徒法不能以自行：2011年東日本大地震日本政府救災工作之檢討

The Japanese Government and Citizens' Response to the Tohoku Earthquake, 2011

2011年3月，發生於日本東海地區的大地震造成嚴重生命、財產損失。此次地震亦暴露當前日本防災制度中若干有待改進之處：根源自傳統官場文化，政府缺乏有效的領導力量，致使中央與地方官員無法於災後第一時間做出積極而有效的指揮；救援行動的缺乏效率，嚴重影響人民對政府的信心與信任；缺乏足夠的專業人員也使得災情不斷擴大。本研究在對照1995年日本政府處理阪神大地震的經驗後發現，公私協力災害治理網絡並未達到預期所應發揮的功效，甚至產生「治理失靈」情形。災害發生時，主要乃依靠市民團體以及公民組織的積極參與，協助救災及災區復原重建工作。然而傳統上強調絕對服從的政治文化、疊床架屋的組織設計，以及地方政府間的財政困境，嚴重阻礙了政府機關的救災效率，更引發政治風暴。本研究建議：基於公民社會已然成為災害治理網絡中之要角，日本政府應強化互利互惠之協作關係，使公民社會與政府有效結合、積極參與各項環境與災害治理建設工作，不但可降低政府施政成本、提昇施政效率，進而提升民間社會與人民對抗災害之韌性。如何有效運用最新資訊科技，以防止因災害而產生資訊傳遞困難，使政府無法在第一時間有效掌握最新災情之弊病，則為當前環境與災害治理中另一項關鍵課題。

On Friday, 11 March, 2011, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake attacked the Tohoku region which located in the northeast Japan. It is the most powerful known earthquake to have hit Japan in history. Following the earthquake, a tsunami hit the coastal area of northeast Japan. In responding to the earthquake in 2011, the government, especially in the central level, did not perform as well as expected. The low-efficiency and lacking a strong leadership weakened the government officials' performance. Still, the unexpected huge damages which destroyed local communication and direction system in disaster area also delayed rescue and recovery actions seriously. In this paper, experiences in response to a similar case (Kobe earthquake in 1995) are compared to find out that the public-private cooperation network in local emergency management affairs did not work well to enhance Japanese government's disaster response efforts. The traditional Japanese political culture, inappropriate institution design and financial crisis among local governments led to low efficiency of disaster response in Tohoku Earthquake. Japanese government is suggested to enhance its cooperation with civil society to jointly devote to disaster and environmental governance works to have less costs, better efficiency and resilience. How to use information technology to enhance the information transportation in disaster response has been a critical issue as well.