Why Japan Requires Judo, Kendo or Sumo in Schools

In most countries, learning to throw another student to the ground or strike them with a bamboo sword would be an unusual addition to a compulsory school curriculum. In Japan, since 2012, it has been mandatory: every junior high school student in the country is required to study either judo, kendo, or sumo as part of physical education, alongside more conventional options.

Are martial arts compulsory in Japanese schools? Yes. Since 2012, every junior high school student in Japan has been required to study judo, kendo, or sumo as part of physical education.

The policy is not simply about physical fitness. It reflects a specific, government-articulated belief about what martial arts training is supposed to teach students beyond athletic skill.

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A Return, Not a New Idea

Budo (martial ways) instruction was actually part of Japanese school physical education long before the 2012 mandate — it was a standard component of prewar and wartime physical education, closely tied to nationalist and militarist education at the time, before being banned entirely by Allied occupation authorities after Japan’s defeat in the Second World War, alongside broader occupation-era restrictions on martial arts and military-adjacent cultural practices.

Budo instruction was gradually permitted to return to Japanese schools in the postwar decades as an optional elective, but the 2012 curriculum reform, introduced under Japan’s Ministry of Education, made a martial art (chosen by each school from options generally including judo, kendo, and sumo) mandatory specifically for first-year junior high school students nationwide.

The Official Justification

Japan’s Ministry of Education has framed the mandatory budo requirement explicitly around character development rather than combat skill or even primarily athletic fitness — official curriculum guidance emphasizes budo’s capacity to teach respect for tradition, proper etiquette, self-discipline, and what the ministry describes as a correct attitude toward both victory and defeat.

This framing directly echoes the broader philosophy found throughout traditional dojo culture, in which etiquette and character development are treated as inseparable from technical martial training rather than a separate concern layered on top of it — the education ministry is, in effect, importing that same philosophy wholesale into compulsory public schooling for an entire national cohort of students, most of whom will never train in the art again after junior high school.

Judo’s Dominance in School Programs

Among the three main options, judo is by far the most commonly selected martial art in Japanese schools implementing the requirement, likely reflecting judo’s status as an Olympic sport, its comparatively lower equipment costs relative to full kendo armor, and the wide existing availability of qualified judo instructors within the national physical education teaching workforce.

This heavy tilt toward judo has meant the mandatory budo requirement functions, in practice, largely as a judo requirement for most Japanese students, with kendo and sumo representing meaningfully smaller shares of school implementation despite being formally equal options under the national guidelines.

Safety Concerns and Real Controversy

The mandatory judo requirement in particular has generated genuine safety controversy, since judo throws carry real injury risk, including documented cases of serious head and neck injuries and, in a number of tragic instances prior to and around the policy’s rollout, student deaths linked to judo instruction in Japanese schools — incidents that drew significant public attention and calls for improved teacher training and safety protocols specifically for school-based judo instruction.

In response, Japan’s education authorities and judo governing bodies have worked to strengthen instructor certification requirements and safety guidelines for school programs specifically, an ongoing effort to balance the policy’s character-education goals against the genuine physical risks of teaching a full-contact throwing art to students, many of whom have no prior martial arts experience, within standard school physical education class sizes and supervision levels.

What Most Students Actually Take From It

For the large majority of Japanese students who complete their mandatory budo unit and never train in judo, kendo, or sumo again afterward, the lasting impact is generally understood by education researchers as less about retained technical skill and more about direct, embodied exposure to specific etiquette and hierarchy patterns — bowing, respect for instructors and training partners, controlled emotional response to both success and failure — that echo throughout the rest of Japanese social and institutional life.

In this sense, the mandatory budo requirement functions as one more structured, government-designed touchpoint reinforcing values that Japanese students encounter repeatedly across many other contexts — school cleaning duties, structured group activities, senpai-kohai hierarchy — where the explicit lesson is nominally about something else, but the underlying training in discipline, hierarchy, and respectful conduct is doing real cultural work.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is martial arts training required in Japanese schools?

Yes, since a 2012 curriculum reform, Japanese junior high schools are required to teach a martial art, typically judo, kendo, or sumo, to first-year students as part of mandatory physical education.

Why does Japan require students to learn martial arts?

Japan’s Ministry of Education frames the requirement around character development, citing respect for tradition, etiquette, self-discipline, and a proper attitude toward victory and defeat, rather than primarily athletic or combat skill.

Which martial art do most Japanese schools teach?

Judo is the most commonly selected option among Japanese schools implementing the mandatory budo requirement, likely due to its Olympic status, lower equipment costs than kendo, and wider availability of qualified instructors.

Teaching Character Through the Body

Japan’s mandatory school budo requirement treats martial arts training as a legitimate, government-endorsed tool for teaching character and social conduct, not merely physical fitness — a policy choice that would be unusual in most other national education systems.

For students who never pursue judo, kendo, or sumo again after junior high school, the throws and strikes themselves may fade from memory quickly. The bowing, the etiquette, and the specific way the class handled winning and losing are, by design, meant to stick around considerably longer.

Why Japanese Schools Still Teach Judo or Kendo as Physical Education