Conservation of the environment of the Seto Inland sea
Title:
Conservation of the environment of the Seto Inland sea
Author:
Akaha, Tsuneo
Appeared in:
Coastal management
Paging:
Volume 12 (1984) nr. 1 pages 83-136
Year:
1984
Contents:
Governments everywhere are under pressure to respond promptly to complex problems facing their citizens. The stronger the pressure and the more urgent the problem at hand, the greater will be the incentive for governments to take some action. On the other hand, the more complex the problem and the greater the uncertainty surrounding the nature of the problem and effective solutions to it, the greater will be the inclination of governments to postpone policy response. This case study describes how the Japanese government, under prefectural, regional, and national pressures, developed its response to urgent environmental problems in the Seto Inland Sea marine and coastal areas from a set of ad hoc measures to a provisional policy systematic in intent but lacking in content and eventually to a permanent, systematic, and coordinated—yet incomplete—system of legislative-administrative measures. The study explains the progressive policy development process and the substantive problems and limitations of the policy at each stage largely as a consequence of the interaction between (1) political pressures on the policy system and (2) uncertainties regarding the government's action which resulted from a lack of (a) scientific information about the nature and extent of the environmental problem and (b) technical information regarding the effectiveness of alternative policy measures.
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