Kang Sang-jung, who became the first professor at the University of Tokyo as a Korean citizen. Central photo
“In Japan, the word “East Japan Great Jinjae” is used. It is an expression that emphasizes that it is a natural disaster. The great earthquake was meant to dilute what was a tragedy involving terrible human resources.”
Kang Sang-jung (71), an emeritus professor at the University of Tokyo. I asked him about the earthquake 10 years ago, a representative intellectual in Japan who was the first Korean nationality holder to be appointed as a full professor at the University of Tokyo and served as the president of Seigakuin University. In an interview conducted by e-mail on the 9th, he first questioned the name. It is pointed out that in the political world, the shadow of human resources is hidden and it is trying to emphasize the point that it is a natural disaster. For him, the Great East Japan Earthquake was the same talent as the Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident in Russia in 1986. It was also an incident that shook Japanese society beyond an accident caused by a simple natural disaster. This is the conclusion he came to the site immediately after the earthquake. According to the official count of the Japanese National Police Agency, the number of deaths due to the earthquake that occurred on March 11, 2011 amounted to 1,5894, and thousands of people were missing.
Ten years have passed since the earthquake, but he points out that there are a lot of problems in Japanese society. This is because the Japanese people lost trust in science and technology as well as the government’s energy policy after the accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant. The following is the summary of questions and answers.
- Please diagnose Japanese society after the earthquake.
- Various changes deviated from each other, confronted or resonated, and showed complex movements. The first important change is a large-scale development that has been pursued to prevent the expansion of the aftermath of the nuclear accident. (Great Earthquake) It is not a restoration to revert to the previous one, but a new change that does not leave an original form. That is, development from above. A typical example is that the Tokyo Olympics were nailed down as the’Revival Olympics’.
- Do you think such large-scale development helps to overcome the trauma of the Great East Japan Earthquake?
- Earthquakes and nuclear accidents are not problems that can be solved by fully operating a strong governance structure in the’top down’ method. If these disasters were only a major earthquake and tsunami, the people would have been able to get rid of the trauma by restoring infrastructure and developing new land through the’National Land Strengthening Project’ (exhibited by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe). However, the nuclear accident and radioactive contamination were serious problems, and this is not simply a problem to be solved by a national project.
A miracle pine tree on the coast of Rikuzen Takata, Iwate Prefecture, Japan. It is the only surviving pine tree among 70,000 pine trees during the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. Central photo
- What politicians and social leaders should do.
- Careful support and care for human life and life are needed. It is to make a’participatory democracy’ in which citizens actively intervene in regional regeneration. Although some politicians and leaders tried to use it for state affairs, in reality, it was only used to enforce top-down governance, and it seems to have become a dragon head. For this reason, I am concerned that many people, regardless of conservatism and progress, are greatly disappointed in politics, democracy, and autonomy and have been obsessed with resignation.
According to the Japan Reconstruction Agency, which was established for the purpose of recovering from the great earthquake, 41,000 people are still evacuating due to the Great East Japan Earthquake. Asahi Shimbun reported on the 8th that “Of those who lived in temporary housing facilities in three prefectures such as Fukushima, where the damage was severe, 614 people died alone until last year.” Professor Kang said, “The debris of nuclear fuel that has flowed to the ground is not even understood,” he said. “The problem is still in abundance, and we don’t know how many people have been abandoned.”
Professor Sangjoong Kang personally visited the site of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and pondered life and death. Central photo
The Great East Japan Earthquake had a great influence on Professor Kang’s life. A few months before the earthquake, my son, who was in his twenties, died on his own. Seeing the tragedy of the Great East Japan Earthquake, he recalled the words of his son, “The misery is in (me) not outside the world.” I ran to the field. I saw other deaths. People nevertheless asked whether they should end up living. He said, “I still can’t forget the smell that I smelled when I visited the coast of Soma City, where the damage was great.”
The sadness and worries at this time were also contained in his books 『The Reason to Live』 and 『Heart』. Published in 2013, 『Mind』 is a novel with an autobiographical experience in which Naohiro Nishiyama, a college student who is confused after the death of a friend, talks about life and death through e-mail exchanges with writer Kang Sang-jung. More than 300,000 copies were sold in Japan alone. The protagonist Naohiro is also the name of Professor Kang’s son who passed away. He said, “The pain of losing my son will not be healed in the future.”
![In 2013, Professor Sangjoong Kang's autobiographical experience, The Heart, has sold over 300,000 copies in Japan. [사계절 출판사]](https://i0.wp.com/pds.joins.com/news/component/htmlphoto_mmdata/202103/10/8d9df83f-379b-493a-ae19-47541d548fa5.jpg?w=560&ssl=1)
In 2013, Professor Sangjoong Kang’s autobiographical experience, The Heart, has sold over 300,000 copies in Japan. [사계절 출판사]
In the end, he concludes that what is needed to overcome pain is’human empathy’. It means that’salvation’ is what those who bear the wounds that cannot be healed even after time accept each other humanly. He explained that it suggests that Korea should consider how to create a diverse and prosperous society even in Korea, which has social problems similar to those of Japan, such as low birthrate, aging, and polarization.
After visiting Korea in 1972, Professor Kang, the second generation of Koreans in Japan, abandoned his Japanese name, Nagano Tetsuo, and used a Korean name. He also published 『Zainichi(在日)』, which contains the concerns of Koreans in Japan. In 2009, “The Power to Contemplate” is a best-selling author with over 1 million copies sold in Japan. Last month, he published 『The Future of the Korean Peninsula and Japan』 (The Four Seasons Publishing House), which explored the relationship between the Korean Peninsula, Japan and neighboring countries and sought ways to resolve the conflict between Korea and Japan. The translation was handled by Noh Soo-kyung, who has already worked with him on eight books.
Reporter Kim Sun-mi [email protected]
