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Differentiating SEALDs from Freeters, and Precariats: the politics of youth movements in contemporary Japan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Robin O'Day
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As a student movement, SEALDs (Students Emergency Action for Liberal Democracy) is often compared with the ANPO student movements of the 1960s and 1970s by media, outside observers, and the members themselves. The comparison is obvious since SEALDs has been able to politically mobilize large numbers of youth to a degree so far unseen since the AMPO period, and both movements are concerned, at least in part, with security treaties with the United States and Japan's global role. Yet, SEALDs is also contrasted with, and works hard to distinguish itself from ANPO in an effort to differentiates itself from this legacy. While it is valuable to compare SEALDs with the student activism of ANPO, it is also import to recognize SEALDs positioning within the broader social movement scene in contemporary Japan.

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Research Article
Information
Asia-Pacific Journal , Volume 13 , Issue 37 , September 2015 , e2
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
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Copyright © The Authors 2015

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