Kosaka Masaaki (高坂正顕)
Masaaki KOSAKA (January 23, 1900 - December 9, 1969) was a Japanese philosopher. He was an expert on Kantism. He was a member of the Kyoto school. Masataka KOSAKA, a specialist of international politics, is his second son.
Personal Profile
Masaaki KOSAKA was born in Nagoya City, Aichi Prefecture. After graduating from the former Daiyon (the Forth) High School, he enrolled at the Faculty of Letters at Kyoto University, where he studied under Kitaro NISHIDA.
Kosaka together with Keiji NISHITANI, Iwao KOYAMA, and Shigetaka SUZUKI are referred to as "the Big Four of the Kyoto school.'
On October 21, 2007, a report was discovered in the United States National Archives and Records Administration.
This record reveals the information manipulation activities conducted in Japan during the 1950's by the U.S. Information Service (USIS) which was concerned over the influence of communism on Japan. According to the report, the anti-communism campaign targeting the professors of Kyoto University was launched in 1952, whereby Shunjiro HATTORI, the president of Kyoto University, and the USIS Kobe office dispatched Kojiro YOSHIKAWA, a professor of literature, Masaaki KOSAKA, a professor of education, and others to the United States to train them as anticommunists. The report continues that after returning to Japan, those anti-communism professors kept in touch with the USIS and succeeded in curbing the influence of communism by taking control of each department. This officially proves that Kosaka was under the influence of the United States.
Brief Personal History
1923: Appointed as an assistant professor of Kyoto Prefectural University. 1936: Appointed assistant professor of Tokyo Liberal Arts and Science University (Currently, Tokyo University of Education). 1939: Appointed professor of Institute for Research in Humanities at Kyoto Imperial University. 1951: Appointed professor at the School of Humanities at Kansei Gakuin University. 1955: Appointed professor of the Faculty of Education at Kyoto University. 1961: Appointed president of Tokyo Gakugei University. 1967: Appointed head of the National Education Center.