Why Onagawa Nuclear Power Station Survived the Tsunami

Kyusaku Natsume writes "While the town of Onagawa, Miyagi Prefecture, was hit hard by the March 2011 tsunami, the nuclear plant it shares with the equally devastated city of Ishinomaki survived. The reason it did so is mostly down to the personal strength and tenacity of one Yanosuke Hirai, who passed away in 1986 and insisted that the plant should have been protected by a 14.8 m tall seawall. A great quote from the article: 'Corporate ethics and compliance may be similar, but their cores are different, from the perspective of corporate social responsibility, we cannot say that there is no need to question a company's actions just because they are not a crime under the law.'"

Comments

Re:Legality

[TheGratefulNet]

JN _is_ a viable way to fight unjust laws. not just instances of injustice but whole laws.

we all know that getting laws passed (or even worse, revoked) is near impossible for regular people.

the JN option is essentially the only option we have left, as 'little people'. our power faded when corps took over making (and even sometimes enforcing) laws.

but if you are in the jury box, you DO have a way to say 'enough is enough' this is bullshit and this guy does not deserve X to happen to him. I simply don't give a shit about what law you claim he broke; sending him to prison is WRONG and I won't allow it'.

that's what JN is about. standing up for your view of ethics even in the face of 'establishment' saying otherwise.

Re:Legality

[roman_mir]

Um.. did it ever cross you mind that the weathy has a responsibility to ensure that the society which is has benifitted from immensely is sustained?

- what crossed my mind is that this is exactly the kind of thought process that destroys the society by taking away people's individual rights and killing off the economy.

There is a moral argument for providing a social safety net

- not by using majority to steal from minority. There is absolutely nothing moral or just about it.

May I remind you that there were a time when government was small - social cohesion was usually maintained by force - and the living standards of the many were squalid. Are you seriously adovcating the return to those times (just so we can compete with China on cheap labor)?

- May I remind you that there was time when USA had the most individual freedoms FROM government intervention (specifically between the Civil war and WWI) and that was the time when USA became the most productive country, becoming world's biggest creditor nation, exporting highest quality, affordable manufactured goods. All this, while increasing the strength of its own economy and making everybody who lived in it much wealthier (the dollar gained value by factor of 2, while USA still became the largest exporter of manufactured goods).

This was definitely prior to USA growing a huge government and destroying its economy and society in the process, while becoming world's greatest debtor nation not only on the planet at the time, but in history of humanity. USA is now bankrupt, only holding together by other nations providing it with the consumables that it eats without producing anything in return.

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There is no such thing as 'responsibility' of the few to maintain standard of living for many, that's pure nonsense. Voluntarism is the key, but it only works in a free society, there is no voluntarism in a totalitarian regime. Again: democracy leads to tyranny, that's what you have now.

As to 'safety net' - the best safety net that the humanity has invented is a wealthy and a growing economy based on a free individual making voluntary decisions in a market that is not perverted by the government intervention. Sadly USA has lost this very simple knowledge, so now it's losing the economy that it developed in that system.