The Formulation and Decision, Screening, and Terminationof the Purge Directives

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This research aims to clarify the process of formulating, screening, and terminating the purge directives, SCAPIN-550 (Removal and Exclusion of Undesirable Personnel from Public Office) ans SCAPIN-548 (Abolition of Certain Political Parties, Associations, Societies and Other Organizations) which MacArthus's GHQ on January 4, 1946 ordered the Japanese government to execute. Despite the decisiveness of the purge in the demilitarization and democratization of Japan in the post-war period, this has hardly been studied in Japan or in the UNited States.There appeared three characteristics in the formulation-process: firstly, that SAPIN-550 was gradually recognized as being more important, especially for the coming election, than SCAPIN-548 although the former seemed to be subordinated to the latter in the beginning. Secondly, there appeared many differences between the purge in Germany and in Japan in the final stage, although the purge policy in Japan originally followed the German example. And finally,the original, severe policy towards ultranationalists was gradually moderated by internal politics in GHQ, as seen by the decreasing number of purgees and of organizations, except the range of military offecers.With the purge directives, which the Japanese were forced to execute after February, 1946, two hundred-thousand Japanese were eventually removed and excluded from public office until March, 1948. However, after the termination of the purge, the Japanese government gradually dissolved the purgees under the cold war and finally the peace treaty with Japan brought the purge to end in April, 1952.