Reconstruction of Marginality: The Tokyo Bay Area in the Great East Japan Earthquake

Abstract

This paper focuses on the liquefaction disaster that happened in the Tokyo bay area in the aftermath of the Great East Japan Earthquake. The Tokyo bay is known as both a spatially and a socially marginalized area. Lower-middle-class and underclass households in particular have for some time now lived in cheap public housing in the area. In this sense, liquefaction strongly hits on relatively more vulnerable people in the Tokyo region, one of the most vital centers in global networked capitalism. However, although post-disaster reconstruction will result in large-scale spatial transformations, local residents of old public housing have been excluded from discussion on the direction taken by reconstruction policies. In conclusion, Yamamoto argues that this situation forces us to re-invent grass-roots democracy in order to make the communities more ecologically and socially sustainable.