History in the Making – Decolonizing in Japan: Leftist Zainichi Koreans in a Postimperial Society

How did Korean minorities pursue decolonization while remaining on their former colonizer’s soil after August 1945? Drawing on hundreds of interviews and archival research, this talk examines the political strategies of leftist Koreans in postwar Japan. In occupation-era Japan, the grassroots energy of Korean residents, the hostility of American and Japanese authorities, and the ideological magnetism of North Korea converged. Together, these forces propelled a majority of zainichi Koreans to construct a state-like organization and form a nation-like community within Japan’s borders. This movement became the central force shaping zainichi society’s internal dynamics while simultaneously (and paradoxically) reinforcing Japanese conservative hegemony. By centering these Korean experiences, we unlock critical new frameworks to examine postwar Japan, East Asia, and beyond.

Sayaka Chatani is Associate Professor in the Department of History at the National University of Singapore. She is a multilingual social historian of the Japanese Empire and its aftermath, focusing on ideological mobilization, emotions, and community dynamics. Her first book, Nation-Empire: Ideology and Rural Youth Mobilization in Japan and Its Colonies (Cornell University Press, 2018), compares the experiences of young men under imperial mobilization in the countryside of northern Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Okinawa. Her second book, A Nation Within: North Korean Zainichi in Postimperial Japan (Stanford University Press, 2026), delves into the internal dynamics of the North Korean zainichi community and proposes a new perspective to conceptualize “postimperial” Japan.

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