The Collaborative Partnership during Disaster Rescue: Using Tohoku Earthquake as an Example
Shu-Hsin Lin*
Abstract
Japan is located in an area of high seismicity, and earthquakes have brought devastating damages and destructions to the country. But Japan has always been a leading country in the fields of disaster education, disaster preparedness (for example: disaster drills) and emergency rescues, which have led to a significant improvement for disaster rescue and prevention. Although the 2011 Tohoku earthquake had devastated Japan, the public-private collaboration in rescue has provided an opportunity for the global community to study and reflect on.
Study shows that during the rescue of Tohoku Earthquake victims, Japan had established the system of mutual assistance and made good use of division of labor, carrying out horizontal cross-boundary governance which reduced effectively the negative impacts that might have arose from the disaster. However, the challenges that lies ahead is what the government can do to strengthen the partner relationship during emergency and to resolve the heavy financial burden of horizontal partnerships. Moreover, we have learnt from Japan’s experience that although disaster prevention activities are mainly led by government, we will still need to utilize the power of intermediate organizations to integrate private resources with public ones so that we can achieve the goal of reducing damages caused by disaster. Finally, the institutionalization of cross-boundary governance for disaster prevention and the capacity of public-private partnerships for managing different issues are what Taiwan can learn from.
Keywords: disaster management, Tohoku earthquake, public-private partnership, wide area administration, non-profit organization
* Professor, Department of Public Administration and Policy, National Taipei University, email: susin@mail.ntpu.edu.tw