science

Red Purge

Red Purge is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Red Purge rather than just read about it. In short: The Red Purge (Japanese: レッドパージ, Hepburn: reddo pāji) was an anticommunist movement in occupied Japan from the late 1940s to the early 1950s. Carried out by the Japanese government and private corporations with the aid and encouragement of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), the Red Purge saw tens of thousands of alleged members, supporters, or sympathizers of left-wing groups, especially those said…

Key takeaways

Red Purge belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Red Purge to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Red Purge from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Red Purge (Japanese: レッドパージ, Hepburn: reddo pāji) was an anticommunist movement in occupied Japan from the late 1940s to the early 1950s. Carried out by the Japanese government and private corporations with the aid and encouragement of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), the Red Purge saw tens of thousands of alleged members, supporters, or sympathizers of left-wing groups, especially those said to be affiliated with the Japanese Communist Party, removed from their jobs in government, the private sector, universities, and schools. The Red Purge emerged from rising Cold War tensions and the Red Scare after World War II, and was a significant element within a broader "Reverse Course" in Occupation policies. The Red Purge reached a peak following the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, began to ease after General Douglas MacArthur was replaced as commander of the Occupation by General Matthew Ridgway in 1951, and came to a final conclusion with the end of the Occupation in 1952.

Background

Surrender of Japan and early reforms

In August 1945, Imperial Japan surrendered to the Allied Powers. From September 1945 to April 1952, the United States occupied Japan and attempted to transform Japanese society from an authoritarian regime into a democracy. The Allies endeavored many ways to reform, including disarmament, dissolution of the Zaibatsu, granting of the freedom of speech, release of political prisoners, and enactment of the three labor laws to protect workers' rights: the trade union law, the labor standards law, and the labor relations adjustment law. To manage Japan under the Allies, MacArthur constituted the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, a management organization of about 2,000 U.S. officers, also commonly known as General Headquarters (GHQ). Because MacArthur had a huge influence on the people of Japan, GHQ/SCAP was also often used to refer to MacArthur and his bureaucrats rather than just the organization itself.

Political reform

On October 4, 1945, GHQ's Civil Information and Education Section composed the Civil Liberties Directive and ordered the Japanese government to abolish all laws and ordinances that restricted "freedom of thought, of religion, of assembly and of speech, including the unrestricted discussion of the Emperor, the Imperial Institution and the Imperial Japanese Government." Furthermore, SCAP commanded that all persons imprisoned under the designated laws must be released within a week, including many of these prisoners who were socialists or communists, and also specifically noted that the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) should be allowed become a legal political party again. Shortly afterward, many released communists and left-wing activists reorganized the JCP and held its first general assembly since 1926. Its membership grew rapidly, reaching 7,500 in 1946, 70,000 by 1947, and 150,000 in 1950. Based on the Potsdam Declaration, Douglas MacArthur sent to the Japanese government a document "Removal and Exclusion of Undesirable Personnel from Public Office" on 4 January 1946, which commanded the purge of war criminals and leaders of ultranationalist groups. This purge, which lasted until May 1948, later came to be referred to as the "White Purge" in comparison to the "Red Purge", and led to more than 900,000 people undergoing investigation, with more than 200,000 former career military personnel, politicians, bureaucrats, educators, and opinion leaders ultimately being purged.

Educational reform

During the occupation period, the United States took many methods to reform Japanese educational system, which was heavily influenced by militarism, imperial ideologies and central government. These methods included expanded years of compulsory education, textbook reform, and issuance of the Fundamental Law of Education in 1947. Marxism, especially Marxian economics, was widely spread within many universities during this period. Many Marxists and leftist scholars, who had been banned from teaching, were encouraged by SCAP to organize social activities and regarded as victims of the previous regime and progressive and democratic by many students.

Economic reform and labor movement

Japan was seriously devastated in World War II. Nonetheless, with the help of the United States, Japan quickly recovered from the suffering, earning the title of "Japanese Economic Miracle". In Japan, industrial production decreased in 1946 to 27.6% of the pre-war level, but recovered in 1951 and reached 350% in 1960. By the end of the American occupation of Japan in 1952, the United States successfully reintegrated Japan into the global economy to eliminate the motivation for imperial expansion and rebuilt the economic infrastructure that would later form the launching pad for the Japanese economic miracle.

However, rapid economy growth also brought shortcomings and inequalities for poorer and weaker class in the society, especially the workers. The struggle between the working class and the capitalists in Japan became progressively more intense as the reconstruction work progressed. Initially aiming at gaining control over the workplace, seeking better security and respect for the working class, the struggle later evolved into a social movement. The workers not only formed trade unions and developed all kinds of trade unionism and socialism, but also united with the communists, the peasants and the poor city people in their struggle. In addition, Japan's rapid economic development brought serious inflation. From September 1945 to August 1948, prices in Japan increased more than 700%, which later led to crucial unrest in the society. Under these reformations, activism and with the help of American authorities, nearly five million workers joined the labor movement by December 1946. At first, MacArthur was confident about labor movement because "working classes are the strongest single bulwark of the new democratic regime". The number of organized workers continued to grow, from 5 million in 1946 to 6.7 million by the end of 1948.

Cold War and the Reverse Course

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Red Purge

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Red Purge claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Red Purge before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Red Purge ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Red Purge

In research: Red Purge appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Red Purge in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Red Purge is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Anti-communism in Japan, Cold War terminology, Japanese Communist Party, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Red Purge outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Red Purge in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Red Purge means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Red Purge out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Red Purge in simple terms?

Why does Red Purge matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Red Purge?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Red Purge.