Human Security After the Great East Japan Earthquake: Rethinking the Role of External Assistance

Abstract

As the experiences of the Great East Japan Earthquake showed, conventional aid such as sending relief goods and rescue teams may be less useful, and sometimes burdensome. Was the Japanese government’s decision to accommodate all types of offers of external assistance the best possible option from a human security viewpoint? Declining such conventional relief aid should not be denounced but understood. Non-conventional aid such as special skills to deal with the nuclear accident appeared more useful in this case, although these forms of aid require coordination and preparation in peacetime. Forging grass-roots solidarity is effective in the longer term.

Drafts of this research were presented at the International Association of Humanitarian Studies meeting in 2016, where representatives of Oxfam , Doctors without Borders, Overseas Development Institute among other organizations offered precious comments, as well as at a conference organized by Tsinghua University, Harvard Kennedy School and the China Institute for Reform and Development early in 2017 in China , where further comments were received. I greatly benefitted from the opportunity to take part in a major Federal Emergency Management Agency drill in Washington State, USA, in 2016 where I was able to contrast views from the other side of the Pacific and directly ask military personnel about external assistance . The usual disclaimer applies.