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    I spent the last three months in Japan as part of the US Navy’s disaster relief efforts.  The Japanese government is highly effective with respect to repairing infrastructure, the repair of the Great Kanto Hwy in less than a week as case and point.  The humanitarian side of the recovery has indeed been less successful.  It was nearly impossible to coordinate channels of delivery of humanitarian supplies donated by the US military community in Japan to those in need.  Resettlement of those displaced by the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster has been painstakingly slow, largely because it is conducted exclusively by the central government in Tokyo.    Much of the problem of bureaucracy and the recovery effort has to do with Japanese culture itself.  Unlike Americans, the Japanese are accustom to bureaucracy.  What this disaster shows is the limits of government involvement in disaster relief.  Government is generally highly effective in organizing immediate response to disaster.  However, long term recovery must be conducted by civil society.  There seems to be no political will to fix the bureaucratic overrun of the Japanese government.  Prime Minister Kan’s announcement that he will resign last month is the sad symptom of the aversion to facing political challenges in Japanese political culture.  It is said of Japanese politicians that they do not solve problems, they just resign.

  • Matthea Brandenburg

    I agree with your statement that long term recovery must be conducted by
    civil society.  Aid organizations can only do so much.  When it comes
    down to it, the people have to desire change and take steps to ensure it
    happens.  Aid and volunteer organizations are generally more present in
    a country directly after a disaster happens, and the aid tends to taper
    off as time goes on.  The initial aid is helpful, but is not received
    correctly if after time people become so dependent on it that they don’t look
    for solutions themselves.  Japan is very entrepreneurial, especially in
    the technology sector, so they have the advantage of rebounding their
    economy quicker than countries in the midst of natural disasters that lack industry.

  • Ken

    Thanks for this post, Matthea! With the disaster having all but disappeared from American newspaper headlines, it’s easy to forget that Japanese are still dealing with the very real after-effects of unprecedented tragedy.

    Your opinions are well-taken, and I agree with them all. It is important, however, to view the disaster in perspective. In the mid-1990s, Kobe was devastated by a 6.8-magnitude earthquake. About 6,500 lost their lives. Response to that particular disaster was, in itself, another disaster, with certain regional fire and paramedic response teams having to await permission from the national government before they could enter the fray and help save lives. Afterward, the country passed new laws that allowed, for example, Japan’s quasi-military [SDF] to participate in this disaster response much more quickly and easily than had earlier been the case. As a result, post-disaster polls reveal a Japanese people prouder of their military than they are of their political leaders.

    Perfect? Of course not. No country succeeds at disaster relief, a task debatably more art than science. But Japan has shown a willingness and ability to learn from previous mistakes. May that be the case here, as well.