Fukushima’s Black Bags: How Citizen Scientist Activism is framed by Cultural Contexts, Environmental Justice, and Ethical Reasoning
Keywords:
Japan, Fukushima, Environmental Justice, Human Rights, Radiation, Decontamination, Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power PlantAbstract
Fukushima Prefecture, on the Pacific coast north of Tokyo, Japan, is spotted with radioactively contaminated matter packed into black bags as a result of the March 11, 2011 Tohoku earthquake, tsunami, and subsequent meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant run by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO). Through a lens of local culture and the core ideas of human rights and deontological ethical reasoning, I argue that a solution to Fukushima’s remaining radioactive mess, symbolized and made visible by the black bags, must be created by the citizens of the affected areas and backed by TEPCO and the government. Citizen scientists, defined as any person with scientific proficiency or expertise who translates between laypeople and professionals, provide a crucial link between local and expert. The pursuit of a land-use based approach to reorganize and revitalize Fukushima must come from those who live there, because only then a feasible solution will be realized.
This essay will examine the conversation of what should be done to remedy and who should have a say in what happens with the remains of the 3/11/11 Triple Disaster encapsulated in the black bags. If you were Japan’s Minister of the Environment, who would you decide should have a voice in resolving the dilemma? How is the tension between insider and outsider groups resolved? Who should be invited to the table to make a decision about what to do? How to move forward in Fukushima is a question yet unresolved.
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