Deprivation of Media Attention
by Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident:
Comparison Between National and Local
Newspapers
Ryuma Shineha and Mikihito Tanaka
Abstract On March 11th in 2011, a huge earthquake and tsunami struck Japan and
caused severe accidents at the Fukushima first nuclear power plant (NPP). The
impact and damages of these triple disasters, called “3.11,” continue to this day.
There was a diversity of damages and social conditions among devastated areas.
This means that this disaster struck so broad area that it brought many kinds of
“realities” to different areas. Therefore, we cannot treat the various regions that
were affected uniformly. At the same time, the attention given to the 3.11 based on
location has ultimately been covered differently between various media sources.
The aim of this paper is to share basic descriptions and media analysis of the 3.11
disasters for future discussions. Through our analysis, it is showed that there is a
different framing of the 3.11 between national and local media. The difference
implicates that it is deprived of social interest in the national newspaper by the NPP
accident, and on the other hand, the local newspaper kept their perspectives
reflecting damages from the earthquake and tsunami.
Keywords 3.11 Á Media analysis Á Newspaper Á Local media
1 Introduction
On March 11th in 2011, a huge earthquake and tsunami struck Japan and resulted in
many victims. The earthquake and tsunami caused severe accidents at the
Fukushima first nuclear power plant (NPP). The impact and damages of these triple
disasters, called “Higashi-Nihon-Daishinsai” or “3.11,” continue to this day.
R. Shineha (&)
Seijo University, Tokyo, Japan
e-mail: r_shineha@seijo.ac.jp
M. Tanaka
Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan
e-mail: steman@waseda.jp
© The Author(s) 2017
J. Ahn et al. (eds.), Resilience: A New Paradigm of Nuclear Safety,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-58768-4_9
111
by Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident:
Comparison Between National and Local
Newspapers
Ryuma Shineha and Mikihito Tanaka
Abstract On March 11th in 2011, a huge earthquake and tsunami struck Japan and
caused severe accidents at the Fukushima first nuclear power plant (NPP). The
impact and damages of these triple disasters, called “3.11,” continue to this day.
There was a diversity of damages and social conditions among devastated areas.
This means that this disaster struck so broad area that it brought many kinds of
“realities” to different areas. Therefore, we cannot treat the various regions that
were affected uniformly. At the same time, the attention given to the 3.11 based on
location has ultimately been covered differently between various media sources.
The aim of this paper is to share basic descriptions and media analysis of the 3.11
disasters for future discussions. Through our analysis, it is showed that there is a
different framing of the 3.11 between national and local media. The difference
implicates that it is deprived of social interest in the national newspaper by the NPP
accident, and on the other hand, the local newspaper kept their perspectives
reflecting damages from the earthquake and tsunami.
Keywords 3.11 Á Media analysis Á Newspaper Á Local media
1 Introduction
On March 11th in 2011, a huge earthquake and tsunami struck Japan and resulted in
many victims. The earthquake and tsunami caused severe accidents at the
Fukushima first nuclear power plant (NPP). The impact and damages of these triple
disasters, called “Higashi-Nihon-Daishinsai” or “3.11,” continue to this day.
R. Shineha (&)
Seijo University, Tokyo, Japan
e-mail: r_shineha@seijo.ac.jp
M. Tanaka
Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan
e-mail: steman@waseda.jp
© The Author(s) 2017
J. Ahn et al. (eds.), Resilience: A New Paradigm of Nuclear Safety,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-58768-4_9
111