1970s Japan in Three Acts: Spectacles, Shockwaves, and Transformations

Free Talk Event
march 14, 2025

The 1970s was an era of tumultuous transformation in Japan. The decade started in grand fashion with the opening of the Osaka World Exposition in March 1970. With its exuberant theme of “Progress and Harmony for Mankind,” the expo encapsulated Japan’s rebirth from a war-defeated nation to a global economic superpower. Inspired by this optimistic vision, millions of Japanese thronged to see the wonders of the Expo with its futuristic pavilions and cutting-edge technology. But what was Japanese reality like beyond the dreamland of the expo? And, what future awaited the Japanese people in the 1970s?

In this presentation we journey from the dazzling spaces of the expo to a Japan on the brink of monumental change. Throughout this decade the Japanese people would be shocked and mesmerised by sensational events, nerve-wracking crises, and tantalising new cultural trends. Until the 70s, utopian narratives like “economic growth” and “political revolution” had ruled supreme. But in the 1970s these modernist visions began to collapse. The new world was all about feelings, fashions, and phobias. It was about baby boomers, blue jeans, Big Macs, narcissistic novelists, and toilet-paper panics. And for the Japanese, things would never be the same.

After the talk, there will be a fun Osaka Expo quiz and some Myaku Myaku prizes*!

*Prizes are given to onsite attendees only.

Topics to be covered

The Osaka Expo and its message of “Progress” and “Harmony”
The story of Komatsu Sakyo – involved in planning expo, also the author of Japan Sinks
The early 1970s as a moment of crisis – the Oil Shocks and toilet paper panics
The 1970s as the end of grand narratives like “progress” and “revolution” and the appearance of new challenges and shocks (student radicals, Mishima Yukio, economic shocks etc.)
The 1970s as an era of image, feeling, fashion, and consumption (McDonalds, cup noodles, blue jeans, etc.)

PROF SIMON AVENELL

Simon Avenell is a professor at the Australian National University. He focuses on modern Japan, with a particular interest in the social, political, and intellectual history of the postwar era. His books include Making Japanese Citizens (California, 2010), Transnational Japan in the Global Environmental Movement (Hawaii, 2017), and Asia and Postwar Japan: Deimperialization, Civic Activism, and National Identity (Harvard, 2022). His new book, A History of Postwar Japan: Recovery, Prosperity, and Transformation, will be published in mid-2025 by the University of Hawaii Press. He is currently working on a project about youth and generational change in contemporary Japan.

This is the second day of the talk event, The Osaka Expo and 1970s Japan: Pavilions, Punchlines, and Pandemonium.