Thursday, January 3, 2013

On the Political Power of Nuclear Power: Japan's Radioactive Plutocracy

Reversing his campaign pledge to reduce Japan’s reliance on nuclear power even as he had just been elected as prime minister of Japan in 2012 (Tepco’s nuclear power-plant meltdown having occurred in 2011), Shinzo Abe announced that he would have more nuclear reactors built in Japan. “They will be completely different from those at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant,” he said in a television interview.[1] Adding a silver lining on to a rather gray, radioactive cloud, he said, “With public understanding, we will be building anew.”[2] This change in policy is dramatic, for the previous administration--that of Yoshihiko Noda—had sought to phase out nuclear power in Japan by 2040. In fact, Abe’s own party, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), had in its platform the goal “to establish an economy and society that does not need to rely on nuclear power.”[3] That the shift took place within the LDP suggests a shift in its power-dynamics, with the pro-nuclear sub-faction astonishingly having gained the upper hand over its rival while memories of the tsunami-triggered meltdown were undoubtedly still fresh.

The full essay is at "On the Political Power of Nuclear Power"



1. Hiroko Tabuchi, “Japan’s New Leader Endorses Nuclear Plants,” The New York Times, December 30, 2012.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.