is hidden. My suggestion is that the statue can be interpreted in terms of a transnational content in consideration of its civil society dimension. It is argued that the transnational content lies in emancipation from the taboo of sexualized violence.« (Source: Article)

- »Miguel Zulaica y Mugica once again takes up the controversial topic of the euphemistically named “comfort women” and also asks about the possibilities of overcoming national antagonisms. He takes as his starting point the diplomatic conficts between South Korea and Japan that took place in Germany on the occasion of the erections of the so-called Statue of Peace in German cities. These statues are meant to commemorate both the forced prostitution system organized by the Japanese military during the Asia–Pacifc War and the breaking of silence by the women involved in the 1990s. Zulaica y Mugica recapitulates the numerous argumentative references to the historical factuality of the forced prostitution system as well as the objections and reinterpretations from the historical revisionist side and elaborates the problematic of the national and moral polarization of the discourse. In the political battles over memory, the statues serve as a proxy for the question of the responsibility of Japanese politics before 1945, which is stylized as a question of national recognition and honor. In this context, Zulaica y Mugica points to the danger of antagonistic discourse constellations and memory politics understood in identitarian terms, which are used by conservative and right-wing nationalist groups, and through which both the civil society controversies in Japan, Korea, and Germany about memory and history are hidden and their differences to state-organized collective memories. He proposes as an alternative to these “history struggles” to consider the transnational content of the statues, namely the emancipation of women from patriarchal memory cultures through the verbalization of sexualized war violence. On the one hand, this transnational content allows critical conclusions to be drawn about Germany’s reluctance to come to terms with the Wehrmacht brothels and forced military prostitution during World War II. On the other hand, the examination of how sexualized violence has been discussed offers learning potential, so that discursively anchored memory policies regarding the role of women and inequalities of the value of life can be refected upon« (Source: Wigger, Lothar, et al. »Remembrance—Responsibility—Reconciliation. New Challenges for Education in Germany and Japan. Introduction.« Remembrance – Responsibility – Reconciliation: Challenges for Education in Germany and Japan. Edited by Lothar Wigger et al. Berlin 2022: 8)

Contents:

	Abstract (p. 125)
	1 Introduction (p. 125)
	2 The Statue of Peace and Its Symbolism (p. 127)
	3 The Statue of Peace in Germany. A Reconstruction (p. 128)
	4 The “Comfort Women” Issue and Its Historical Background (p. 130)
	5 Struggles Over the Interpretation of the Statue of Peace in the Politics of Memory (p. 133)
	6 Final Consideration (p. 137)
	Bibliography (p. 138)

Wikipedia: History of Asia: History of Japan / Shōwa era | History of Asia: History of Korea / Korea under Japanese rule | History of Europe: History of Germany | Memorial: Works about comfort women / Statue of Peace | Prostitution: Forced prostitution / Comfort women | Sex and the law: Wartime sexual violence / Wartime sexual violence in World War II | War: Pacific War / Japanese war crimes