Japan After 3.

11
A Comparative Analysis of Human and State Security Issues
Regarding Post-Fukushima Nuclear Restart Decisions
Prepared by
Jorel Chan

"Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.

Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less."
Marie Curie

Japan After 3.11

Contents
Abbreviations ................................................................................................................ 2
Background and Objectives .......................................................................................... 3
Research Methodology ................................................................................................. 4
Introduction ................................................................................................................... 5
Human Security: Concerns of the Japanese People ...................................................... 8
The Basis for Fear: Historical Origin of Radiation Paranoia from Hiroshima ......... 9
The Consequence of Fear: Humanitarian Challenges in Fukushima ...................... 12
Preliminary Policy Proposition ............................................................................... 15
State Security: Interests of the Japanese Government ................................................ 17
Domestic Political Economy: The Inertia of the Nuclear Village .......................... 18
International Security: Interstate Relations and Japans Sovereignty ..................... 21
Final Revised Policy Proposition ............................................................................ 25
Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 30
Appendix..................................................................................................................... 33
Bibliography ............................................................................................................... 36

Japan After 3.11

Abbreviations

ANRE

Agency for Natural Resources and Energy

DPJ

Democratic Party of Japan

IAEA

International Atomic and Energy Agency

ICRP

International Commission on Radiological

Protection

LDP

Liberal Democratic Party

METI

Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry

MLIT

Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and

Tourism

MOE

Ministry of the Environment

MOF

Ministry of Finance

MOFA

Ministry of Foreign Affairs

NISA

Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency

NRA

Nuclear Regulation Authority

NSC

Nuclear Safety Commission

TEPCO

Tokyo Electric Power Company

UNDP

United Nations Development Programme

UNSCEAR

United Nations Scientific Committee on the

Effects of Atomic Radiation

Japan After 3.11

Background and Objectives

Written three years after 3.11, this paper aims to present a

comparative analysis of both human security concerns and state
security interests after the 3.11 Fukushima disaster, arguing against
a total shutdown and decommission of nuclear plants in Japan, and
proposing a policy involving nuclear restarts justified on grounds
of state security and which likewise takes into account human
security issues correspondingly.

Japan After 3.11

Research Methodology

In addition to the various books, journals, articles, official

reports and other academic sources used for research, an
independent fact-finding humanitarian mission was undertaken in
the summer of 2014 to the different parts of Japan affected by the
3.11 disaster. For the sake of brevity, the relevant research obtained
during this trip which are referenced in this paper includes: a
research presentation by Professor Tanigaki Minoru of Kyoto
Research Reactor Institute and two interviews conducted with Ms.
Yui Hamada of Nozomi Center and with Ms. Minako Takahashi of
Fukushima Matsushimaya Ryokan. Excerpts can be found in the
appendix. Full original audio tapes, transcriptions and translations
are available upon request.

Japan After 3.11

I
Introduction

More than three years since the 3.11 earthquake and tsunami
struck off the Pacific coast of Japan, the aftershocks of the
Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Plant Incident are still being felt.
While infrastructural recovery has been steadily underway for
those hit by the natural disasters, the present situation for those
refugees affected by the nuclear disaster remains bleak, their
uncertainties only exacerbating with each passing year. Yet, at this
point in time, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is already
taking concrete steps to begin restarting nuclear plants, which had
all been shut down after the disaster, in order to alleviate energy
demands of the worlds third largest economy. Now, presented
with such a stark contrast in humanitarian circumstances and state
action, one would almost be compelled to question whether the
Japanese government has truly learnt anything from the 3.11
disaster. Hence, in order to understand the policy decisions that
need to be made at this juncture, this paper seeks to present a
comparative analysis between human security concerns and state
security interests, investigating what each of them specifically
entail in the context of Japan, and through their fundamentally
crucial relationship state security as guarantor of the imperative
pursuit for human security critically examine if differences in
their respective visions can ultimately be reconciled in a
consolidated and negotiated policy response.
Human Security as an Imperative:
Freedom from Fear and Disaster Recovery
Regarding human security approaches, the final policy
proposition of this paper focuses on achieving two main elements
according to the 1994 UNDP Human Development Report (HDR),
namely: (1) human security is easier to ensure through early
prevention than later intervention, and (2) human security is
people-centred (UNDP 1994: 22-3). Recognising that the role of
the state is to be responsible for its citizens lives, the idea of
people-centredness grounds human security as an imperative goal
5

Japan After 3.11

to which all democratic governments must endeavour. With this in

mind, we begin our examination by employing HDRs freedom
from fear (UNDP 1994: 24) strategy, with fear in this case defined
relevantly for the 3.11 context. By identifying the basis for fear as
radiation paranoia due to the publics unscientific
misunderstanding between nuclear energy technologies and nuclear
weapon consequences, a misunderstanding which originated from
a historical conflation with pacifism ever since the Hiroshima and
Nagasaki atomic bombings, it appears that an anti-nuclear policy to
decommission all nuclear plants would seem to be an effective
preventive measure. However, when we consider the context of
Japan now after 3.11 where human security breaches have already
occurred, resulting in psychological and sociological problems
constituting the disaster recovery challenges presently faced by
refugees, we recognise that achieving human security requires not
only prevention but also immediate intervention, hereby
elucidating the insufficiency of such anti-nuclear policy.
State Security as a Guarantor:
Domestic Politics and Structural Realism
Yet, the insufficiency of anti-nuclear policy is not reason
enough to abrogate it; we need to argue for its impossibility. The
inverse decision in favour of nuclear restarts is argued on grounds
of first requiring a guarantor for human security, of which state
security provides and will be, in this paper, best explained via a
structural realist approach. Realism proves too simplistic in this
case as it does not understand that policy is the outcome of a
complex political process; therefore structural realism is required
to emphasise structural factors whilst allowing for their mediation
through domestic political processes (Kitchen 2010: 118). By
looking at the domestic political structure of the nuclear village in
Japan which involves both powerful non-state actors such as pronuclear energy firms with the capabilities to influence state policy,
as well as the incumbent state administrators in place that stabilises
a complex bureaucratic structure that resists significant policy
overhaul, we understand that this constitutes the national system
of political economy (Gilpin 2001: 18) upon which Japanese
economic and security policies then hinge. Accordingly, emerging
as an outcome of international structure, domestic factors and of a
complex interaction between the two (Liu and Zhang 2006),
Japans foreign policy seeks to maximise capabilities within the
6

Japan After 3.11

regional security configuration with the US against Chinas rise,

and minimise constraints by leveraging on Kenji Gotos death to
justify greater trade with Middle East export partners while
diversifying energy sources, policies of which are all made
possible through nuclear technology and restarts, for the sake of
state security.
Guarantor of the Imperative
In the Commission on Human Security (CHS), it is
acknowledged that human security reinforces state security but
does not replace it (CHS 2003: 4-6), yet it does not mean that
human security is of any less importance. Without a sovereign state
to belong to, we may not have the chance to even speak of human
security issues; but without always concerning ourselves with the
ordinary individual, our relentless pursuit for statehood would be
pyrrhic at best. State security is the means to which human security
is an ends that all governments ought to seek; state security is the
fundamental guarantor of the chief imperative pursuit for human
security. Hence, even while choosing to restart nuclear plants for
the sake of state security, human security strategies still can and
ought to be pursued to prevent public fears, mitigate present
humanitarian challenges and reduce disaster risk of future
vulnerabilities in Japan. It is to this end that we begin our first
investigations into human security.

Japan After 3.11

II
Human Security: Concerns of the
Japanese People

In this chapter, we shall be investigating the human security

concerns within the context of Fukushima via the theoretical
framework of UNDPs freedom from fear concept. Before we can
begin to analyse the policy rationale behind the decision to shut
down nuclear plants, we need to begin by identifying the
imperative need of pursuing freedom from fear to achieve human
security for the people. The chapter hence begins by first
addressing this primary overarching question: why is there a need
to free these people from fear? To this end, we proceed to unpack
the relevant justifications by examining what exactly this notion of
fear comprises in this nuclear discourse, and consequently, what
ramifications this fear has on human security such that it warrants
policy action that is aimed at providing the people with a freedom
from fear.
This is rephrased into the two secondary questions that
sequentially structure our arguments in this chapter: firstly, what is
the basis for this fear prevalent in Fukushima? This section will
argue that the genesis of this radiation paranoia can be traced
historically to the Hiroshima atomic bombings, and that the pursuit
of freedom from fear is imperative because this radiation
paranoia has been falsely correlated with pacifist political agenda,
resulting in scientifically unfounded beliefs prevalent amongst the
Japanese public.
Recognising such prevalence of radiation paranoia in
Fukushima, we then ask secondly, what are the consequences of
fear in the affected local and refugee communities? We shall argue
that such consequences on health security are psychological rather
than biological, resulting in present and immediate disaster
recovery challenges such as psychiatric disorders and social
problems. Precisely then, because the basis of fear is unnecessary,
and its consequences urgent, the imperative to pursue a disaster
8

Japan After 3.11

recovery strategy as well as freedom from fear is justified in

order to achieve human security.
With this framework of justifications in place, we can now
proceed to analyse whether or not the anti-nuclear decision is
indeed an appropriate policy to achieve freedom from fear. The
fundamental argument for human security here is as follows: the
presence of nuclear plants is a cause for fear for the people in Japan,
so if we eliminate the object of fear through a policy of keeping
nuclear plants shut down, it follows that there will be no more risk
of nuclear disasters and the people will be free from radiation fear,
thereby achieving human security. While logically valid as an
argument, this policy action is nonetheless problematic as this
limits the consideration of other policy possibilities to which
freedom from fear can be achieved as well, but more importantly,
as will constitute our next main argument in the succeeding chapter,
the fact that the inverse policy that is, of restart nuclear plants is
fundamental as guarantor for the state to even pursue human
security policies.

The Basis for Fear:

Historical Origin of Radiation Paranoia from Hiroshima
In this section, we shall argue for a freedom from fear
strategy as part of achieving human security, because the basis of
such fear, prevalent amongst the Japanese people throughout
modern Japanese history, is deeply entrenched in pacifist antinuclear political agenda and is fundamentally also scientifically
unfounded. These shall be examined by looking at the 1945 atomic
bombings, an important political event which had set the precedent
accordingly for pacifist political interests against nuclear weapons
to be mixed in and often conflated with other forms of non-hostile
nuclear activities such as nuclear reactors; this constitutes an
equivocation because of differences between relevant vested
interests as well as the respective technologies behind nuclear
weapon proliferation and nuclear power usage. Hence, by
undiscerningly superimposing the radiation consequences from the
aftermath of nuclear bombings onto the effects of a nuclear plant
meltdown such as in the case of Fukushima, we realise that the
present paranoia in Fukushima is a product of historically political
and scientific misinformation.

Japan After 3.11

Anti-nuclear Movements and Political Pacifism

As the first and only usage of nuclear weapons for warfare in
modern world history since, the 1945 atomic bombings of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which marked the end of WWII and took
hundreds of thousands of Japanese lives, played a key role in
ushering in modern Japan, with its unique Peace Constitution
which was to see the rebirth of Japan out of destruction (Momose
2010: 117), eventually serving as the historical cornerstone and
precursor of its anti-nuclear pacifism (Kim 2008: 61). While these
worldwide anti-nuclear pacifist movements have greatly
contributed towards international nuclear arms disarmament efforts
(Wittner 2004), the coalescent nature of anti-nuclear politics
together with political pacifism, while complementary during the
Cold War when nuclear holocaust was a real possibility, meant also
that the pursuit of both ideals of world peace and a nuclear-free
world was often articulated in tandem; this eventually became
problematic as the international political situation changed.
Especially ever since Eisenhowers historic call to facilitate the
development of peaceful use of atomic power (Eisenhower 1953)
and the subsequent formation of IAEA, there was to be observed
an eventual divergence between pacifism and anti-nuclear agenda;
governments had begun shifting their interests to pursue nuclear
power away from military or traditional security purposes towards
peacetime economic and energy infrastructural development.
However, due to the sensitivity of classified government
intelligence which had surrounded nuclear-related information
during the Cold War, such technical distinctions between nuclear
weaponry and nuclear power generation had not been adequately
explained to the public masses and grassroots, of which antinuclear pacifist movements generally comprise. Radiation fears,
associated with the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
that resulted in many lives lost in the immediate explosive
detonation and more due to subsequent radiation poisoning, had
been conflated by grassroots anti-nuclear activists with the
Fukushima disaster, which had no detonation and has yet to result
in subsequent radiation-related deaths. Around the world,
Hiroshima and Nagasaki are constantly re-remembered, but now
through the prism of Fukushima (Mackie 2015), albeit
inaccurately, only because both equivocally involve radiation but
employ very different intent and methods of utilising nuclear
energy. What had originally been a clarion call for a nuclear free10

Japan After 3.11

world originating from a fear of nuclear weaponry that has

intentionally caused deaths, has quietly rebranded itself to
condemn a peacetime incident that has no lethal intent nor claimed
any lives, but which ironically is at present seeing an escalating
refugee death toll precisely because of this conflated condemnation
that has resulted in the perpetuation of severe misinformation and
radiation paranoia in Fukushima.
The Hiroshima Syndrome and Unscientific Beliefs
Having explained that the contextual differences between
Hiroshima and Fukushima are legitimate and that the beliefs about
radiation harboured by the public is truly misinformed, it would be
remiss for us to merely state that the public is wrong by sole virtue
of differences existing; we need to examine how exactly they are
different through the provision of empirical scientific justifications
for our case. Aptly termed the Hiroshima Syndrome, we examine
two main scientifically untenable beliefs of this radiation paranoia
that (1) nuclear power is explosive and therefore any nuclearrelated facility has the possibility of a nuclear detonation, and (2)
nuclear power plant releases are the same as nuclear weapon
fallout (Corrice 2015a).
The first misinformation premise pertains to public
knowledge that both cases use highly reactive radioactive material,
leading to the fear that nuclear explosions can occur in any nuclear
facility. However, while the material used in the radioactive chain
reactions may be similar, concentrations are vastly different.
Uranium-235 used in weapons production are highly concentrated
to about 90%, allowing fissions to sustain a chain reaction, but
those in reactors are diluted to contain less than 5% (WNA 2014),
so fissions operate in conditions where a chain reaction is not
sustained; reactor fuels hence are technically too dilute to result in
any nuclear explosion, even in unexpected natural disasters.
Similarly, the explosion at Fukushima Dai-ichi Unit 3 was
arguably not a nuclear explosion but a steam explosion due to a
malfunctioned build-up of hydrogen gas (WNA 2015). Due to the
fundamental technical architecture of nuclear reactors, the public
fear that nuclear explosions like those at Hiroshima can occur in
nuclear plants is necessarily untrue.

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Japan After 3.11

The second misinformation premise pertains to public

knowledge that radiation is released into the atmosphere in both
nuclear weapon explosion and nuclear reactor malfunction, leading
to the fear that the constituents of such releases are similar.
However, a nuclear explosion is dangerous because its detonation
releases the high amounts of gamma rays and neutrons that makes
the surrounding dust particles radioactive and causes what is
known as a fallout (Corrice 2015b), but due to a lack of
detonation, nuclear reactors mostly only release alpha and beta
particles which, while dangerous when ingested, only travel a few
meters and can be stopped by clothing (NRC 2014). Once again,
using scientific technical knowledge, we know that the fear that the
Fukushima disaster could cause widespread radiation as in
Hiroshima is necessarily unfounded.
Summary
The basis for fear can be traced back to Hiroshima, where
anti-nuclear and pacifist concerns have been equivocated, leading
to a misrepresented superimposition of beliefs from the aftermath
witnessed of nuclear weaponry onto a malfunction of peaceful
nuclear energy production. Such misinformed beliefs can be
attributed to a fundamental lack of public scientific information
about the differences in technical architecture and constitutive
radioactive elements between nuclear weapons and nuclear plants.
Having now established that radiation paranoia is prevalent
amongst the public and yet scientifically unfounded, we proceed to
argue that the urgent disaster recovery challenges at hand that is
currently claiming lives in Fukushima stems from this unnecessary
fear of radiation, rather than the radiation itself.

The Consequence of Fear:

Humanitarian Challenges in Fukushima
As a result of radiation paranoia being a human security
issue, disaster recovery challenges from such a security breach in
Fukushima comprise not so much of physical or biological health
concerns pertaining to radiation, but the psychological and
sociological well-being of survivors and refugees in humanitarian
communities. The governments physical evacuation and
containment measures may have kept people safe from the
physical effects of radiation but not from the psychological
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impacts (Brumfiel 2013: 290); in fact, evacuation may have in

turn led to more complex humanitarian consequences, not unlike
the hibakusha (disaster survivors) of Hiroshima. It will be argued
that such psychological and sociological consequences on
Fukushima victims have been exacerbated due to radiation
paranoia on the part of the government, the collective public and
the refugees themselves.
Consequences of the Governments Radiation Fear
As with the hibakusha who fled Hiroshima after its
destruction, the Fukushima evacuees too experienced severe shock
from losing their sense of home. Due to the alleged severity of
the Fukushima disaster and the prompt and large-scale government
evacuation response, hundreds of thousands of locals have left their
hometowns, with more than 100,000 refugees still remaining in
kasetsu (temporary housings) situated outside evacuated zones
(Fukuleaks 2014). These abrupt relocation measures have caused
transfer trauma (WNA 2015) due to the forced move of the
elderly from hospitals and homes, and have put immense
sociological stress on familial relationships due to space constraints
in the kasetsu that have resulted in families members being divided,
causing them to live separately (Maruyama 2015: 113). Moreover,
with the loss of their original community, it follows that there is
naturally a subsequent loss in the refugees own livelihood as well.
Refugees have been reported to be suffering from spiritual fatigue
brought on by having to reside in shelters (WNA 2015) because
they are unable to make concrete long-term plans for their future in
terms of employment or education due to the temporary nature of
these housings arrangements. Regardless of radioactive biohazard,
the very evacuation to kasetsu itself has resulted in a whole host of
sociological and psychological problems for refugees.
Consequences of the Publics Radiation Fear
For those from Fukushima who have not been evacuated officially
by the government but have chosen to relocate to other towns,
there have been cases of public discrimination. Similar to the
hibakusha who, treated like social pariahs (Jacobs 2014), were
declined jobs for fear of contamination or rejected by marriage
partners for fear of malformed children, the Fukushima refugees
face similar discrimination as well, with the children of evacuated
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Japan After 3.11

families becoming victims of bullying at schools, cars with

Fukushima license plates scratched (Heath 2013: 71-73) and new
refugees being confronted by old locals to leave their towns (Japan
Times 2013). With these hindrances from assimilating into their
new environment, no friends, jobs or schooling, many have
developed acute social withdrawal symptoms (Ballas 2011). As a
result of the prevalent fear of radiation amongst the public in towns
that are safe but seeing an influx of refugees, public discrimination
has resulted in psychological anxieties amongst the victims.
Consequences of the Refugees Radiation Fear
Even individually, because of the invisible and imperceptible
nature of radiation, refugees suffer from perpetual uncertainty as to
whether or not they would eventually contract radiation sickness,
with every physical symptom such as fever or skin irritation
causing chronic worry, as experienced by the hibakusha after
escaping Hiroshima as well. The crux of this issue is not so much
whether empirical data shows radiation levels are sufficiently high
which contrariwise, actually is not, according to international
scientific experts (IAEA 201: 9; UNSCEAR 2013: 10; WHO 2013:
8) but their individual psychological belief, exacerbated by the
stringent hospital treatment procedures required (AFP 2011), that
makes them assume the radiation is lethal. This has resulted in the
rise in individual anxiety and stress-related disorders amongst
refugees, where, in a psychiatric survey conducted, adults showed
signs of extreme stress and mental trauma (Brumfiel 2013: 291),
resulting in many developing into depression and in some cases,
even suicide (CNN 2012). These are but instances of indirect
deaths that have already overtaken those killed in the earthquake
and tsunami, signalling a great urgency to tackle this disaster
recovery challenge and eliminate radiation paranoia.
Summary
At this point of writing, there have been no reports of
anybody dying from radiation due to the Fukushima incident.
However, being unable to return to their homes, scattered in
evacuations centres, facing discrimination and confrontations from
society, and constantly worrying over their own personal biological
health, a growing number of evacuees are ironically developing
mental health problems, with many dying from anxiety, from
14

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suicide or from simply losing the will to live (BBC 2014). Due to
this history of stigmatisation dating back to the atomic bombs
(Economist 2012) being perpetuated into what is treated as merely
another iteration of Hiroshima when the reality is that both are
vastly different, the human security issues in Fukushima have
become increasingly more complex, involving radiation paranoia
that has resulted in human security breaches that need to be
urgently tackled through disaster recovery in order to achieve
freedom from fear.

Preliminary Policy Proposition

Having explained that human security challenges ultimately
stem from radiation paranoia, the most logical and straightforward
way of ensuring human security by pursuing freedom from fear is
then to take action to remove the cause of radiation fear altogether.
This paper proposes a basic preliminary policy recommendation as
follows:
Policy 1
Eliminate the object of fear

Complete
and
sustained*
shutdown and decommissioning
of nuclear plants
(Anti-nuclear stance)

*As of 31 March 2015, the nuclear plant restart of Sendai Nuclear

Power Station, located in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture
and owned by Kyushu Electric Power Company, has been
approved by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as well as the governor of
Satsumasendai, and is already undergoing on-site inspections by
NRA (Japan Times 2015); if it is to be restarted according to plans,
it will then be the first nuclear power plant to do so since the 3.11
disaster and will set a precedent for future restarts across the
country.
Policy 1 Assessment
The proposed preliminary policy is the most direct solution
should we choose to pursue a strategy that aims to eliminate and
ultimately prevent the aforementioned human security issues from
occurring. Basically, if there are no more nuclear power plants,
15

Japan After 3.11

there can be no need to fear the consequences of a nuclear accident,

thereby achieving the human security of freedom from fear.
However, this most ideal and effective situation is only able to
theoretically work ceteris paribus, if we do not have other political
security challenges to consider apart from human security. This is
however not the case in this dynamic world of politics and
international relations, especially for Japans political situation at
present.
The chief difficulty in implementing Policy 1 is that its
inverse that is, restarting nuclear plants is a policy that is
urgently needed. While we acknowledge the importance of
ultimately achieving human security, we recognise that the pursuit
of human security is only possible when state security interests are
guaranteed; as has been laid out, state security is the guarantor of
human security, and human security our imperative pursuit. In the
pursuit of state security, it will be seen that the restart of nuclear
plants is in the interest of securing domestic political economic
stability and international energy independence for the state and
relevant energy stakeholders, especially pertinent in light of
economic issues and regional political tensions rising in relation to
Japan. The urgent case for pursuing state security, put in context of
Japan, will be justified in the following chapter.
Another issue of contention with Policy 1 is that while its
implementation may be able to liberate the people from radiation
paranoia and thereby eliminate the humanitarian security breaches,
since there will no longer be the possibility of nuclear accident
occurrences, this policy does not directly address the disaster
recovery challenges from the fact that the Fukushima disaster has
already caused human security breaches, with people currently
suffering from psychological issues of depression, stress, anxiety,
discrimination, social withdrawal and suicide. While the shutting
down of nuclear plants may be effective since it is easier to ensure
human security through early prevention than later intervention
(UNDP 1994: 22), it does nothing to mitigate the present human
security challenges currently faced by refugees. Hence, a revised
policy must be proposed to address these current challenges
persisting due to the breach; this will be discussed in the end of the
next chapter.

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Japan After 3.11

III
State Security: Interests of the
Japanese Government

In light of the difficulties in implementing Policy 1

aforementioned, this chapter shall elaborate on the specific reasons
why Policy 1 is impossible when we consider Japans strategic
domestic and international interests at present. The main thrust for
this chapter is based on the argument that the state seeks to
guarantee state interests before it can proceed to manage human
security concerns. Opposed to the idealism of an anti-nuclear
policy, we shall approach the issue of state security through a
structural realist perspective, beginning internally with the
domestic political and economic structures regarding nuclear
power in Japan, leading externally on to Japans international
relations with various state actors for the sake of securing state
sovereignty and energy independence.
We shall argue that the interest of the Japanese government
with respect to nuclear power decisions is entrenched in what is
known as the nuclear village, which consists of both state and key
non-state actors, mutually influencing each others interests. The
immediate problem with so-called state interests then is that
matters are no longer clear-cut, since these powerful private actors
who are often pro-nuclear would be interested in keeping the
nuclear village and restarting nuclear plants. Yet, it would be
remiss to only accord responsibility to private actors; due to the
complex bureaucratic architecture of the nuclear village and the
inertia of incumbent interests, the Japanese government is simply
unwilling and unable to sustain a total shutdown and
decommissioning of the nuclear plants.
Having presented the domestic interests supporting the
nuclear village, we proceed to critically discuss the importance of
this village regarding Japans state security challenges; this will be
examined through Japans relations with US and China, and with
the Middle East. In order to maximise Japans defence capabilities
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to protect its sovereignty amidst rising regional tensions with China,

there is vested military interest with US to maintain the nuclear
village and to restart nuclear plants to secure possible nuclear
capabilities in Japan. For the sake of safeguarding Japans energy
independence, the nuclear plants must be restarted to diversify
from conflict-ridden Middle East, and the nuclear village provides
economic means to trade nuclear technology for stable fossil fuel
supply, justifying Abes proactive pacifism policy to secure
Japans own regional state security.
With these justifications for the nuclear village and nuclear
restarts, policy can no longer be based solely on human security
issues. We cannot eliminate the object of fear by shutting down
nuclear plants, since restarts have been shown to be important for
state security, which in turn guarantees human security. Hence, by
reconceptualising the freedom from fear strategy, then we shall
instead eliminate fear of the object, which actually proves to be
more comprehensive as it allows us to additionally address present
human security breaches of disaster recovery challenges as
mentioned. These two policy actions will thus constitute our final
policy proposal regarding nuclear restarts.

Domestic Political Economy:

The Inertia of the Nuclear Village
The nuclear village refers to an intersecting conglomerate of
various players within Japans nuclear industry, consisting of
governmental, political, industrial, academic and media
stakeholders. For the purposes of this paper, we shall focus on two
key citizens of the nuclear village: the nuclear power
administrators and the nuclear power industry leaders, or the state
and non-state actors respectively. However, if we are to be looking
at state security interests, why do we have to consider non-state
actors? In this case of Japanese electric companies, these private
actors, especially TEPCO, exert enormous influence in terms of
political, economic and technological leverage on regulatory
bodies to secure their own private interests. Nonetheless, the state
and its relevant regulatory bodies are still largely responsible for
the inertia of the nuclear village due to bureaucratic complexities
between actors, as well as post-Fukushima structural reforms
already planned, altogether lending weight to the incumbent
interest against emergent post-Fukushima anti-nuclear interest.
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Influence of Pro-Nuclear Industry Leaders

As the principal industry leader amongst the energy
companies, providing approximately one-third of all power in
Japan, TEPCO has consistently exerted a major influence on
national government policy decisions (Bricker 2014: 73). This
influence that TEPCO exerts on national energy policy, and by
extension, the nuclear plant restart decisions, can be identified
through political, economic and scientific leverages that TEPCO
possesses.
TEPCO is able to assert its private interests on policy
because of its political leverage, through a practice of amakudari
(literally, descent from heaven) which involves bureaucrats taking
positions in companies they formerly regulated, and industry
officials being represented on influential government advisory
panels (Colignon and Usui 2003). Former TEPCO executive vice
president Tokio Kano was elected to the Upper House of the Diet
through LDP backing, coinciding with a significant rise in
donations (Asahi 2011a), and former staffers from the central
bureaucracy such as METI, MLIT, MOFA and MOF have been
employed by TEPCO, including a former energy minister who
became TEPCOs vice president (Bricker 2014: 74). With this
revolving door mechanism firmly rooted in place, TEPCOs
involvement in Japanese politics and regulations is easily
facilitated and sustained.
Additionally, due to its economic leverage as one of the
largest private-sector energy firms worldwide, TEPCO asserts its
private interests through kickbacks like contributing large sums of
money to local governments in exchange for hosting nuclear power
plants. TEPCO contributed US$110m to build a soccer stadium in
Naraha, an aging town in Fukushima Prefecture which needed to
attract youths, in return for hosting Fukushima No.2 Nuclear Plant
(Asahi 2011b). Nonetheless, this financial contribution has
distinctly improved the community (Bricker 2014: 76) through
employment and by hosting national sporting events, alleviating its
socio-economic circumstances, undeniably in the interests of the
government as well, thus providing little incentive for state
intervention.

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Japan After 3.11

As the non-state actor that is actually involved in the

technical generation of nuclear power, as opposed to state
administrators, TEPCO possesses technological and planning
capabilities far superior to those of government agencies such as
NISA or ANRE (Bricker 2014: 74-75), which provides the firm
significant leverage to direct government policies. By coming to
the table with watertight proposals according to its own interests
and by pointing out technical errors in other energy proposals by
regulatory bodies, TEPCO continues to exert a profound influence
on the direction of government policy.
Bureaucratic Complexities and Incumbent Interest
Yet, while it appears that the nuclear village is driven by the
private interests of large pro-nuclear energy companies, it is
fundamentally still built upon the complex bureaucratic
interactions involved in its inception and continuity. After the end
of WWII, nationally-controlled electric power was privatised into a
system of regional monopolisation, dominating all the processes
from power generation, transmission, distribution and sales
(Bricker 2014: 73). Until 3.11, this monopolised industry needed to
be strictly regulated by NISA, which oversees regulatory
compliance from within METI. Yet the irony was that this
regulatory body was an arm of METI, the government agency most
committed to expanding nuclear power (Dewit et al. 2012: 157).
As a result of this bureaucratic structure where government
regulators regulated in favour of the regulated (Kingston 2014: 41),
it was always possible for moral hazard to undermine professional
accountability indeed, in 2002, NISA finally publicly disclosed
that TEPCO had been falsifying data for many years to conceal
various problems (Bricker 2014: 69). Nonetheless, such almost
self-regulating mechanisms remain in place to continue ensuring
that the nuclear village survives.
In addition, by virtue that the entire nuclear village is wellorganised and sufficiently united in their policy vision (to promote
nuclear power), with trillions of yen worth of sales, assets and
investments at stake, there is a strong incumbent interest by all
actors, state and non-state alike, to defend the status quo and keep
this nuclear village alive, a powerful and important structure of
energy and policy-making in the worlds third largest economy.
The main strategic advantage of these stakeholders in this colossal
20

Japan After 3.11

structure is that it need only defend the status quo, because

significant change in any policy realm is always difficult. Even
after IAEAs report that the roles of both NISA and NSC
especially with regard to the nuclear safety guidelines should be
clearly identified (IAEA 2007), it was only after 3.11 happened
that reforms of regulatory bodies actually proceeded, finally taking
NISA and NSC away from METI control and housing it under
MOE as a more independent NRA. Moreover, with the Diet
effectively deadlocked between the LDP and DPJ with no sign of
clear and consistent leadership, from Kans anti-nuclear stance
right after 3.11 in 2011 shifting to Abes increasing support of
nuclear power at present, the political context remains fluid and
policymakers are occupied in policy debates rather than policy
itself. Amidst this situation, METIs strong support for nuclear
power and retaining control over national energy strategy is
therefore an invaluable stability that advocates for incumbent
interest, thereby allowing the nuclear village to persist, and sooner
or later, permitting nuclear restart once again.
Summary
The interest of the state in nuclear policy is fraught with the
political, economic and technological advantages that the private
energy companies, especially TEPCO, hold in the realm of
policymaking. Moreover, with bureaucratic structures in the
nuclear village involving complex, almost self-regulating
mechanisms, the strategic advantage of maintaining only its
incumbent interests, and the strong and stable policy vision it
carries amidst uncertain political discourse, it is clear that with its
enormous power to influence public discourse and politics
(Kingston 2012: 204), the nuclear village, desperate to survive,
will indeed live on.

International Security:
Interstate Relations and Japans Sovereignty
Having argued that the domestic community of electric
utilities and bureaucrats comprising the nuclear village have vested
interest in sustaining its existence by opposing shutdowns and by
extension, pushing for nuclear restarts, we proceed to recognise the
nuclear village goes beyond being only a domestic issue. By
looking at Japans strategic role on the regional and international
21

Japan After 3.11

level, we recognise, through the lens of structural realism, the

nuclear village provides the means for Japan to achieve its need to
both maximise capabilities and minimise constraints within the
structure of international relations in order to secure its sovereignty.
This will be analysed through case studies of Japans relations with
China and US, as well as with the Middle East.
Maximising Capabilities: China, US and Nuclear Weaponry
With tensions rising recently between China and Japan, due
to the ongoing Senkaku island disputes (MOFA 2014) which has
resulted in maritime security and sovereignty issues, in addition to
the already persistent nationalistic politics of apologies over WWII
war-crimes (MOFA 2006), it is especially at this crucial political
juncture where Japan needs to maximise its security capabilities to
ensure state survival. In order to utilise the various actors within
this regional political structure, Abe has proceeded by visiting all
ten ASEAN states to strengthen both diplomatic and economic ties
(Sekiyama 2014), securing multilateral networks to hedge against
Chinas rise. On a national level, his government has reinterpreted
Japans peace constitution to permit collective self-defence and
further his policy of proactive pacifism in order to justify future
objectives to take on further hedging measures against China.
However, while somewhat effective at engaging with Chinas
offensive expansionary claims on a diplomatic and economic basis,
these measures at best only serve as indirect soft deterrents against
Chinas increasingly hard military capabilities, such as its secondstrike capability while disallowing its nuclear programme to be
subject to international restrictions (Cabestan 2013), as well as land
reclamation for airstrip construction in the Spratly islands for
greater maritime and airspace assertion (Reuters 2015). By a
structural realist analysis of military might, the lack of defensive
manoeuvres on Japans foreign policies may prove insufficient.
However, the rise of China as a regional power both
economically and militarily is also disrupting the present power
configuration in the Asia-Pacific region firmly established by the
Japan-US security architecture. Thus, in accordance to its
rebalancing strategy into Asia, US has a security interest in
strengthening its bilateral alliance with Japan, to maintain its
military presence and counterbalance Chinas rise. According to
structural realist interpretation then, since ASEAN is not a security
22

Japan After 3.11

complex, Japans recourse would be to leverage on this US alliance

structure to allow nuclear weapons as a balancing possibility
against Chinas military threat. Indeed, Prime Minister Abe has
identified the benefits of retaining nuclear energy as a way of
keeping Japans nuclear weapons options open (Bacon and Sato
2014: 164), consistent with US geostrategic interest in securing its
military presence, after having pressured the Japanese cabinet for
no decision to be made for a phase-out zero option (Tokyo Shimbun
2012), since the existence of nuclear plants means the practical
possibility of producing an A-bomb within one year (Global
Security Newswire 2012). Hence, from a security perspective of
structural realism, US and Japan both benefit from Japanese
nuclear technology, and would therefore be disadvantaged in the
dynamic regional power relations if the nuclear village, and by
extension the possibility of nuclear weapons, was to be abandoned.
Minimising Constraints: Middle East, Conflict and Nuclear Energy
There is also strategic interest for Abe to retain nuclear
energy capacity in Japan when we look at its economic and
security relations with the Middle East. As a nation that is limited
in natural resources and thus heavily reliant on energy imports,
Japan is primarily dependent on the Middle East which provides at
least 80% of all its fossil fuel imports. After 3.11 and the shutdown
of all nuclear plants across Japan, this number has only increased;
with the comparatively inexpensive nuclear energy representing a
quarter of Japans energy supply out of the equation, this has
further deepened Japans energy and economic dependency in the
conflict-ridden Middle East, opening possibilities for likely
compromises on foreign policy (McCann 2012: 3). Hence, in order
to minimise Japans own structural constraints and circumvent
possible economic ramifications should the Middle East region
destabilise further, and possibly see Japans oil partners
compromise its willingness and ability to sustain trade, Japan has a
security interest in restarting nuclear plants. By alleviating current
energy supply strains and costs through a domestic baseload power
source, as well as to diversify away from this increasingly
destabilising region due to the ongoing irredentist conflicts,
towards other strategic actors such as Russia, Southeast Asia and
Africa for energy stability (EIA 2015), Japan puts itself in a better
position to secure its own energy independence.

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Japan After 3.11

Moreover, with the ISIS murder of Kenji Goto, Abe has

leveraged on this security incident to further justify his proactive
pacifism by taking on a more proactive foreign policy stance to
enhance security and economic cooperation with the Middle East
(MOFA 2015). This functions as a pretext for exporting more
nuclear technologies to the region, a strategy that remains
consistent with Abes recent negotiations with Saudi Arabia and
UAE (Nikkei 2014), two of Japans major energy partners, as well
as other state actors in the region, in exchange for securing future
supply of fossil fuel for the sake of Japans energy stability. Hence,
there is a state interest not only in nuclear restarts but in the
persistence of the nuclear village as an economic tool to minimise
its own energy constraints through economic cooperation to secure
energy independence, as well as a diplomatic tool to minimise its
own military constraints by legitimising Abes own proactive
pacifism foreign policy to the international community, a
decisively strategic move that ultimately is drawn back to Japan
own concern with regional tensions regarding China, so as to
justify strengthening the established regional security alliance
structure with US and further enhance its military capabilities for
the sake of safeguarding Japans sovereignty.
Summary
Regarding the rise of China and the security threat it poses,
maintaining nuclear energy with respect to the Japan-US alliance
maximises Japans capabilities by keeping the option of nuclear
weapons open as a defensive manoeuvre to balance against China,
thereby safeguarding their key positions as stabilisers in dynamic
security framework within the Asia-Pacific region. In the case of
the Middle-East, restarting nuclear plants would then reduce
dependence on the conflict-ridden region, and in light of Kenji
Gotos murder, keeping the nuclear village minimises constraints
by allowing Abe to secure future supply of oil from its export
partners while further legitimising his proactive pacifism to
secure Japans regional state sovereignty.

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Japan After 3.11

Final Revised Policy Proposition

Having argued at this point that the nuclear restarts and the
nuclear village are necessary for state security, this rules out the
preliminary proposal to keep nuclear plants shut down; Policy 1 is
therefore replaced by Policy 1, whereby the object of radiation
fear cannot be eliminated, and restarts must occur. However, since
the pursuit of human security is imperative, instead of seeking to
eliminate the object of fear, we shall then eliminate fear of the
object, through radiation literacy, psychiatric humanitarian
assistance and DDR management expertise. This final revised
policy proposition stands as follows:
Policy 1
Eliminate the object of fear

Complete and sustained*

shutdown and decommissioning
of nuclear plants
(Anti-nuclear stance)

Policy 1
Impossible to
eliminate the object of fear
Policy 2
Eliminate fear of the object

Prompt restart of nuclear plants

(a) Education of the public masses

regarding radiation literacy;
(b) Provision of psychiatric and
community assistance to
evacuees;
(c) Investment in DRR
management expertise in
accordance to SFDRR

Policy 1 Assessment
Policy 1 follows as the logical conclusion of the chapters
arguments against nuclear shutdowns and for nuclear power
generation to persist in Japan. However, while Policy 1 was
labelled as the anti-nuclear stance, it would be remiss to simply
label Policy 1 as the pro-nuclear stance. The fact of the matter is
that such nuclear discourse has often been separated discretely such
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Japan After 3.11

that one category finds itself pit against the other, with little
possibility of negotiations or compromise. This false dichotomy
that ignores consolidated thought only serves to eschew how we
are to perceive the reality of present circumstances, and the most
we can make of it at this juncture. The fact of the matter is that
nuclear plants exist in Japan, and perhaps it is important to rely on
nuclear energy. However, we should not be pursuing nuclear
energy blindly without recognising its great underlying risks, such
as the safety myth it proliferated (Bricker 2014: 50-62) amongst
energy firms and the public, or its great financial costs involved,
like the large financial payouts to refugees (TEPCO 2015) which
resulted in its partial nationalisation, especially apparent when we
witness the ongoing aftermath of 3.11 disrupting every strata of
society. Just because we have ruled out the possibility of a total
shutdown and decommissioning of all nuclear plants does not mean
that we ought to abandon any decommissioning whatsoever.
Indeed, as Maruyama suggests, from the human security
perspective, the appropriate approach to nuclear energy would be
to () decommission the outdated reactors as soon as possible
(Maruyama 2015: 108). This is one of the many possible human
security policy options we can further explore that should be
developed in the context of debate about the desired future
Japanese energy mix (Bacon 2014), once we have first and
foremost acknowledge that a total and complete shutdown is
impossible at this juncture, which has been the main aim of this
paper. It is always important to recognise that engaging human
security issues in humanitarian contexts does not mean that we
must remove all possibilities of disaster; rather, when we are aware
that anything man-made or natural will always be associated with
risks, we learn that the importance lies not so much in a
preoccupation with a total avoidance of risks, but in accepting their
possibilities and thus work towards identifying, managing and
reducing such risks.
Policy 2 Assessment
Policy 2 keeps our focus back on the imperative of human
security. Having shifted our strategy to accommodate the existence
of nuclear plants, as well as recognising that human security
compromises have already occurred, it follows then that our policy
must take into consideration not only prevention of radiation
paranoia to achieve freedom from fear, but also intervention to
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Japan After 3.11

render appropriate humanitarian assistance and reduction of future

vulnerabilities through disaster risk reduction (DRR) mechanisms.
(a)

Prevention: Education of the Public Masses regarding

Radiation Literacy

In order to accomplish the main aim of eliminating fear of

radiation, it is important to raise radiation literacy amongst the
public masses. By raising awareness to the public about the truths
of the dangers by pointing out prevalent myths of radiation,
especially in identifying key differences in technical processes and
extent of radiation between nuclear weaponry and nuclear plants,
we can then explain the differences in atmospheric releases
between weapon detonation and reactor malfunction respectively.
However, the difficulty now lies in the fact that official radiation
information dissemination is facilitated by state administrators, of
which the public has increasing distrust for due to their
aforementioned ties with private energy companies, no less due to
TEPCOs and the governments failure to behave in an open
manner and provide honest, accurate information about what was
happening (Bacon and Hobson 2014: 12) during the Fukushima
incident. Therefore, no matter how scientifically justified their data
may be, even by international scientific experts, with such existing
misgivings on the side of the public, even the most objective of
information will not be readily accepted. As Professor Balonov, a
former ICRP member and consultant to WHO and UNSCEAR,
proposes, only an open information policy on the level of the
effects [through] the media and the science community will create
the trust needed to heal () and prevent negative socio-economic
effects from unwarranted anxiety and fear (WNN 2013). The local
academics of the scientific community, being visibly more
disinterested than the government, therefore play an integral role in
providing objective data for the public. In particular, according to
Professor Tanigaki whose KURAMA radiation device has been
placed into public transport around Fukushima city, with live data
being broadcast publicly in the city centre, the primary objective of
government policy is then only to minimally support the scientific
community with relevant administration and logistics, as the
scientists themselves move forward to provide transparent,
objective, accessible, comprehensible and sustained data to gain
the confidence of the public, and in so doing, fix the gap between

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Japan After 3.11

truth and public perception in order to dispel the myths of

radiation (Tanigaki 2014: Appendix I).
(b)

Mitigation: Provision of Psychiatric and Community

Assistance to Evacuees

The immediate challenge of disaster recovery is the

psychological and sociological issues that have arisen amongst the
evacuees due to radiation paranoia; the question now turns to how
we ought to go about providing such assistance to refugees. With
the rising cases of anxiety disorders, depression and suicide,
alongside the cultural fact that Japanese societys values
emphasising conformity may also be a deteriorating factor for
stigma against mental illness, which deviates from the norm
(Taplin and Lawman 2012: 129), the very act of diagnosing
individuals as mentally ill poses difficulties, on top of the fact that
mental health is not a priority for this rural, conservative region
of Fukushima (Brumfiel 2013: 291). Hence, the challenge is to
provide psychiatric help without being categorically psychiatric
in order to gain trust. This is where the role of volunteer
community centres comes into play. According to Yui Hamada of
Nozomi Center (Hamada 2014: Appendix II), the role of running a
community centre was not only to serve as a safe place for children
whose parents both have to work since the disaster, but as one of
the places they will run to when they feel sad or lonely or scared
because the centre has earned the trust of the community. With
time, the rest of the local community had become encouraged and
slowly began to voluntarily contribute to the Centers community
projects, such as providing foodstuff and rendering humanitarian
support by visiting and cooking for kasetsu refugees. This is a
prime example of how strategies of community development and
involvement contribute to alleviating the psychological and
sociological challenges, where the aim of the government would be
to encourage and support through providing the financial means for
these humanitarian groups to sustain a long-term presence in the
communities.
(c)

Reduction: Investment in DRR Management Expertise in

Accordance to SFDRR

Out of all these three policy strategies, it is here in risk

reduction management where the role of the governments
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policymaking bodies is most integral. Due to the revolving door

and self-regulating mechanisms in place between the state and
TEPCO within the nuclear village, alongside METIs agenda to
promote nuclear power to the bureaucracy and the public, it was
inevitable that a safety myth, instead of a safety culture, was
promulgated. This did not reflect well on the governments part
even after 3.11 when the Cabinet reported, with respect to the
Hyogo Framework for Actions (HFA) priority for action 5:
strengthen disaster preparedness for effective response at all levels
(UNISDR 2005), that Comprehensive achievement with sustained
commitment and capacities at all level (Cabinet Office 2011: 20),
perhaps too positive a self-appraisal when the relentless cascade
about fundamental errors, lax enforcement of safety guidelines,
shady practices and negligence began unfolding soon after in
Japanese media reports (Kingston 2014: 40). It was not so much
the problem of the Hyogo Framework, but the governments
attitude in merely putting the legal and institutional framework in
place without worst-case scenario conceptualisation. With the
newly conceived post-2015 Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk
Reduction (SFDRR) underway, of which priorities for action 3:
investing in disaster risk reduction for resilience, and 4:
enhancing disaster preparedness for effective response, and to
Build Back Better in recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction
(UNISDR 2015), pertains especially to 3.11, one can only hope
that the government and relevant stakeholders learn from this
severe lesson and finally take a serious, honest and committed
stand by adhering to these safety priorities.

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Japan After 3.11

IV
Conclusion

This paper has sought to argue, in a negative sense, against

the anti-nuclear policy of completely shutting down and
decommissioning all nuclear plants in Japan. This is fundamentally
impossible because of domestic and international state security
interests which require the inverse restarting nuclear plants.
Inasmuch as we ought to pursue freedom from fear in order to
eradicate radiation paranoia that finds itself enmeshed with pacifist
movements and unscientific misinformation originating historically
from Hiroshima, we cannot forget that the sovereignty of Japan
remains top priority, especially against the backdrop of a rising
China, whereby Japans military alliance with US and economic
trade relations with Middle East requires the domestic structure of
the nuclear village to persist in order to guarantee Japans state and
energy security. Yet, as we proceed to restart nuclear plants, it does
not mean that human security fades into irrelevance; always the
imperative, we must complementarily pursue a comprehensive and
prompt freedom from fear strategy alongside nuclear restarts to
meet the present exigent needs, through having the state provide
background support to the scientific community as they provide
radiation literacy to the public, financially assist humanitarian
organisations in their community involvement projects as they
work to meet the ongoing psychiatric and sociological disaster
recovery challenges of depression and discrimination, and invest
more in risk communication and risk reduction expertise as we
move on from the harsh lessons learnt from 3.11 and proceed to
work towards a post-2015 SFDRR Japan.
Acknowledging Limitations
This much is easy to say from an academic research
perspective. What remains out of the scope of this paper are the
detailed outlines of Japans future nuclear policy, that is, in a
positive sense, to what realistic extent nuclear restarts should occur.
What should the rate of restarting plants be? What is the time
frame we are looking at for restarts? Should we seek to restart all
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Japan After 3.11

plants eventually, or place a limit, enough to provide a baseload

power minimum? What would constitute a nationally sufficient
baseload power minimum for a resource-scarce country as Japan?
Should we be considering the construction of even more nuclear
plants on top of existing ones in the future? These are extremely
important questions that policymakers have to come together to
address even as plans to restart the first nuclear plant may be
commencing as we speak. Yet, even as the newly-reshuffled
agencies come to the policymaking table with mature, experienced
pro-nuclear players in the nuclear village currently enjoying the
backing of pro-nuclear Abe, decisions to limiting nuclear plants
restarts from a human security perspective will definitely meet
many more bureaucratic challenges in this political complex. As
long as legislation does not discreetly revisit and lay out the
specific obligations of parties, the current safety regulatory
governance in which the locus of responsibility remains ambiguous
between state and private firms will continue to foster public
distrust of the bureaucracy. As Japan moves forward with nuclear
power, it is the states responsibility to provide a conducive
environment for ordinary citizens to have a sufficient perspective
to access critically the powerful bonds that exist among the
political and industrial communities comprising the nuclear village
(Bricker 2014: 61).
Future Recommendations
This paper has focused on the short term considerations of
Japan with respect to its immediate domestic and international
issues surrounding nuclear restarts. Looking ahead long term, on an
energy front, as Abe already begins diversifying energy partners
worldwide, the state should move from the 3.11 disaster and start
to seriously consider investments in other energy sources such as
renewables, a strategy strongly pushed by Softbank CEO Son
Masayoshi, the richest man in Japan, that has since expanded
policy momentum and maintained strong public support
nationwide (Dewit et al. 2015: 166-69). On a humanitarian front,
the time scale remains smaller but no less significant. Articulating
the precise sentiments of SFDRRs Build Back Better, Minako
Takahashi from Fukushima city says that she wants it to be a place
of hope tourism and show the foreign delegates who will come
for the 2020 Olympics how they have recovered and progressed
since the disaster (Takahashi 2014: Appendix III). The most
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Japan After 3.11

pressing need for the government within these coming years then is
to steadily proceed with the expansion and reconstruction of urban
areas to provide permanent residences so that refugees can once
again be integrated into society. To this end, it is up to us
researchers specialising in Fukushima now to strategise how best to
sustain our research efforts by monitoring, supporting and raising
awareness of the humanitarian recovery, for refugees and the
public, governments and firms, as well as domestic and
international communities, all in the hope of a better age for Japan.

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Appendix

APPENDIX I
Excerpt from Research Presentation with TANIGAKI, Minoru
Assistant Professor, Kyoto Reactor Research Institute, Osaka

Efforts on decontamination are already underway, such as at roads

or houses in Fukushima. So what I should do is to show that efforts
are producing results. Thats why I am extending KURAMA-II
throughout the prefecture, to update daily, plot the data to show a
decreasing trend that radiation is dropping. This is what the citizens
should see that efforts are effective, and decreasing results are
maintained and this is what I would like to show them with our
system. As a result, our KURAMA-II system is well-received and
people are more trusting of our results than the government
monitoring posts, although they are not defective at all.
The KURAMA-II has been accepted because of its long continuous
activities in Fukushima. If we start a discussion on radiation, we
should rely on the results from KURAMA and its activities. We
want the people to have confidence in our activity, to trust in our
data that produces results, and we want to continue increasing the
number of monitoring devices and make it more comprehensive to
cover a wider area, so that the results can be communicated to the
public in a more transparent manner.
That is what I have told the people at Harvard University, at a
conference with the audience of specialists in risk communication.
It is important to fix the gap between truth and public perception
using KURAMA, if we wish to dispel the myths of radiation. ()
If we can show the results to the people properly, then they can
have the confidence to continue living there. If it is publicly
accessible, then it would be great, for that is how policies should
work, to tap on the scientific specialised expertise of the industry,
and to be able to disseminate such information in a manner
understandable for the public.

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Japan After 3.11

APPENDIX II
Excerpt from Interview with HAMADA, Yui
Humanitarian worker, Nozomi Centre, Yamamoto Town

Q:

Can you tell us more about the situation in the community

when you first came here, and how the needs have changed?

Especially after the disaster, both parents had to work, so families

really appreciated a place they could send their kids, knowing that
they are safe and well taken care of. That need increased and we
are very thankful that the community trusts us and allows us to
have their kids here. The needs turned into more of emotional care
for traumatic experiences, because some kids will start shaking and
panicking once they hear the words tsunami or jishin
(earthquake), and they needed someone to be there when they had
those moments. Im glad and thankful that this place became one
of the places they will run to when they feel sad or lonely or scared.
Recently in the past months, people in the community have been
saying, I want to help you guys at Nozomi Centre, such as
cooking for people at the temporary housings, because the people
who had stayed here and then had their houses fixed, ready for
moving in right away, felt like they wanted to do something to help
the community in return. People wanted to contribute, and that was
a great step. I was also thrilled when grandmas and grandpas in the
area were telling us that hearing the kids voices and watching
them play around have encouraged them, so they brought food and
snacks to feed the kids and in all this I see the community is being
rebuilt, slowly but surely, in the love of Christ. Needs have
changed, but the fact that we have had the chance to be here in
Yamamoto for a while has helped our relationship and allowed us
to trust each other.

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Japan After 3.11

APPENDIX III
Excerpt from interview with TAKAHASHI, Minako
Hotel owner, Matsushimaya Ryokan, Fukushima City

Q:

What is your hope for Fukushimas future?

Some say they want to make Fukushima become the spot of dark
tourism like Auschwitz, but we want to make Fukushima the spot
of hope tourism. We want to show how Fukushima, which has
suffered from compound disasters, is recovering and changing. We
want make the recovery so significant that our children can be
proud of the fact that they are born and grow up here. We go to see
government officials from Fukushima once every few months.
Moreover, in 2020, many foreign officials will come to Japan and
travel around as visiting delegations as part of the Olympics
tradition. When it happens, I want to show them how Fukushima
has changed and progressed dramatically.

Full original audio tapes, transcriptions and translations are

available upon request.

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Japan After 3.11

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