Yoneyama, Shoko

Abstract
German sociologist Ulrich Beck writes that Japan has become part of the ‘World Risk Society’ as a result of the 2011 nuclear accident in Fukushima.¹ By World Risk Society he means a society threatened by such things as nuclear accidents, climate change, and the global financial crisis, presenting a catastrophic risk beyond geographical, temporal, national and social boundaries. According to Beck, such risk is an unfortunate by-product of modernity, and poses entirely new challenges to our existing institutions, which attempt to control it using current, known means.² As Gavan McCormack points out, ‘Japan, as one of the most successful capitalist countries in history, represents in concentrated form problems facing contemporary industrial civilization as a whole’.³ The nuclear, social, and institutional predicaments it now faces epitomise the negative consequences of intensive modernisation.
The stalemate over nuclear energy – the restart of Ohi reactors and the massive citizens’ protest against it – suggests that we are indeed at a significant crossroad. But what is the issue? A quick look at the anti-nuclear demonstrations shows that the slogan, ‘Life is more important than money!’, is ubiquitous, suggesting that many citizens see a problem not only with nuclear power generation but also with something more fundamental: the prioritisation of economy over life. The fact that such an obvious proposition has to be raised as a point of protest indicates the depth of the problem. How is this rather extreme dichotomy between life and the economy to be faced at this point of modern history? And what will be Japan’s contribution, if any, in envisaging a new kind of modernity?
This paper explores these questions by drawing upon the notion of ‘life-world’ presented by OGATA Masato,⁴ a Minamata philosopher-fisherman whose ideas developed in response to the Minamata disease disasters in the mid-1950s.⁵ It discusses this concept in order to reflect on the relationship between nature and humankind in an attempt to envision a new kind of modernity that does not generate self-destructive risks as denoted by the notion of ‘World Risk Society’.
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