Local Environmental Problems and the Alienation of Climate Change Issues: A Case Study of the Sakura Shrimp Fishery at Suruga Bay, Japan

• Published in: Journal of Environmental Sociology Vol. 26; pp. 60 - 79
• Main Author: TOMITA, Ryoto
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Japanese
• Published: Japanese Association for Environmental Sociology 05.12.2020; 環境社会学会
• Subjects: Climate Change Issues; Dynamism of Knowledge Fragmentation and Reconstruction; Sakura Shrimp; Social Acceptance; Suruga Bay; サクラエビ; 気候変動問題; 知識の断片化と再構成; 社会的受容; 駿河湾
• ISSN: 2434-0618
• DOI: 10.24779/jpkankyo.26.0_60

It is often pointed out that Japan’s response to climate change has been insufficient. This is not simply due to a shortfall of effort, technological development and “right knowledge” by the parties concerned, but rather to a lack of social acceptance of climate change issues locally. At a local level, knowledge about environmental issues can become fragmented resulting in the problems being alienated from people’s reality. Not only does this prevent social acceptance of environmental problems and action to solve them, but actually exacerbates them.This study sets forth an analysis of the sakura shrimp fishery at Suruga Bay, central Japan, and considers a solution for the alienation of climate change issues as they are encountered within the context of local environmental problems. As a result, the following three causes of the alienation were highlighted. First, the people involved in the sakura shrimp fishery have fragmented knowledge of the sea itself. Second, it is difficult for stakeholders to foresee the cost of time caused by carrying out countermeasures because climate change problems are outside of their experienced knowledge. Third, the unwillingness to accept responsibility for insufficient sakura shrimp resource management in the past by the stake-holders concerned. In order to solve this problem, it was suggested that comprehensive knowledge including, not only scientific knowledge, but also local, indigenous knowledge about the marine environment and the sakura shrimp fishery, should be reconstructed and shared, and a convincing process should be carried out explicitly and openly to the community.In conclusion, this solution has been produced employing a conventional environmental sociological approach. It demonstrates that environmental sociologists can contribute to over-coming the alienation of climate change issues confronted at a local level.