Rethinking Civil Society–State Relations in Japan after the Fukushima Accident

Abstract

The 3/11 combined disaster in Japan focused both Japanese civil society and government decision makers on the issue of nuclear power. Whereas surveys over the post-war period indicated that many Japanese supported the growing role of nuclear power in Japan's overall energy policy, the current crisis has resulted in a sea-change in public opinion. Even though some scholars have depicted Japanese civil society as comparatively weak and poorly organized, the disaster has stimulated citizen science, prompted large protests, and spurred many to challenge governmental authority. This article investigates the ways that Japan's relatively stable patterns of state-and-civil-society relations have been reconfigured as a result of the Tohoku disaster.