Hello Dr Riggs,
I am very pleased to welcome you as a member of this forum and look forward to some good discussions in the future.
From all I have read of Morihei Ueshiba, I wonder how seriously he thought about the question of budo organizations. I am sure he thought they were necessary in some vague way and the Kobukan became the Zaidan Hojin Kobukai (a tax-free foundation) quite early on. But I doubt whether he saw his art in these terms.
This thread is called the 'Flavours of Aikido' and in my opinion, all the flavours were pretty well formed when Morihei Ueshiba was still alive. The increasing antagonism between K Tohei and K Ueshiba occurred and flourished under his very nose and he appears to have done little to stop it. Much earlier on, there was a love-hate relationship with Noriaki Inoue, and this became a split after the second Omoto Incident in 1935. Minoru Hirai came to M Ueshiba as a budoka in his own right and did not stay with him for very long. Mr Farmer has mentioned M Ueshiba's relationship with Minoru Mochizuki, and, though he was attached to the Aikikai until well into the sixties, Kenji Tomiki increasingly went his own way not long after he was repatriated soon after the war. The only mutually amicable split appears to have been with the Yoshinkai and this is reflected in its present relationship with the Aikikai.
I have done nowhere near enough research on the matter, but I think it is received wisdom in some quarters that Kano Jigoro tried to make a new start and end the progressive fragmentation of martial arts that developed in Tokugawa / Meiji, as each master sought for a distinctive mark for his own ryuha.
Why the tendency to fragmentation in the Japanese martial arts? I do not know, but I would point out that the tendency to form 'habatsu' (small groups always centred around a prominent figure, sometimes called factions), has been pretty endemic in Japanese culture from well before the Tokugawa period. This tendency governs the decision-making process in my own university and also lies behind the stagnation in Japanese politics at present. The writings of Chie Nakane discuss this to some extent.
Some have suggested that it is a mark of tribalism, and aikido organizations do seem to bear the marks of tribes in some sense. There is a strong awareness of historical origins (always correctly interpreted), a strong sense of relying on elders, a strong sense or mutual solidarity, of the need to keep the 'true faith' and to be true to the collective ideals of the tribe.
I think that Kisshomaru Ueshiba acted against this tendency and thus the Aikikai after the war became a repository of quite different ways of training. Initially at least, K Ueshiba led from behind and tried to be a different Doshu from his father. I believe the split with K Tohei was a major scourge for him. It is interesting that the IAF was created immediately after this split.
Best regards,
Peter Goldsbury,
Forum Administrator,
Hiroshima, Japan