campaign

今日はブログっ子たちも採用試験（一次）のあとで，ポストするエネルギーがないようです。私自身も原稿の締め切りを明日に控え，まったく余裕のない一日でした（でも，どうも「延長」になりそうです...）。

大津市の「自殺練習」のいじめ事件には心が重いどころか，それを通り越した衝撃を受けています。

Police refuse father's complaints about bullies linked to son's suicide
OTSU

The father of a boy who committed suicide in Otsu, Shiga Prefecture, due to bullying was denied the opportunity to file a complaint about his son’s assailants.

The then 13-year-old boy committed suicide by jumping from the roof of an apartment building in October of last year, according to Fuji TV. The Shiga Prefecture Board of Eduction conducted a survey among the boy’s classmates, which suggested he had been the victim of a series of assaults and sustained campaign of bullying.

The father of the boy took the survey results and other evidence to the police in an attempt to lodge a complaint against his assailants, Fuji reported. However, the man said that Otsu police have refused to accept the complaint on three occasions, claiming that complaints cannot be lodged in the event that the victim is deceased and was not murdered. They also said the boy left no suicide note indicating what might have driven him to kill himself.
Otsu police say they plan to investigate the circumstances leading up to the boy’s death.

http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/police-refuse-fathers-complaints-about-bullies-who-prompted-sons-suicide

campaignは通常，「（選挙や販売などの）運動，勧誘，遊説，キャンペーン」，さらには「戦闘，戦役，作戦」という意味です。しかしながら，ここの用例には目を引かれました。英英でみると，"An operation or series of operations energetically pursued to accomplish a purpose"とあります（The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language）。どうも元々，「開けた土地」という意味だったものが軍事用語となり，さらに一般に転用されて，政治，社会，販売などの分野で，「ある目的を達成するために組織的な運動」を繰り広げるときに使われるようになったようです（そしておそらく、日本語では「いじめ事件」といっても差し支えがないのかもしれません）。

こんなときに役に立つFarlex Trivia Dictionary を見ますと；
campaign - First meant an open tract of land, from Latin campus, "level ground," and the change to a military meaning came from troops "taking the field"—moving from fortress or town to open country—from which the political sense evolved, referring to the organized efforts of office-seekers to sway public opinion or influence their vote at an upcoming election.

とありますが、残念ながら現代的な意味でのcampaignには対応できていないような気がします。それにしても一連のいじめ行為にこのcampaignが使われるようになったこと自体，やはり驚きです。（UG）