February 21, 2012

Special Seminar: The Governance of Reconstruction from the Great East Japan Earthquake

Program

Moderator: Shigeki UNO (Institute of Social Science)

13:00-13:05 "Opening Remarks" Mari OSAWA (Institute of Social Science)

13:05-13:20 "Keynote Report: Perspectives and Issues for 'Restoration Governance'"
   Iwao SATO (Institute of Social Science) 

13:20-14:35　Session 1

"One Year since the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake: Issues and Prospects Based on an Examination of the Process Involved in Restoration Plan Formulations by Local Governments Affected by the Earthquake"
   Mikiko ISHIKAWA (School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo)

"Housing Restoration with a View Toward Community Sustenance"
   Yosuke HIRAYAMA (Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe University)

Discussion

14:35-14:40　Break

14:40-15:55　Session 2

"Earthquake Restoration, Financial Reconstruction, and Construction State Japan: Will Public Works Projects Create ‘Bonding'?"
   Eisaku IDE (Department of Economics, Keio University)

"The Special Zone for Reconstruction as a Legal Technique for Earthquake Restoration"
    Hiroki HARADA (Graduate School of Law, Kyusyu University)

Discussion

15:55-16:05 Break

16:05-17:00 Panel Discussion

Abstracts

Keynote Report: Perspectives and Issues for "Restoration Governance"
Iwao SATO (Institute of Social Science)

The 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and the nuclear power incident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant operated by Tokyo Electric Power Company brought extensive human and property damage to all areas of Eastern Japan, mainly in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima Prefectures. The purpose of this seminar is to examine issues on the restoration of the affected areas from various perspectives by inviting guest speakers from the fields of urban engineering, housing policy, fiscal sociology, and law. Prior to the presentations by the guest speakers, this keynote report will discuss the following matters in order to give a brief summary of the presentations.

First, by taking into account social vulnerability, which has been an issue in the affected areas since before the earthquake, restoration efforts need be shaped so that they enable sustainable development of the areas concerned. Although the affected areas were damaged extensively by the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake, most of these areas had already been facing issues such as increasing population outflow and aging, severe local economic and employment conditions, and persistency of the norms based on gender division of labor. Restoration of the affected areas needs to be advanced on a mid- to long-term time scale extending over "pre-quake days," "the earthquake," and "the future" and also by keeping in mind the inclusion of individuals who can easily be overlooked in the course of the restoration process.

Second, in association with this matter, restoration measures need to be implemented by taking into consideration the actual circumstances of the community and life of the affected people. In order to achieve this goal, it is critical, upon the implementation of every measure, to carefully examine the actual circumstances of the damage and the current circumstances of livelihood experienced by the affected population and also the outlook of livelihood rehabilitation into the future. That is, measures should be reviewed on an ongoing basis for verification.

Third, for the restoration process, it is essential to adopt a viewpoint which captures in a comprehensive manner the relationships among participation, cooperation, and internal adjustment of various actors. It is necessary to construct 1) a mechanism which enables participation, cooperation, and internal adjustment by maximizing the possibility and suitability for autonomous choices by the residents and municipalities and 2) a system to distribute the authority and financial resources associated with this mechanism. The process for constructing the mechanism and system requires both the vertical relationships of national government - prefectural governments - municipal governments and the horizontal relationships of administration – residents – companies, non-profit cooperative organizations, volunteers, and other organizations and individuals.

In this project, the perspective of comprehensively examining restoration-related issues as described above will be referred to as the perspective of "restoration governance." After the occurrence of the earthquake, various words such as "bonding," "connection," and "cooperation" have been used in connection with restoration and rehabilitation of the affected areas. However, these words tend to yield images which lack definite substance. The aim of this seminar is to provide tangible form (system) to these words and to look for paths for residents' livelihood rehabilitation and sustainable development of communities.

One Year since the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake: Issues and Prospects Based on an Examination of the Process Involved in Restoration Plan Formulations by Local Governments Affected by the Earthquake
Mikiko ISHIKAWA (School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo)

The area affected by the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and tsunami extended over Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, and Tokyo Prefectures. As for human damage incurred from the earthquake and tsunami, there were 15,845 deaths and 3,380 missing persons. Building damage consisted of 128,477 completely destroyed houses and 242,472 partially destroyed houses. The number of evacuees reached 337,819. (Human and building damage: data reported by the National Police Agency on January 23, 2012)

This presentation will discuss relevant issues and challenges after the passage of one year since the Tohoku Earthquake. These issues and challenges are identified based on the perspective of current conditions as well as the process involved in formulations of restoration plans, which serve as the foundation of the post-quake restoration.  As of January 2012, 34 out of the 43 municipalities affected by the earthquake and tsunami, i.e., approximately 80% of all the affected municipalities, have formulated or are in the process of formulating restoration plans. Of all the affected municipalities, 32 are in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima Prefectures, and 30 of these 32 municipals have formulated restoration plans. 

The presenter has been asserting the need for "city-pairing assistance" since the occurrence of the earthquake on March 11, 2011. This stance is based on her actual experience of supporting the restoration efforts after the Sichuan - Wenchuan Earthquake, which occurred on May 12, 2008. Applying lessons learned from this experience, the presenter has been involved with the supporting efforts for Iwanuma City, Miyagi Prefecture, as a part of the Global Center of Excellence for Sustainable Urban Regeneration, the University of Tokyo. 

During the presentation, the restoration planning of local governments in Miyagi Prefecture will be reviewed by following the process of formulating restoration plans for Iwanuma City in chronological order as an example. Based on this review, issues inherent to restoration will be discussed.

The following questions and issues will be addressed in the presentation:
 1) Who should formulate restoration plans?
 2) How should consensus building be achieved?
 3) In this era of decentralization, what types of connections can exist among the restoration planning of municipalities, regional planning, and national planning?
 4) There is a need for an institutional framework for formulating "city-pairing assistance as horizontal associations of municipalities" as infrastructure in preparation for predicted earthquakes such as Tokai and Tonankai Earthquakes.

Housing Restoration with a View toward Community Sustenance
Yosuke HIRAYAMA (Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe University)

Housing restoration plays an essential role for sustaining communities and rebuilding the lives of individuals affected by earthquakes and related disasters. As a result of the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake, land as well as buildings and other man-made structures was destroyed by the tsunami. Many of the disaster-affected people lived in owner-occupied houses. It is now being asked how housing restoration should be advanced in the context of "tsunami," "land," and "owner-occupied houses."

In this presentation, based on the circumstances of disaster-affected people, the following matters will be discussed. 1) A large portion of the households affected by the earthquake and subsequent events are elderly households. The disaster-affected households also include households with children and working households. While elderly households require assistance to restore their lives, households with children and working households require measures promoting integration into their communities. 2) Since restoration is a lengthy procedure, examination and improvement of housing measures during the stage of temporary livelihood are required. 3) Although most of the disaster-affected people desire to have the house which they owned reconstructed, actual circumstances suggest that reconstruction will be difficult to be achieved in many cases. 4) It is not necessarily the case that disaster-affected people wish to go back to the area of their pre-disaster residence. 5) Uncertainty about the future has increased due to land damage and the necessity of implementing measures against tsunamis, which in turn has become an obstacle to housing restoration. 6) The paths to livelihood rehabilitation have branched and diffused, further reducing the homogeneity of the needs of those affected by the disaster. 7) The matters described above suggest that it is essential and indispensable to set a direction which links housing restoration and town restoration. Specifically, such a direction needs to be set by establishing a systematic policy response consisting of support for reconstructing the land and houses owned by disaster-affected people, provision of new owner-occupied houses, and construction of municipal housing. 

Argumentation on how to formulate governance requires continuous re-examination with an emphasis on the actual circumstances of the disaster-affected people and their communities as well as attention to the circumstances of the public authorities providing services. Not only are arguments and policy formulations which do not address the actual circumstances of the affected people and their communities ineffective, they become a hindrance to restoration.

Earthquake Restoration, Financial Reconstruction, and Construction State Japan: Will Public Works Projects Create "Bonding"?
Eisaku IDE (Department of Economics, Keio University)

The Japanese government has projected that public works during the five-year intensive restoration period will cost on the order of 19 trillion yen. However, the total budget for public works in the first fiscal year, including the supplementary budget, has already reached 18 trillion yen. This suggests that expansion of public works is unavoidable. On the other hand, severe budget constraints have prevented special procurements associated with the restoration from expanding beyond the construction industry in the affected and surrounding area. This has clearly influenced the local economy in Tohoku differently from that in other areas. In addition, financial needs shifted from public works to social security, particularly personal social services. Yet, because tax increases have emphasized financial reconstruction as seen in the integrated reform of the social security and tax systems, the situation is far from one in which people's needs are assessed appropriately.

Regarding the financial resources, it has been resolved that the special income and corporate taxes for financing the restoration of the Tohoku region will be newly imposed as a supplement to non-tax revenues such as funds transferred from interest maintenance reserves and funds originating from the disposal of state-owned shares. However, despite the philosophy that the financial burden should not be shifted to the future, the redemption period of the Tohoku recovery bonds was extended from the originally planned 10 years to 25 years out of consideration for the opposition parties. In response to the above resolution, the decision was made that the special corporate tax will be imposed for three years while the tax increase associated with the special income tax will last over a long term, 25 years. Although fairness in tax burden continues to remain a serious concern, as long as public works projects expand in the future, addressing the imminent issue of the additional financial resources required for this expansion cannot be avoided.

In the midst of the difficulty in building consensus as described above, the significance of "bonding" has been emphasized. While social solidarity is necessary for levying taxes, benefits from public services are necessary for the foundation of social solidarity. However, objectively, Japan is being pushed back in the direction of becoming a construction state in contrast to the needs of the people. This has caused issues of limited financial resources and the possibility of additional taxation to move further in a direction different from that demanded by the people, which has ironically resulted in the emergence of a need for increased tax burdens. If the circumstances described above reflect reality, how should public works be reconstructed so that the people can accept the additional taxation and also how can a general consensus be achieved on the increased tax burden? These questions will be addressed by examining a new model of public works.

The Special Zone for Reconstruction as a Legal Technique for Earthquake Restoration
Hiroki HARADA (Graduate School of Law, Kyusyu University)

Planning for the Special Zone for Reconstruction has been the center of attention since the initial stage of debates on restoration after the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake (also known as the Great East Japan Earthquake), which caused unprecedented damage to some areas in Japan. A special zone for restoration efforts was included in a proposal by the Reconstruction Design Council in response to the Great East Japan Earthquake, and also the need for legislative measures was acknowledged in the Basic Act on Reconstruction (Basic Act on Reconstruction) (Article 10). Why was the Special Zone for Reconstruction selected as a legal technique for earthquake restoration? What legal characteristics and issues exist in this approach? These questions will be addressed as the topics of this presentation.

First, the reasons for the need for a special zone system will be examined. This examination will be made in line with the characteristics of the legal system of the Special Zone for Reconstruction. If "special zone system" is defined broadly in such a way as to encompass means to suspend regulations and taxation and provide subsidies and financing with advantageous terms in certain designated areas, regulations and tax exemptions or reductions in particular can become legal (or political) issues. With this background, the notion of the elimination of "one-country-two-systems" is frequently brought up. By examining this stance from the perspective of public law, legal requirements will be clarified for designing the special zone system. Second, after general explanations are offered on the design of the special zone system in the Basic Act on Reconstruction, the characteristics of the system in terms of its legal technique will be analyzed with the use of three keywords "integration," "proceduralization," and "decentralization." In the course of this analysis, differences among the pre-existing special zone systems (the special economic zones in Okinawa, the special zones for structural reform, and comprehensive special zones) and the system of the Special Zone for Reconstruction will be examined. Third, an examination will be made on what types of characteristics comprise the Special Zone for Reconstruction, based on the perspective of earthquake recovery governance. In the context of the relationships among central government ministries and agencies, the special zone system implies enhancement of consultations among these ministries and agencies. In terms of the relationships between the central government and local governments, the comprehensive special zones and the Special Zone for Reconstruction provide a system to meet the needs of the regions concerned, harmonizing with calls for local self-governance. As for the relationship between local governments and residents, the Special Zone for Reconstruction has been slightly modified from the design of the comprehensive special zone system due to the nature of the former Special Zone in that it concerns self-governance in times of emergency. Based on this analysis, the implications of the system of the Special Zone for Reconstruction will be put in perspective in the context of public law (constitution and administrative law) theories.