Following the article, the author J. Kenens has published another paper "Changing perspectives: tracing the evolution of citizen radiation measuring organizations after Fukushima (2020)" DOI: 10.1051/radiopro/2020041 (link) that draws on the research on citizen science in Japan with a new focus on the comparison of their practices directly after the nuclear accident and today.
It is interesting to see how citizen science in Japan is enacted and how the concept of citizen science is dependent to the social and cultural context. Also looking at it not only from a top-down perspective, where universities or organizations are involved, but also the bottom-up perspective that includes only those practices that are done by citizens alone opens up a new space. As I am currently engaging with research on air pollution in different sites, I could build from this text in considering the link between "citizen-driven approaches and institutional imparatives in the governance" (p. 7) of issues with air pollution.
The text is an article about citizen science in the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster in 2011. The first noteworthy detail about this text that struck me is the inclusion of Japanese words and even their original spelling. This creates a kind of closeness to the field that the authors did their research in.
The authors engaged in multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork that took place in and around Fukushima but also in other geografical sites like Tochigi, Miyagi, Aichi, Tokyo and Kyoto. There, they conduct semi-structured interviews with various organisations that are all somehow involved with citizen science or radiation measurement. To learn about the citizens that measure radioactivity and create their own data on radiation because of a lack of provided data by the government, a literature review of policy documents and workshops with those citizen scientists is performed.
“The Hague Street inquest featured many experts, none with the authority to effect real change. The result was a blanket of blame that covered everyone”
"Blame, memorial, and reconstruction tend to outpace technical consensus."
"Investigators had no power to protest the decision. In fact, their initial request to inspect the steel had been lost in the confusion by city officials still pressed with the responsibility of looking for bodies."
More scientific data and perspectives from public health officials could be used to broaden the perspective of this film and change its purpose from being an emotional film to being a more educational film.
The DHS embarked on the process of researching, collecting, and compiling data for this report durring the summer and fall of 2011.
Vincanne Adams - Former director of Medical Anthropology with UC Berkeley.
Diana English - Assistant Professor at Stanford Hospital and Clinics.
Taslim van Hattum - Director of Behavioral Health Integration for the Louisiana Public Health Institute. Research focuses on public health.
Detailed research into historical cases was done to produce the claims and arguements presented in this article. No new investigation was conducted to obtain support for the arguement, and the historical cases were used to draw ties with the ongoing investigations taking place at the World Trade Center site.