Governing nuclear safety in Japan after the Fukushima nuclear accident: incremental or radical change?

Abstract

Official Japanese reports into the causes of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident identified significant weaknesses in the country’s structures and systems for governing nuclear safety. As a result, the government undertook a number of legal and structural reforms. One of the most important was to establish a Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) in 2012 and grant it a high degree of independence and authority. Despite scepticism at the time over the likely effectiveness of this new agency, the NRA has taken a robust approach to permitting restarts after all nuclear reactors were shut down following the accident. This style of safety regulation owes much to the personality of the NRA Chairman and has been criticised as being unpredictable and overly strict. In late 2019, only 8 GWe of capacity was operating out of a pre-accident total of 48 GWe. As a result, the current government’s preference that nuclear power provide a significant, though gradually declining share of the energy mix is under threat. In institutional terminology, Japan’s nuclear power industry is at a juncture that could become critical, but the outcome is unpredictable at present. The rapid demise of the nuclear industry is quite possible, but a range of political and economic interests may prevent this. Much will depend on the actions of the next government.

Keywords:

• Japan
• Fukushima
• safety
• regulation
• governance
• institutions

1. Introduction

In March 2011, Japan suffered the world’s worst nuclear accident since the Chernobyl accident in 1986. This event challenged the Japanese establishment in many ways: to explain the causes of the accident, to overhaul and greatly improve the regulatory infrastructure for nuclear safety, and to win back the trust of the people. Much has been written about the causes of the accident and the confused response to it, not least in official Japanese reports.¹ While these are important issues, a more pertinent question today is the extent to which the subsequent reforms are leading to significant changes to the governance of nuclear safety in Japan or even to the demise of the civil nuclear power industry. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident and its economic and social consequences have been of such magnitude that they could be seen as having provided a critical juncture in the way that Japan is governed, and not just with respect to nuclear power. A critical juncture is a period of uncertainty, often caused by an exogenous shock, which creates the opportunity for significant institutional change.

In their analysis of how junctures become critical, Rinschild and others argued that the conditions before a potentially disruptive event are an important determinant of the likelihood of significant change after the event.² Of particular relevance is the degree of conflict among powerful actors over the issue at stake before the event. The greater the degree of pre-existing conflict, the more likely that the event will result in a critical juncture. They concluded that the lack of a strong conflict of interests before the accident and the absence of a radically different consensus after the event rendered the radical transformation of Japan’s nuclear industry unlikely in the short term. In a similar vein, Vivoda and Graetz contended that the persistence of vested interests supportive of nuclear power would make an abandonment of this form of energy unlikely. However, they conceded that moderate change would occur to Japan’s nuclear policy and regulation.³

While adjustments within the country’s nuclear power sector are potentially important, these will be constrained to a significant extent by the degree of change in the wider political arena. As Samuels observed, after the Fukushima accident there were two sets of thinking and rhetoric in or about Japan.⁴ One identified the window of opportunity for ‘renaissance’ created by the crisis. The other suggested that ‘restoration’ was more likely. Both Samuels and Pilling took a middle road, suggesting that change would not be transformational but would rather be incremental, building on pre-existing trends.⁵ One reason for the improbability of radical change lies in the diffuse nature of political power in Japan, which dates back to the end of the Meiji era in 1912. R Taggart Murphy argued that this situation persists today because the modern, western democratic institutions introduced after the Second World War at the insistence of the United States were overlain on these pre-existing systems and norms.⁶ Moreover, it is significant that the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was returned to power in 2012 despite the fact that it put in place the systems that lay behind the Fukushima accident.

What these accounts have in common is their explicit or implicit acknowledgment of the importance of path dependence in societal change and the probability that change will be incremental. These are key concepts in the field of neo-institutionalism,⁷ particularly in historical institutionalism.⁸ In simple terms institutions can be seen as the formal and informal rules, values, norms and expectations of a society. Institutions create predictability, shape the decision-making of actors, and thus constrain the pace and direction of change. Actors of different types may try to change certain institutions: governments to address new challenges or economic actors to gain advantages. However, most institutional change is incremental barring a major crisis that creates a juncture which becomes critical and results in fundamental transformation.

In the case of Japan, the key question is whether or not the Fukushima accident has triggered a juncture that will become critical. Thus the aim of this analysis is to assess the extent to which the systems for governing nuclear safety in Japan have undergone substantial change since the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011. This will form the basis for conjecturing whether or not the country’s civil nuclear power industry is at a juncture that is or will become critical.

The account begins with a brief introduction to perspectives from the field of institutionalism that will be applied in the subsequent analysis. This is followed by an overview of the institutional environment for economic governance in Japan within which the nuclear industry operates. The heart of the analysis lies in the two subsequent sections that examine the governance of Japan’s nuclear industry before and after 2011 respectively, with a focus on regulation and public participation. The research draws on a range of literature, mainly in the English language, including reports of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and of various Japanese commissions, on academic and think tank papers and press articles. The findings were tested and supplemented by semi-structured interviews with informed individuals from industry, think tanks and universities in Tokyo in May 2019.

2. Institutional perspectives

Oliver Williamson presented a useful heuristic to draw on the different strands of institutionalism and apply at the societal level of analysis.⁹ At the top are the embedded institutions that can be considered as forming the foundation of a society’s culture. These comprise the values, traditions, normative behaviours and cognitive rules that depend, in part, on the metaphysical and epistemological perspectives of the society. These features of a society are long-lived and generally slow to change.

The institutional environment forms a second level and consists mainly of formal institutions consciously designed by humans but operating within the wider context of the embedded institutions. Most important in the study of economics are the political and economic systems, the bureaucratic structures and systems of government, and the formal allocation of powers between different levels of government. Also of great significance are the features of the law relating to property rights, contracts and dispute resolution, the systems for policy-making and implementation, and the role of civil society and the media. Generally, change within the institutional environment tends to occur over periods of decades rather than years because of interdependence between the different types of institution – between the legal and the economic systems, for example.

At the third level are the structures, systems and rules that govern individual economic transactions. Such rules may be issued by government in the form of laws, regulations and policy instruments to govern markets. Rules may also be internal to firms, government agencies and networks. At this level of institutions change can be rapid, and this is the focus of transaction cost economics.

This distinction of three levels of institution is somewhat arbitrary as overlaps and tight links exist between the three levels of institution. These links result in a high degree of positive feedback and inertia in the governance system that in turn leads to path dependency.¹⁰ The key characteristic of this path dependency is that institutional change is incremental.¹¹ Change in one institution or the introduction of a new institution will generally require change in a number of other connected institutions. If the associated changes are not made, the new institution either may not be adopted by society or may result in unintended consequences.¹² For example, a modification in the way a sector is governed will require not just new rules, policies and systems governing individual transactions that need to be consistent with each other. It may also require fundamental changes in the institutional environment, for example, in the way that government and the law operate.

The full replacement of one set of institutions by another can also occur, especially if a major crisis of confidence in existing institutions takes place. Such a substantial institutional shift has been referred to as a ‘critical juncture’, for it creates a new evolutionary path for the affected set of institutions.¹³ Mahoney and Thelen termed this process ‘displacement’ and suggested that an ‘insurrectionary’ actor would be needed to drive such institutional change.¹⁴

3. Institutional environment of economic governance in Japan

While acknowledging the importance of embedded institutions, the present study focuses on Japan’s institutional environment, especially the elements relating to governance of the economy. At the heart of Japanese economic governance lies the ‘iron triangle’, which involves close relationships between politicians, bureaucrats and private industry.¹⁵ It also embraces the media and academia.¹⁶ For around 60 years, the LDP has been the dominant political party in Japan. Right from the start, the LDP focused its energies on economic reconstruction and growth. This involved close relations between politicians and bureaucrats, a powerful Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), and strong political and financial support for the LDP provided by leading industrialists.¹⁷ Of particular note is the central role played by the LDP’s Policy Affairs Research Council in government decision-making, particularly in relation to financial matters. This web of relationships became known as the ‘1955 System’.¹⁸

Policy implementation has relied heavily on subsidies granted by ministries mainly to local governments, but also to private companies and individuals. The subsidies to local governments are usually directed at infrastructure projects. Local governors and mayors compete to attract these funds through the lobbying of bureaucrats and Diet members. The resilience of the LDP owes a great deal to the subsidies provided to rural communities, which are overrepresented in the Diet, as well as to the existence of a large proportion of hereditary seats. The 1994 electoral reforms further marginalised the smaller political parties and failed to address rural overrepresentation.¹⁹

The emergence of the iron triangle dates back to the period after the Second World War when the political leadership decided not to follow the pre-war approach to economic governance that drew on liberal market ideology. Rather, it chose to develop what Hall and Soskice²⁰ would term a coordinated market economy in which industry, although privately owned, is guided by the government bureaucracy. This required cooperation between bureaucrats, politicians, the industrial associations, banks and labour.²¹ The Japanese Business Federation (Keidanren) was a particularly powerful body with close links to MITI.²²

Heavy industry, though privately owned, was characterised by complex systems of cross-holdings between corporations and banks (keiretsu). These companies guaranteed long-term employment. Promotion within a company was based on seniority, and board members and top management came almost entirely from within the company. The loyalty of the board was therefore more likely to be to the company rather than to shareholders. In addition, the majority of shares would be held by corporations and banks in the same keiretsu that would be happy to have steady if unspectacular dividends and good business relations. In their business dealings, companies preferred informal, relational transactions over arm’s-length, formalised contractual relations. This led to the development of long-term relations between firms and suppliers.²³

The close relationship between government and industry was facilitated by the movement of officials from the bureaucracy to political office, the public sector and private enterprises, a process known as amakudari. This not only provided career continuity for bureaucrats, but also created informal policy networks between key actors. These placements were not random but appeared to be purposively structured.²⁴ The reverse process of amaagari, though less common, saw individuals from industry transfer to government departments and even to the National Diet.

In the 1990s the Japan Association of Corporate Executives (Doyukai) started to argue for a change in the style of Japanese economic and business management. These ideas were picked up in the early 2000s by Prime Minister Koizumi who implemented a number of economic reforms, overriding opposition from the Keidanren as well as from within the LDP itself.²⁵

Koizumi’s efforts to enhance the role of the market resulted in a number of changes in the way that large corporations behaved: greater attention was paid to share price and dividends rose; external directors were appointed to boards; promotion was based more on performance than seniority and the power of the labour unions diminished; keiretsu-based relationships declined in importance; and hostile takeover attempts became more common. However, many features remain relatively unchanged including the continued preference for internal appointees at senior levels, and a willingness to place the interests of non-financial stakeholders above profits and dividends.²⁶

At the same time, Koizumi succeeded in reducing the practice of amakudari. However, his attempts to reduce the influence of the bureaucracy over policy made little progress. One of the reasons was that there were few other sources of policy analysis. There were no independent think tanks and the members of the National Diet had staffs that were much smaller than those of US members of Congress, for example.²⁷ He also failed to convince Japanese society of the wider benefits of market reforms, not least because the government did not institute adequate social safety nets.²⁸ The global financial crisis of 2008, combined with a number of high-profile financial scandals and growing social inequality, brought an end to these neoliberal initiatives.²⁹

Outside the iron triangle lie the Japanese people and civil society. In the past, levels of civil society participation in economic governance had been low, and the gap between the people and politicians was greater than in most mature democracies.³⁰ The economic slowdown leading to the ‘lost decade’ of the 1990s triggered a number of phenomena that helped to enhance the strength and activity of civil society. The primary driver was the decline of trust in the bureaucracy resulting from the economic stagnation and the government’s response, as well as growing disgust at systemic corruption.³¹

As will be described below, civil society anti-nuclear activism grew dramatically after the Fukushima accident, but it is far from clear that its influence on policy decision-making has increased.³²

4. Governance of Japan’s nuclear industry before 2011

4.1. The Nuclear Village and its evolution before 2011

The iron triangle of economic governance was reflected in the nuclear industry by the Nuclear Village.³³ At the core of the Nuclear Village lay MITI and its successor the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), as well as two agencies within the Prime Minister’s Office: the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan and the Science and Technology Agency. The other main actors were the LDP, the government bureaucracy, the power utilities and the equipment suppliers. Of particular note is the political influence that the power companies acquired through their direct financial support of politicians. The practices of amakudari and amaagari assisted in aligning interests, and the power of the government agencies permitted a high level of bureaucratic discretion in policy-making and implementation.

The actors in the Nuclear Village and their respective influence have varied over time.³⁴ Until the late 1970s, the Prime Minister supported by the Science and Technology Agency held strong nominal power over the nuclear power industry, possessing the authority to issue licences. However, this authority was constrained by the obligation on the Prime Minister to seek the consent of MITI and respect the opinion of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan, the latter being an active proponent of nuclear power. The Japan Atomic Industrial Forum represented the industry. The Nuclear Reactors Regulation Law at the time exempted nuclear power plants from many approvals and inspections.

An accident on a nuclear-powered ship in 1974 triggered reforms to the sector.³⁵ The Nuclear Reactors Regulation Law was revised in 1978. MITI was given responsibility for regulating nuclear power plants, taking advice from the newly created Nuclear Safety Commission (NSC). The NSC lay within the Prime Minister’s Office as part of the Science and Technology Agency and took over safety issues from the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan. The role of the NSC was to provide overall supervision of the safety regulation carried out by MITI in a system known as ‘double checking’. However, the NSC, like the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan, was an ‘advisory committee’ that possessed no executive authority.

A later accident, this time at a nuclear power plant in 1999, triggered further reforms. The NSC was transferred from the Nuclear Safety Bureau of the Science and Technology Agency to the Cabinet Office which enhanced its status, authority and capacity. For the first time the NSC instituted post-approval inspections procedures for the phases of construction and operation. Simultaneously, the government established Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) under METI’s Natural Resources and Energy Agency, giving NISA a clear remit for safety regulation including licensing and inspection. NISA was supported by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organisation established in 2003 as a technical service organisation. In addition, METI took control over nuclear research and development from the Science and Technology Agency and reduced the remit of the NSC to reviewing NISA actions.³⁶

The reforms undertaken over this long period enhanced the number of actors with an interest in the nuclear power industry. In addition to the public sector agencies were the utilities, their suppliers and the Federation of Electric Power Companies. As will be described below, the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986 led to greater activism on the part of prefecture governors and civil society. This expansion in the number of what Hymans³⁷ termed ‘veto players’ made policy change and power plant siting progressively more difficult.

The LDP and the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) were consistent in their support for nuclear power throughout this structural evolution,³⁸ and the LDP retained strong control over the agencies that governed the industry.³⁹ Furthermore, court cases brought by anti-nuclear groups or local communities failed, because the judiciary was loyal to the interests of the elected (LDP) politicians, dependent as they were on the politicians for their appointments.⁴⁰

4.2. General assessment of the legal and regulatory framework before 2011

The earliest systematic assessment of Japan’s legal and regulatory framework was carried out by the IAEA’s Integrated Regulatory Review Service (IRRS) mission to Japan in 2007. Despite the report being couched in relatively diplomatic language and prefaced by the caveat that the number of recommendations and suggestions is no measure of the status of a regulatory body, it is quite clear that the mission was deeply unimpressed.⁴¹ The report highlighted the need to clarify in law the roles of NISA and the NSC in producing safety guides, and the apparent lack of independence of NISA from METI. The report made a large number of specific recommendations and suggestions directed at NISA. Of particular note is the failure of Japan’s government to follow the normal practice of responding to the report and requesting a follow-up mission. Neither did it make the report publicly available at the time. A further IRRS mission did not visit until 2016.

Following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident, three separate official Japanese reports reviewed the way in which the nuclear industry was governed.⁴² Many scholars also provided their own assessments, often drawing on these reports.

The National Diet Report observed that the legal and regulatory framework was fragmented, was not systematically updated to meet evolving international standards and practice, and failed to take into account technological advance.⁴³ The framework also did not take into account the possibility of a severe nuclear accident caused by a natural disaster. The government appeared to have no effective emergency response plan for a severe accident of any type, let alone a nuclear accident,⁴⁴ and lacked a whole-of-government, all-hazards approach to emergency preparedness and response.⁴⁵ Moreover, responsibility for nuclear regulation was excessively fragmented. In addition to the NSC, NISA and the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organisation, the Ministry of Education, Sports, Science and Technology was in charge of regulating radiation doses and managing safeguards.⁴⁶

4.3. Assessment of the regulatory agencies before 2011

Following the Fukushima accident, the formal reports and other commentaries were united in identifying fundamental flaws in Japan’s nuclear regulatory agencies, many of which had been highlighted in the IAEA’s IRRS report.⁴⁷ These included a lack of expertise in all the relevant agencies, NISA’s lack of independence from METI, regulatory capture by the utilities, insufficient attention being paid to public safety, and a failure to adopt recommendations of international agencies. Together these and other weaknesses resulted in a complete failure of NISA and the NSC to fulfil their responsibilities for nuclear safety and emergency planning.⁴⁸

The shortage of expertise in NISA was not primarily a budgetary problem. Rather its roots lay in the fact that all senior positions were occupied by civil servants on rotation, not by nuclear professionals, and NISA was not perceived as a good career move by officials.⁴⁹

NISA lay within METI, but the promotion of nuclear power was one of METI’s top energy priorities, thus leading to a conflict of interests. NISA’s inadequate capacity and its lack of independence from METI contributed to its capture by the utilities.⁵⁰ This capture found expression in many ways. NISA systematically failed to enforce regulations and standards. Instead, it left the nuclear plant operators to decide what should be done on a voluntary basis.⁵¹ The NSC and NISA allowed TEPCO to operate despite having inadequate emergency response plans.⁵²

The National Diet Report argued that the NSC and NISA had paid insufficient attention to public safety, but rather focused more on the interests of the agencies themselves.⁵³ In the 1990s, probability safety assessments were limited to internal events within the plant and did not take into account external events such as natural disasters, though the scope was later widened to include external events. After 2002, NISA made these assessments formally compulsory but left them as voluntary requirements because NISA itself lacked the skills to carry them out.⁵⁴ NISA issued new safety guidelines relating to tsunami risk in 2006, but failed to ensure compliance.⁵⁵ In addition, these guidelines treated tsunamis as ‘accompanying phenomena’ of earthquakes, rather than as a risk to be independently assessed.⁵⁶ The NSC had even explicitly excluded the possibility of a prolonged loss of power.⁵⁷

Two of the official reports identified that the NSC and NISA had failed to interact effectively with the IAEA and other international agencies, and had made insufficient effort to follow international trends in managing nuclear safety.⁵⁸

4.4. Disregard for nuclear safety before 2011

At the heart of these regulatory deficiencies lay the belief in the ‘myth of absolute safety’ that was held across the Nuclear Village. In part, this reflected the interests of the members of the Village, but was also a symptom of the psychological reluctance to discuss the possibility of a serious nuclear accident.⁵⁹ As early as 1975, a civil society organisation, the Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center, had identified both technical problems as well as seismic risks that could lead to meltdown. But warnings were ignored because of the perceived necessity of building a large fleet of nuclear power plants.⁶⁰ Scientists repeatedly warned of a risk of massive earthquakes and tsunamis based on geological and geophysical evidence. Fourteen lawsuits were brought against the operators accusing them of ignoring these risks, but all the cases were unsuccessful.⁶¹

In 2002, the Japan Society of Civil Engineers assessed that there was a risk of a 5.7 metre tsunami along the Fukushima coast, which was significantly above TEPCO’s original assumption of 3.1 metres. In 2009, NISA and TEPCO discussed the possibility of a 9.2 metre tsunami, but no action was taken to implement countermeasures. TEPCO itself carried out a study in 2008 which showed that a tsunami could reach a height of 15.7 metres, very close to the estimated 14–15 metre height of the tsunami of March 2011. But TEPCO only shared this result with NISA a few days before that tsunami.⁶²

Moreover, regulators and TEPCO had been aware since 2006 that a tsunami might result in a total loss of electricity supply to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Yet NISA did not draw up new safety regulations nor oblige TEPCO to implement structural reinforcement. TEPCO itself did not voluntarily undertake these enhancements. Moreover, NISA asked TEPCO to send them a report explaining why such changes were not needed.⁶³

TEPCO’s priority, along with those of other nuclear power plant operators, appeared to be the maximisation of plant operation and minimisation of the risk of lawsuits and loss of trust in the company. Falling profits exacerbated this approach to safety. Through the Federation of Electric Power Companies, the utilities blocked or delayed attempts to bring in new laws and regulations. No apparent consideration of the risk of a severe nuclear accident appeared to exist, nor care for public health and welfare.⁶⁴ Symptoms of this attitude included the longstanding practice of systematically falsifying repair and maintenance records that came to light in 2000 and a low level of transparency.⁶⁵

Such behaviours were characteristic of the collusive relationships between members of the Nuclear Village. Further, they reflected the weakness of the safety culture that pervaded the Village.⁶⁶ A narrow focus on risks arising from within the plant and over-confidence in the engineered robustness of the plants led to a failure to truly appreciate the damage that could be caused by external events such as natural disasters.⁶⁷

4.5. Public opinion and civil society before 2011

Before the Fukushima accident, there was no nationwide movement against nuclear power and civil society had little voice within the Nuclear Village.⁶⁸ In part, these deficiencies arose from the general weakness of civil society in Japan. But objections to nuclear power were further suppressed by the generosity of the industry and the central government to communities that agreed to host the reactors.

The generally remote and poor towns that agreed to host nuclear power plants would receive major funding from the nuclear plant operator, as well as new infrastructure. Most of this would be delivered at the time of planning and construction, though the towns gained an influx of well-paid employees and tax revenue. These initial subsidies for investment in infrastructure created a long-term problem of maintenance that incentivised local governments to keep agreeing to new nuclear power plant construction. This in turn led to ‘subsidy addiction’ and the crowding of reactors on a single site.⁶⁹

Nevertheless, there were local protests in areas of potential sites during the initial and main phases of nuclear power plant construction, in the 1960s through to the 1980s. Communities were concerned over public health, food safety, fisheries and farming. They launched petitions, held referenda and instigated court cases. These moves succeeded in blocking an estimated 45 per cent of proposed sites.⁷⁰

It was during the 1970s that the Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center was created and started to build a national network from these local anti-nuclear groups.⁷¹ Nevertheless, public surveys revealed a generally high level of support for nuclear energy until the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl nuclear accidents of 1979 and 1986 respectively gave the anti-nuclear movements a boost. The Chernobyl nuclear accident triggered anti-nuclear protests in Japan’s cities and 1992 saw protests against a fuel reprocessing plant.⁷²

Despite this steady rise of anti-nuclear activism, there was no route for engagement in the policy process. The civil society organisations lacked funds and professional staff, and thus were powerless against the Nuclear Village’s argument that nuclear power was essential for the economy.⁷³

5. Governance of Japan’s nuclear industry after 2011

5.1. Recommendations of official Japanese reports after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident

Of the various reports on the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident, two are particularly relevant to this account as they focus on the regulatory infrastructure.⁷⁴ Both reports were insistent that the government should create a new regulatory agency that was independent, transparent, professional, proactive and well resourced. The new agency should bring together all responsibilities relating to nuclear matters, including emergency preparedness and response. Noting the failure of the NSC and NISA to respond to the earlier IAEA IRRS mission, the Hatamura Report drew attention to the need to engage effectively with international agencies and the national regulators of other countries.⁷⁵ The National Diet Report recommended that the new regulatory agency report to a permanent Diet committee.⁷⁶

With respect to the power industry, the National Diet Report argued that TEPCO should undergo major reform and that the influence of the Federation of Electric Power Companies should be reduced to prevent it obstructing regulatory action. The nuclear power plant operators should accept the authority of the new regulator and should develop their own peer review system.⁷⁷

Both reports identified the need to improve the laws, regulations and guidelines governing the nuclear power industry in order to reflect and keep pace with international standards. In particular, they identified the need to draft new rules on the retrofitting and decommissioning of old reactors. The seemingly chaotic response to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident provoked the demand for government to completely overhaul the national system for crisis management as well as defining the procedures and roles for nuclear emergency preparedness and response.

A final theme common to both reports was the need to radically enhance the safety culture of both regulators and operators, as well as revising their assumptions when undertaking risk assessments. In this context, the message of the commission chair, Professor Kiyoshi Kurokawa, at the beginning of the National Diet Report is particularly pertinent:

What must be admitted – very painfully – is that this was a disaster ‘Made in Japan.’ Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions of Japanese culture: our reflexive obedience; our reluctance to question authority; our devotion to ‘sticking with the program’; our groupism; and our insularity.⁷⁸

5.2. Organisational and regulatory reforms and initial assessments

Major organisational reforms were already starting under the DPJ government during 2012, even before the various commission reports were finalised. The most important of these was the abolition of the NSC and NISA and the creation of the new Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) that became the key actor in the governance of nuclear safety and security. The NRA was established as an ‘external bureau’ of the Ministry of Environment. This gave it the status of a ministry and a much higher degree of independence than any other government agency in Japan. The NRA reports annually to the National Diet via the Prime Minister.⁷⁹ The NRA Chairman and four other commissioners are appointed for five-year terms by the Prime Minister with the consent of both houses of the National Diet. As recommended, the NRA has sole responsibility for nuclear safety, security and safeguards, as well as radiation monitoring and the use of radioactive isotopes.⁸⁰ It has full authority over safety regulation, including the issuance of permits and approvals. The pre-existing technical service organisation, the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organisation, was incorporated within the NRA.

The NRA was set up with an initial staff of 480, of which 460 came from NISA and the NSC. The first Chairman of the Commission was previously the Vice-Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan.⁸¹ All NRA staff are subject to a ‘no-return rule’, meaning that those who join the NRA from METI or another agency cannot return to their original organisation.⁸² The annual budget for the NRA is granted by the Ministry of Finance. In 2013 and 2014, this amounted to about JPY 90bn (US$830m). Funding then declined to around JPY 70bn (US$640m) between 2016 and 2019.⁸³

Two other changes were of critical importance. First, the reporting lines from the nuclear regulator to METI and its subordinate Natural Resources and Energy Agency were removed. Second, the role of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan was reduced from promoting nuclear power to managing the nation’s plutonium stockpiles and fuel recycling policy.⁸⁴ These moves significantly reduced the influence over the NRA of those agencies with an interest in promoting nuclear energy. At the same time the influence of the Federation of Electric Power Companies over METI and the regulator has been drastically reduced, as has its role in the shingikai, the deliberative councils that advise government on policy.⁸⁵ Two other ministries retain roles in nuclear matters: the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare is responsible for the medical application of radioisotopes and for related radiation protection issues; and the Ministry of Education, Sports, Science and Technology continues to oversee nuclear research.

The reforms have seen the emergence of a number of new organisations. In 2012, the nuclear operators established the Japan Nuclear Safety Initiative, modelled on the US Institute of Nuclear Power Operations and charged with managing peer reviews of nuclear reactors in Japan. The Japan Nuclear Safety Initiative replaced the pre-existing Japan Nuclear Technology Institute. A new Nuclear Risk Research Center was formed in 2014 within the Central Research Institute of Electrical Power Industry. The most recent development was the creation of the Atomic Energy Association in 2018. The Atomic Energy Association’s membership includes almost all Japanese organisations involved in the nuclear power supply chain (Box 1). It is modelled after the US Nuclear Energy Institute and its role is to work with the Japan Nuclear Safety Initiative and the nuclear power plant operators to promote nuclear safety.

Box 1. Members of the Atomic Energy Association.

• Nuclear power plant operating companies

• Equipment manufacturers and service providers

• Federation of Electrical Power Companies

• Japan Electrical Manufacturers Association

• The Nuclear Risk Research Center of the Central Research Institute of Electrical Power Industry

• Japan Atomic Industrial Forum

Source: Atomic Energy Association , ‘About Atomic Energy Association (ATENA)’ (undated) www.atena-j.jp/en/about accessed 2 August 2019.

The DPJ government also nationalised TEPCO, the operator of the Fukushima nuclear power plant, and required the company to undergo radical reform. The plans for reform addressed a wide range of issues including corporate governance and culture, decommissioning the Fukushima Daiichi site, compensating victims from the accident, improving the management of nuclear safety, diversifying into renewable energy, and enhancing the financial viability of the company.⁸⁶

Early reactions to these reforms were generally welcoming, but still sceptical on certain issues such as the background of the senior officials in the NRA secretariat⁸⁷ and the authority of the NRA to enforce decisions.⁸⁸ Another concern related to the conflict of interests facing the government between their various policy priorities: maintaining a significant role for nuclear power in the energy mix, reforming the power sector and reducing power tariffs, boosting the safety of nuclear power plants with the costs being paid by the operators, and the need to make the now-nationalised TEPCO profitable.⁸⁹

5.3. More recent assessments of the reforms

In 2016, the IAEA carried out its first IRRS mission to Japan since 2007. Its report was generally positive and concluded that the NRA had demonstrated ‘effective independence’.⁹⁰ The report noted that the number of full-time staff had increased to 920, all of which were civil servants on rotation. Nevertheless, the mission noted a number of important deficiencies that need to be addressed. For the government, the key task was to amend the law governing the NRA to allow its inspection procedures to be more effective and for inspections to be carried out at any time. The NRA was recommended to:

• Continue enhancing the competence of its staff through recruitment, training, research and international collaboration.

• Improve coordination and information sharing with other bodies involved in nuclear regulation.

• Enhance the level of safety culture within the NRA and the regulated organisations.

• Continue building the NRA management structures and systems.

• Develop a clear enforcement policy for sanctions and penalties for non-compliance by nuclear reactor operators.

• Improve documents and procedures relating to emergency preparedness and response and establish requirements for reactor decommissioning.

As noted by the IAEA, there seems to be widespread agreement in Japan that the NRA is acting independently from both the government and the industry.⁹¹ The law has now been amended to allow the NRA to carry out inspections without advance notice,⁹² and the NRA has created a new department to address safety culture.⁹³ The days of regulatory servitude to the government and capture by the industry appear to be over. Instead, experts of different persuasions are concerned by the approach being taken by the current NRA Commission.

Although the NRA is supposedly modelled after the US Nuclear Safety Commission, it acts in quite a different way. It is seen as being too mechanistic and excessively risk-averse.⁹⁴ Unlike the US Nuclear Safety Commission, the NRA does not take into account public values and perceptions or industry interests and costs when defining its safety goals.⁹⁵ In other words, there is no clear basis for deciding ‘how safe is safe enough?’. As a consequence, there are no clear decision criteria for the review process, and it is alleged that technical staff of the NRA appear to confuse the essential with the unnecessary. In addition, the NRA stands accused of failing to communicate effectively with the plant operators and of acting more like a policeman than a regulator. The result of this inefficient review process is that the operators face a high level unpredictability and regulatory risk.⁹⁶

It is argued by some that responsibility for the NRA’s behaviour lies with the Chairman of the NRA Commission, Dr Toyoshi Fuketa.⁹⁷ He has been a member of the Commission since its establishment in 2012 and Chair since 2017. During his term as a commissioner, he held responsibility for nuclear safety. Dr Fuketa’s strong personality, combined with the reluctance of ministers, the National Diet and government officials to be seen to be interfering, has helped him as Chair to promote regulatory independence. But there are questions concerning whether he runs the Commission in a suitably collegial manner as well as over his explicit discounting of public values.⁹⁸

The result of this approach to safety regulation has been that the approval of restarts and licence extensions has been slower and costlier than anticipated. As of December 2019, nine reactors had restarted.⁹⁹ Of these, four reactors had received lifetime extensions giving them a life of 60 years to the mid-2030s. However, questions remained over TEPCO’s willingness and ability to fund the safety upgrades needed for one of these plants (Tokai-2) in which it is a major shareholder.¹⁰⁰ In 2018, the NRA gave approval for a further three units to restart. Two of these (Kashiwazaki-Kariwa 6 and 7) are owned by TEPCO, but the municipal government has demanded that TEPCO commit to decommissioning the older five units at this site as a condition of agreeing to the restarts of the younger two.¹⁰¹ This loss, together with the decommissioning of all ten units at Fukushima would leave TEPCO with only two operating commercial nuclear reactors.

In late 2019, a further 15 units were still under NRA review.¹⁰² Some of these applications had been under review for more than six years, in some cases involving more than 300 meetings. In 2015, an expert committee assessed that the additional cost for safety investment would be about JPY 100bn (US$920) per reactor. By April 2018, JPY 4.4tn (US$40bn) had been spent on 35 reactors totalling 34 GWe, an average of JPY 150bn (US$1.4bn) per reactor. Yet, most of these units were still under review at that time.¹⁰³

So, at the end of 2019, of 48 GWe of nuclear power capacity in operation before the Fukushima nuclear accident: 8 GWe is in operation, almost 20 GWe is being or will be decommissioned (if the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa 1–5 reactors are included), and the future of the remaining 20 GWe remains uncertain. Two further reactors with a combined capacity of 2.7 GWe are under construction, subject to NRA safety checks.¹⁰⁴

The other major undertaking has been the reform of TEPCO. Few details of implementation progress appear to be publicly available; however, some information has been presented in TEPCO’s annual reports. For example, the report for 2017 identified a large number of measures for which progress was judged to have been insufficient over the period 2014–2016. These included issues relating to awareness of nuclear safety, public communication and transparency of information.¹⁰⁵

5.4. Public opinion

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident had a great effect on public opinion in two respects. Trust in the government and the nuclear industry was greatly reduced and support for nuclear power plummeted. The decline in trust was particularly related to dishonesty and a lack of transparency.¹⁰⁶ Surveys in the second half of 2011 implied that only two per cent of the population supported an increase of nuclear power capacity, while 50–60 per cent supported reducing capacity or abolishing nuclear power completely.¹⁰⁷ A series of polls taken over the period to 2014 indicated that 70 per cent or more of the population supported the phasing out or abolishment of nuclear power.¹⁰⁸ Surveys since then have shown diverse results, not least because the questions posed have varied. Nevertheless, at least 50 per cent of the population remains against restarting the reactors and the proportion in favour of phasing out nuclear power has remained above 70 per cent.¹⁰⁹

The accident also created a new population of activists to challenge the government through the largest and most frequent street protests ever seen in the country. Civil society groups, such as the Citizens’ Commission on Nuclear Energy established in 2013, have organised petitions and science information campaigns, and localities have held referenda. Some local politicians have even taken a strong stand against nuclear energy and declared a preference for renewable energy.¹¹⁰ However, these anti-nuclear groups appeared to have few supporters in the LDP-dominated parliament,¹¹¹ and so the issue fails to be politicised at elite levels.¹¹²

As a result of these developments, the ability of the central government to persuade communities to allow their local nuclear power plants to restart has greatly diminished, despite the support of industry associations and trade unions.¹¹³ Although the approval of the NRA is the legal requirement for a restart, politics demands acquiescence from the local government in the form of a local safety agreement, not least because of the need to agree an evacuation plan.¹¹⁴ Further, local courts are now frequently accepting civil cases brought by local groups against power companies. Before the accident this was rare, and the courts generally found in favour of the operator. Courts are now granting injunctions against operators, though some of these have been reversed.¹¹⁵ The outcomes of these cases, at both prefectural and high courts, are quite variable and unpredictable, adding to uncertainty for communities and enhancing business risk for the operators.¹¹⁶

6. Discussion and conclusions

The above analysis has demonstrated that Japan’s nuclear industry is undergoing some important changes that could be interpreted as being fundamental in nature and thus reflecting a critical juncture. However, the evidence presented in this paper suggests that it is too early to assess whether or not the juncture will become critical.

The key initial step in 2012 was to create a new regulatory agency, the NRA, and make it ‘effectively independent’ from the government and the industry. Eight years on, in 2020, the NRA appears to have the resources and the legal remit to carry out its various tasks. This agency is now much more proactive than its predecessors were. Other improvements have included the establishment of the Japan Nuclear Safety Initiative through which nuclear power plant operators in Japan carry out peer reviews on each other, and the Atomic Energy Association which brings together all the key actors in the industry including research institutes, to enhance nuclear safety.

At the same time, local governments, civil society and local communities are becoming more vocal in their anti-nuclear stances, less trusting of central government and heavy industry, increasingly demanding of transparency, and more capable of collective action.¹¹⁷ Further, courts have been more willing to hear cases against the power plant operators. Nevertheless, the current LDP government has retained nuclear power as a significant though declining component of the nation’s future energy mix.¹¹⁸

The key step in the reform process was to provide the NRA with a high degree of independence. Neither the government nor the Diet has publicly interfered with its operation to date. This has given the NRA, under the leadership of Dr Fuketa, the opportunity to take a robust approach to reviewing safety and security standards in plants seeking approval to restart operations. This has resulted in significant changes to the formal and informal rules and expectations concerning nuclear power safety in Japan that are leading in an unpredictable direction. This institutional adjustment has received significant support from local courts, local governments and communities, and from wider civil society.

As a result, it is far from clear that the country will have a viable civil nuclear power sector in ten years’ time.¹¹⁹ Continued delays in NRA approvals and rising costs may persuade operators to abandon their nuclear reactors and invest in other forms of energy such as renewables. Such an outcome was publicly favoured by the newly appointed Minster of Environment in September 2019,¹²⁰ until he was contradicted by the METI minister soon afterwards.¹²¹ For these reasons, Japan’s nuclear power sector appears to be at a juncture that could become critical. Applying the terminology of Mahoney and Thelen,¹²² the insurrectionary and instigator of this crisis has been the Chairman of the NRA Commission, Dr Fuketa.

On the other hand, it is worth recalling the analysis of Rinschild and others which concluded that the lack of a strong conflict of interests before the accident and the absence of a radically different consensus after the event renders the radical transformation of Japan’s nuclear industry unlikely at present.¹²³ While the original architecture of the Nuclear Village has been dismantled, a slightly modified nuclear complex persists, comprising the current Prime Minster Abe and LDP government, METI and numerous members of the Atomic Energy Association. Outside this reformed Nuclear Village lie the NRA, local municipal governments and communities, the wider public and those nuclear reactor operators that chose to exit the industry.

Support for the continued existence of nuclear power in Japan, albeit at a lower level, is justified on the grounds of energy security as well as the need to sustain an important manufacturing and service industry. However, it will be politically difficult for the government to challenge or remove the current NRA Chairman, Dr Fuketa, before his term expires in 2022. This will be after the next general election for the House of Representatives that must be held in or before October 2021. Thus, the appointment of a new Chairman of the NRA will be the responsibility of a new government, most probably of the LDP.

Despite its many unique characteristics, Japan’s nuclear industry is embedded in the institutional environment of the national economic, political and societal contexts. As briefly documented above, some key moves have been made to weaken the power of the iron triangle in the economy, and civil society has become more active. Nevertheless, a number of longstanding features of Japanese society act to restrain change. The importance of hierarchy and the collective, lifetime employment and great loyalty to the employing organisation, and the culture of male bonding at work all act to promote groupthink and weaken the willingness to challenge authority or dissent from the consensus.¹²⁴ These features have critical implications for nuclear safety, because safety culture relies on the individual not the collective.¹²⁵

Finally, there are the issues of secrecy and accountability. Public pressure is succeeding to some extent in creating greater transparency. However, organisations remain unwilling to stand accountable for their actions. This may reflect a belief that the institutional structure is sacrosanct.¹²⁶ In this context it is notable that three senior TEPCO executives were acquitted in a criminal trial of failing to prevent the Fukushima nuclear accident.¹²⁷ Further, the English term ‘accountability’ is said to translate into Japanese as ‘responsibility to explain’.¹²⁸

In conclusion, Japan’s civil nuclear power industry has undergone significant institutional change, at least temporarily, due to the actions of the NRA, headed by Dr Toyoshi Fuketa. The agency has taken advantage of its effective independence to apply higher safety standards in such a way that reactor restarts are taking longer and costing much more than initially anticipated. Combined with the actions of local courts, administrations and communities, this regulatory strategy is increasing the likelihood that nuclear plant operators will either choose to or be obliged to decommission their reactors rather than continue upgrading to meet the new standards. This would severely undermine the current government’s energy and industrial strategies. Whether or not this juncture becomes truly critical and results in the demise of the country’s nuclear power industry is unpredictable. The outcome will depend to a great extent on the policies and authority of the next government and the influence of the rump Nuclear Village.

The experience of Japan in its reform of nuclear energy regulation has lessons for other countries with mature nuclear power industries. Of critical importance is the way in which a nation’s nuclear industry is deeply embedded in the wider institutional environment – in other words, the wider polity and economy. Not just energy security is at stake. The industry is also likely to be a major provider of jobs, a source of industrial and technological prestige, and an earner of export revenue. It may also be closely linked to military applications and aspirations. The consequences are twofold. First, governments of countries with a nuclear power industry that is seen to be of strategic importance will allow its demise only with great reluctance. Second, measures to reform the way in which nuclear safety is governed will only achieve sustained success with a high level of political support and if accompanied by reforms in the wider institutional environment.

Notes

1 The National Diet of Japan, The Official Report of the Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission (The National Diet of Japan 2012) www.nirs.org/wp-content/uploads/fukushima/naiic_report.pdf accessed 17 July 2019 (National Diet Report); The Independent Investigation Commission on the Fukushima Nuclear Accident, The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station Disaster: Investigating Myth and Reality (Routledge 2014) (Funabashi Report); and the Investigation Committee on the Accident at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Stations of the Tokyo Electric Power Company, Final Report (Investigation Committee on the Accident at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Stations of the Tokyo Electric Power Company 2012) www.cas.go.jp/jp/seisaku/icanps/eng accessed 17 July 2019 (Hatamura Report).

2 Adrian Rinschild and others, ‘Why Do Junctures Become Critical? Political Discourse, Agency, and Joint Belief Shifts in Comparative Perspective’ (2019) Regulation and Governance https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/rego.12238 accessed 10 June 2019.

3 Vlado Vivoda and Geordan Graetz, ‘Nuclear Policy and Regulation in Japan after Fukushima: Navigating the Crisis’ (2015) 45 Journal of Contemporary Asia 490.

4 Richard J Samuels, 3.11: Disaster and Change in Japan (Cornell University Press 2013).

5 Ibid; David Pilling, Bending Adversity: Japan and the Art of Survival (Allen Lane 2014).

6 R Taggart Murphy, Japan and the Shackles of the Past (Oxford University Press 2014).

7 Douglass C North, Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance (Cambridge University Press 1990); Douglass C North, Understanding the Process of Economic Change (Princeton University Press 2005).

8 James Mahoney and Kathleen Thelen, ‘A Theory of Gradual Institutional Change’ in James Mahoney and Kathleen Thelen (eds), Explaining Institutional Change: Ambiguity, Agency and Power (Cambridge University Press 2010).

9 Oliver E Williamson, ‘The New Institutional Economics: Taking Stock, Looking Ahead’ (2000) 38 Journal of Economic Literature 595.

10 Paul Pierson, Politics in Time: History, Institutions, and Social Analysis (Princeton University Press 2004).

11 North, Institutions, Institutional Change (n 7).

12 Thrainn Eggertsson, Imperfect Institutions: Possibilities and Limits of Reform (University of Michigan Press 2005); John L Campbell, Institutional Change and Globalization (Princeton University Press 2004).

13 Peter A Hall and Rosemary CR Taylor, ‘Political Science and the Three Institutionalisms’ (1996) 44 Political Studies 936.

14 Mahoney and Thelen (n 8).

15 Richard Colignon and Chikako Usui, ‘The Resilience of Japan’s Iron Triangle’ (2001) 41 Asian Survey 865.

16 Kiyoshi Kurokawa and Andrea Ryoko Ninomiya, ‘Examining Regulatory Capture: Looking Back at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Disaster, Seven Years Later’ (2018) 13 University of Pennsylvania Asian Law Review 47.

17 Junnosuke Masumi, Contemporary Politics in Japan (Lonny E Carlile tr, University of California Press 1995).

18 Murphy (n 6).

19 Jeff Kingston, Japan in Transformation, 1945–2010 (Longman 2011).

20 Peter A Hall and David Soskice (eds), Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage (Oxford University Press 2001).

21 Fumihito Gotoh, ‘Industrial Associations as Ideational Platforms: Why Japan Resisted American-style Shareholder Capitalism’ (2020) 33 The Pacific Review 125.

22 Hironori Sasada, The Evolution of the Japanese Developmental State (Routledge 2013).

23 Roland Dore, ‘The Residual Japaneseness of Japanese Corporate Governance’ in Hideko Magara and Stefano Sacchi (eds), The Politics of Structural Reforms: Social and Industrial Policy Change in Italy and Japan (Edward Elgar 2013) 25.

24 Colignon and Usui (n 15).

25 Gotoh (n 21).

26 Dore (n 23).

27 Kingston (n 19).

28 Motoshi Suzuki, ‘Japan’s Structural Reform in the Age of Economic Globalization: The Politics of Coordination and Miscoordination’ in Hideko Magara and Stefano Sacchi (eds), The Politics of Structural Reforms: Social and Industrial Policy Change in Italy and Japan (Edward Elgar 2013) 84.

29 Gotoh (n 21).

30 Daniel P Aldrich, ‘Rethinking Civil Society–State Relations in Japan after the Fukushima Accident’ (2013) 45 Polity 249; Brendan M Howe and Jennifer S Oh, ‘The Fukushima Nuclear Disaster and the Challenges of Japanese Democratic Governance’ (2013) 44 Korea Observer 495.

31 Jeff Kingston, Japan’s Quiet Revolution: Politics, Economics and Society (Routledge 2004).

32 Elsie Tipton, Modern Japan: A Social and Political History (Routledge 2016).

33 Jeff Kingston, ‘Japan’s Nuclear Village’ (2012) 10(37), Article No. 1. The Asia-Pacific Journal 1; Vivoda and Graetz (n 3).

34 Jacques EC Hymans, ‘After Fukushima: Veto Players and Japanese Nuclear Policy’ in Frank Baldwin and Anne Allison (eds), Japan: The Precarious Years Ahead (New York University Press 2015) 110; Hideaki Shiroyama, ‘Nuclear Safety Regulation in Japan and Impacts of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident’ in Joohong Ahn and others (eds), Reflections on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident: Toward Social-Scientific Literacy and Engineering Resilience (Springer 2015) 283.

35 Shiroyama (n 34).

36 Elena Shadrina, ‘Fukushima Fallout: Gauging the Change in Japanese Nuclear Energy Policy’ (2012) 3 International Journal of Disaster Risk Science 69.

37 Hymans (n 34).

38 Howe and Oh (n 30).

39 Sherry Martin Murphy, ‘Grassroots Democrats and the Japanese State after Fukushima’ (2014) 2 Japanese Political Science Review 19.

40 Ibid.

41 International Atomic Energy Agency, Integrated Regulatory Review Service (IRRS) to Japan (IAEA-NSNI-IRRS-2007/01) (IAEA 2007) www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/documents/review-missions/irrs_mission_to_japan_jun_2007.pdf accessed 7 April 2019.

42 National Diet Report (n 1); Funabashi Report (n 1); Hatamura Report (n 1).

43 National Diet Report (n 1).

44 Funabashi Report (n 1).

45 Taketoshi Taniguchi and Hideaki Shiroyama, ‘Long-term and Cross-sectoral Management of Interconnected Events: The Case of the Fukushima Nuclear Accident’ (2017) 5 International Relations and Diplomacy 521.

46 Shiroyama (n 34).

47 International Atomic Energy Agency (n 41).

48 Hatamura Report (n 1).

49 Funabashi Report (n 1).

50 National Diet Report (n 1); Funabashi Report (n 1); Kingston (n 33).

51 National Diet Report (n 1); Jeff Kingston, ‘Mismanaging Risk and the Fukushima Nuclear Crisis’ (2012) 10(12), Article No. 4. The Asia-Pacific Journal 4; Shiroyama (n 34).

52 Funabashi Report (n 1).

53 National Diet Report (n 1).

54 Hatamura Report (n 1); Shiroyama (n 34).

55 Kingston (n 33).

56 Shiroyama (n 34).

57 Funabashi Report (n 1).

58 Hatamura Report (n 1); Funabashi Report (n 1).

59 Funabashi Report (n 1).

60 Kingston (n 51).

61 Charles Perrow, ‘Fukushima and the Inevitability of Accidents’ (2011) 67(6) Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 44.

62 Kingston (n 33).

63 National Diet Report (n 1).

64 Ibid.

65 Kingston (n 33).

66 Hatamura Report (n 1); Taniguchi and Shiroyama (n 45).

67 Sulfikar Amir and Kohta Juraku, ‘Undermining Disaster: Engineering and Epistemological Bias in the Fukushima Nuclear Crisis’ (2014) 6 Engineering Studies 210.

68 Kingston (n 33); Kingston (n 51); Aldrich (n 30).

69 Kingston (n 33); Shadrina (n 36).

70 Murphy (n 39).

71 Aldrich (n 30); Murphy (n 39).

72 Koichi Hasegawa, ‘The Fukushima Nuclear Accident and Japan’s Civil Society: Context, Reactions, and Policy Impacts’ (2014) 29 International Sociology 283.

73 Ibid.

74 National Diet Report (n 1); Hatamura Report (n 1).

75 Hatamura Report (n 1).

76 National Diet Report (n 1).

77 Ibid.

78 Ibid, 9.

79 International Atomic Energy Agency, Integrated Regulatory Review Service (IRRS) Mission to Japan (IAEA-NS-IRRS-2016) (IAEA 2016) www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/documents/review-missions/irrs_mission_report_japan_2016.pdf accessed 9 June 2019.

80 Nuclear Regulation Authority, Japan, ‘Nuclear Regulation for the People and the Environment’ (NRA undated) www.nsr.go.jp/data/000067218.pdf accessed 2 June 2019.

81 Jeff Kingston, ‘Nuclear Power Politics in Japan, 2011–2013’ (2013) 37 Asian Perspective 501.

82 Shadrina (n 36).

83 Nuclear Regulation Authority, ‘Budget’ (in Japanese) www.nsr.go.jp/nra/seisakujikkou/budget/index.html accessed 17 July 2019.

84 Anonymous, ‘Beleaguered Japan Atomic Energy Commission to Survive but in Lesser Role’ (Japan Times, 11 December 2013) www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/12/11/national/beleaguered-japan-atomic-energy-commission-to-survive-but-in-lesser-role/#.XPSTf4gzaUk accessed 17 April 2019.

85 Jeffrey B Kucharski and Hironobu Unesaki, ‘An Institutional Analysis of the Japanese Energy Transition’ (2018) 29 Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions 126.

86 Nuclear Damage Liability Facility Fund and Tokyo Electric Power Company, Comprehensive Special Business Plan (Outline) (TEPCO 2012) www7.tepco.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/hd05-02-06-001-120509_1-e.pdf accessed 10 August 2019; Tokyo Electric Power Company, New Comprehensive Special Business Plan (TEPCO 2014) www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/betu14_e/images/140115e0205.pdf accessed 10 August 2019; Tokyo Electric Power Company, Outline of the ‘Revised Comprehensive Special Business Plan (The Third Plan)’ (TEPCO undated) www7.tepco.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/170518e0101.pdf accessed 10 August 2019.

87 Anonymous, ‘New Nuclear Regulation Agency Lined with Nuclear Promoters’ (Japan Press Weekly, 25 September 2012) www.japan-press.co.jp/s/news/index.php?id=4147 accessed 23 May 2019.

88 Jeff Kingston, ‘Abe’s Nuclear Renaissance: Energy Politics in Post-3.11 Japan’ (2014) 46 Critical Asian Studies 461.

89 Hymans (n 34).

90 International Atomic Energy Agency (n 79).

91 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

92 Noriko Behling, Mark C Williams and Shunsuke Managi, ‘Regulating Japan’s Nuclear Power Industry to Achieve Zero Accidents’ (2019) 127 Energy Policy 308.

93 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

94 Ibid.

95 Shin-etsu Sugawara and Tomoaki Inamura, Development and Application of Nuclear Safety Goals in Japan – Lessons Learnt from the Case of 2003 Draft Safety Goals (Socio-Economic Research Center Report No Y15016, CRIEPI 2015) (in Japanese); Akira Yamaguchi, Junko Takeuchi and Shin-etsu Sugawara, Safety Goals Reconsidered – Why Do We Need Safety Goals? (Study Group on Safety Goals 2018) (in Japanese).

96 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

97 Ibid.

98 Ibid.

99 World Nuclear Association, ‘Nuclear Power in Japan’ (updated to August 2019) www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-g-n/japan-nuclear-power.aspx accessed 10 October 2019.

100 Asahi Shimbun, ‘TEPCO to Pour 222 Billion Yen into Tokai No.2 Nuclear Plant’ (Asahi Shimbun, 29 October 2019) www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201910290042.html accessed 10 November 2019.

101 Reuters, ‘Japan’s TEPCO to Submit Decommissioning Plan Regarding Five Reactors’ (Reuters Business News, 23 August 2019) www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-nuclear-tepco-decommissioning/japans-tepco-to-submit-decommissioning-plan-regarding-five-reactors-media-idUSKCN1VD0PL accessed 18 September 2019.

102 Japan Atomic Industrial Forum, ‘NPPs in Japan’ www.jaif.or.jp/en/npps-in-japan accessed 18 November 2019.

103 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

104 World Nuclear Association (n 99); Japan Atomic Industrial Forum (n 102).

105 Tokyo Electric Power Company, TEPCO Integrated Report 2017 www7.tepco.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/hd05-02-03-002-tir2017_01-e.pdf accessed 10 August 2019.

106 Atsuko Kitada, ‘Public Opinion Changes after Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant Accident to Nuclear Power Generation as Seen in Continuous Polls over the Past 30 Years’ (2016) 53 Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology 1686; Tatsujiro Suzuki, ‘Nuclear Energy Policy Issues in Japan After the Fukushima Nuclear Accident: An Analysis of “Polarized Debate” in Japan’ (2019) Intechopen www.intechopen.com/online-first/nuclear-energy-policy-after-the-fukushima-nuclear-accident-an-analysis-of-polarized-debate-in-japan accessed 20 August 2019.

107 Aldrich (n 30).

108 Kingston (n 88); Hasegawa (n 72).

109 Suzuki (n 106).

110 Aldrich (n 30).

111 Howe and Oh (n 30).

112 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

113 Howe and Oh (n 30).

114 Suzuki (n 106).

115 Ibid.

116 Interviews in Tokyo carried out by the author in May 2019.

117 Murphy (n 6); Pilling (n 5).

118 Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry, Strategic Energy Plan 2018 (provisional English translation) www.meti.go.jp/english/press/2018/pdf/0703_002c.pdf accessed 10 May 2019.

119 Sumiko Takeuchi, ‘Is There a Future for Nuclear Power in Japan?’ (The Japan Times, 16 July 2019) www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/07/16/business/future-nuclear-power-japan/#.XddMHOgzaUk accessed 7 October 2019.

120 Justin McCurry, ‘Japan Should Scrap Nuclear Reactors after Fukushima, Says New Environment Minister’ (The Guardian, London, 12 September 2019) www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/12/japan-should-scrap-nuclear-reactors-after-fukushima-says-new-environment-minister accessed 23 October 2019.

121 Michael MacArthur Bosack, ‘The Humbling of Shinjiro Koizumi’ (The Japan Times, 21 October 2019) www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2019/10/21/commentary/japan-commentary/humbling-shinjiro-koizumi/#.XddHV-gzaUk accessed 23 October 2019.

122 Mahoney and Thelen (n 8).

123 Rinschild and others (n 2).

124 Murphy (n 6); Kurokawa and Ninomiya (n 16).

125 William E Kastenberg, ‘Ethics, Risk and Safety Culture: Reflections on Fukushima and Beyond’ in Joohong Ahn and others (eds), Reflections on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident: Toward Social-Scientific Literacy and Engineering Resilience (Springer 2015) 165–87.

126 Murphy (n 6).

127 Justin McCurry, ‘Fukushima Disaster: Japanese Power Company Chiefs Cleared of Negligence’ (The Guardian, London, 19 September 2019) www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/19/fukushima-disaster-japanese-power-company-chiefs-cleared-of-negligence accessed 23 October 2019.

128 Kurokawa and Ninomiya (n 16).