Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”: Assessing Japanese Mass Media Coverage of International Nuclear Power Decisions

Abstract

In the aftermath of the nuclear crisis involving the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear power plant on March
11, 2011, nuclear power generation in Japan and other countries has come under close public scrutiny.
Immediately following the nuclear crisis, countries such as Switzerland and Germany that have relied
historically on nuclear power utilization started to seriously reconsider safety measures surrounding
nuclear power generation. Such considerations led to the June 2011 decision in the German Bundestag that
went into force on August 6, 2011.
In the process of determining its own domestic nuclear energy policy, assessments and evaluations of
other countries’ responses in the aftermath of “3.11” have appeared frequently in Japan’s domestic mass
media. Yet have the nuclear energy policies in certain other countries such as Germany been singled out
for comparison with Japan’s own energy strategies and priorities? Furthermore, has such coverage tended
to focus on the positive or negative aspects of nuclear energy?
In this paper, we assess the characteristics of Japanese mass media coverage of public opinion concerning
nuclear energy policy in other countries. From a methodological perspective, our research draws on a
combination of content analysis and sentiment analysis and investigates how the German case appeared in
news articles concerning nuclear power in Japan in the six-months period from March 11 to September 11,
2011, identifies the main policy actors involved, and assesses if the coverage was positive or negative.

Full text

Keywords: Nuclear energy policy, Content analysis, International policy comparisons, Japanese journalism,
Grounded theory, Framing theory, Narrative theory
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by JSPS Contract Research Grant (AAD26048) “Comparative Energy Policy and
Discourse in Japan and Germany.”
109
In the aftermath of the nuclear crisis involving the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear power plant on March
11, 2011, nuclear power generation in Japan and other countries has come under close public scr utiny.
Immediately following the nuclear crisis, countries such as Switzerland and Germany that have relied
historically on nuclear power utilization started to seriously reconsider safety measures surrounding
nuclear power generation. Such considerations led to the June 2011 decision in the German Bundestag that
went into force on August 6, 2011.
In the process of determining its own domestic nuclear energy policy, assessments and evaluations of
other countries’ responses in the aftermath of “3.11” have appeared frequently in Japan’s domestic mass
media. Yet have the nuclear energy policies in certain other countries such as Germany been singled out
for comparison with Japan’s own energy strategies and priorities? Furthermore, has such coverage tended
to focus on the positive or negative aspects of nuclear energy?
In this paper, we assess the characteristics of Japanese mass media coverage of public opinion concerning
nuclear energy policy in other countries. From a methodological perspective, our research draws on a
combination of content analysis and sentiment analysis and investigates how the German case appeared in
news articles concerning nuclear power in Japan in the six-months period from March 11 to September 11,
2011, identifies the main policy actors involved, and assesses if the coverage was positive or negative.
Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”:
Assessing Japanese Mass Media Coverage of International Nuclear Power Decisions
Manuela HARTWIG, Freie Universität Berlin,
Graduate School of East Asian Studies, Research Associate
Sae OKURA, University of Tsukuba, Master’s and Doctoral Program
in International and Advanced Japanese Studies, Ph.D. Student
Leslie TKACH-KAWASAKI, University of Tsukuba, Master’s and Doctoral Program
in International and Advanced Japanese Studies, Associate Professor
Yohei KOBASHI, Waseda University, Institute for Research in
Contemporary Political and Economic Affairs, Assistant Professor
Research Note
© 2016 Journal of International and Advanced Japanese Studies
Vol. 8, February 2016, pp. 109–124
Master’s and Doctoral Program in International and Advanced
Japanese Studies
Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences,
University of Tsukuba
Introduction
In the aftermath of the nuclear crisis involving the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear power plant on March 11,
2011, nuclear power generation in Japan and other countries has come under close public scrutiny. Immediately

following the nuclear crisis, countries such as Switzerland and Germany that have relied historically on nuclear
power utilization started to seriously reconsider safety measures surrounding nuclear power generation. Such
considerations led to the June 2011 decision in the German Bundestag that went into force on August 6, 2011.
Germany is internationally known to be at the forefront in tackling environment and energy policy issues on a
national scale under wide political and social consensus.
Germany’s coalition government of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Green Party (Bündnis 90/Die
Grünen) between 1998 and 2009 already pursued nuclear phase-out and formulated its legislative framework
into their political agenda. Only a few months before the Great East Japan Earthquake, which damaged the
nuclear reactor of the Fukushima Dai’ichi power plant run by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) and
caused the most serious nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl accident in 1986, the new government coalition
formed after the 2009 general elections of the Christian/Social-Democratic Union Party (CDU/CSU) and Free-
Liberal Party (FDP) postponed nuclear phase-out under major pressure from nuclear-energy-generating
electricity companies in Germany. But the crisis involving the nuclear power plant on March 11, 2011
immediately spurred the reintroduction of a nuclear phase-out platform which was eventually labeled as the
“phase-out of the phase-out” (Schreurs, 2012).
In the process of determining its own domestic nuclear energy policy, assessments and evaluations of other
countries’ responses in the aftermath of “3.11”1have appeared frequently in Japan’s domestic mass media. Yet
have the nuclear energy policies in other countries been singled out for comparison with Japan’s own energy
strategies and priorities? Furthermore, has such coverage tended to focus on the positive or negative aspects of
nuclear energy? Arlt and Wolling (2015: 3) have identified the “Fukushima Effect,” using this phrase to describe
“international findings on attitude changes towards nuclear power as a result of the Fukushima accident.”
However, their results show only a moderate impact of this incident in terms of attitudes towards nuclear
energy based on an analysis of German mass media coverage and survey data. In consideration of Germany’s
reaction on a wide political scale, we assess the characteristics of Japanese mass media coverage of public
opinion concerning nuclear energy policy in Germany. We are specifically interested in assessing how
Germany’s sudden energy shift as a reaction to the Fukushima incident was perceived through four major
Japanese newspapers (the Asahi, the Mainichi, the Nikkei, and the Yo m iuri).From a methodological perspective,
our research draws on a combination of content analysis and sentiment analysis, and investigates the discourse
involving Germany, drawing on news articles concerning nuclear power in Japan in the six-months period from
March 11 to September 11, 2011, identifies the main policy actors involved, and assesses if the coverage was
positive or negative.
The first section provides an overview of Japan’s legal framework regarding nuclear energy policy and the
historical background of nuclear energy in Japan, followed by a review of the literature covering the aspects of
nuclear energy determinants in Japan and characteristics of the Fukushima news coverage. Then, we discuss
briefly the theoretical framework and methodology that we draw on to explain our results. As our research
involves qualitative content analysis, framing theory, with its focus on analyzing in-depth issues or events,
serves our aim to combine content analysis and sentiment analysis of text data. We combine this theoretical
approach with constructivist grounded theory to reveal crucial issues in the research questions by coding the
data interactively instead of using predetermined parameters. We suggest that this combination of framing as a
traditional approach and grounded theory with a new approach in computer-assisted text analysis can allow us
to uncover new patterns in investigating news coverage and provides a potential solution to the critical role the
researcher takes within his/her own research in grounded theory. In section five, we discuss our main results,
Journal of International and Advanced Japanese Studies University of Tsukuba Volume 8 / February 2016
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1The phrase “3.11” (pronounced “three-eleven”) is frequently used by the Japanese people to refer to the triple disasters
that occurred on March 11, 2011 involving the Great East Japan Earthquake, the resulting tsunami, and the nuclear
accident at the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear power plant.

wherein we examine the articles in each newspaper individually, and close with a brief comparison of the
characteristics in the news coverage of the German case in the four newspapers, where we summarize our main
findings and evaluate our methodology for further research.
1. Nuclear energy discourses in Germany and Japan
Since the 1960s, anti-nuclear energy issues have been part of the political agenda in Germany. The
establishment of the Green Party (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) in 1980 and its election to the German Bundestag in
1983 defined the path for strong environmental/anti-nuclear energy policy discourse. Different than in Japan
where the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) is in charge of nuclear-energy regulations,
Germany’s nuclear-energy policy is regulated by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature
Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMUB), established in 1986 (Schreurs 2002). The red-green coalition between
the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Union 90/The Greens (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) under former
chancellor Gerhard Schröder (SPD) between 1998 and 2005 set the foundation for nuclear phase-out. With the
13th change of the Atomic Act (January 1, 1960) on July 31, 2011, as a direct response to the Fukushima
accident, the governmental coalition of the CDU/CSU and the FDP returned to a policy of phasing out nuclear
energy by 2022. Even though the effect on domestic energy policy decisions after Fukushima eventually led to
consensus between the ruling and the opposition parties, the Chernobyl catastrophe in 1986 in the Ukraine, a
close neighbor, had a lasting influence on Germany’s anti-nuclear policy path. This background of political
attention to nuclear issues made the characteristic reaction on the Fukushima disaster on public and policy
discourses in Germany possible (Seiffert & Fähnrich 2014).
The origins of Japan’s anti-nuclear movement dates back to the 1950s. The first incident involved the Lucky
Dragon No. 5 (Daigo fukury¯u maru), wherein a Japanese fishing boat was exposed to and contaminated by
nuclear fallout from the U.S. Army’s hydrogen bomb testing in March 1954. This incident was the initial
catalyst for future anti-nuclear movements in Japan. During the 1970s and 1980s, other incidents occurred such
as the Mutsu radiation leak accident in 1974, which drew limited attention to the nuclear power debate. From
the late 1970s and into the early 1980s, as a result of political and social factors, administrative reforms related
to nuclear energy were carried out, and the building of new nuclear power plants was not permitted during this
period (Honda, 2005).
However, anti-nuclear social movements faced a difficult situation after the 1980s. Labor unions that had
supported these movements were shrinking as a result of reorganization of the labor market. The Cold War
ended and the prestige of Marxism was gradually decreasing. As a result of these global and political changes,
social movements gradually lost material resources and ideological status. In the summer of 1994, the Social
Democratic Party of Japan (SDP) changed its nuclear energy strategy and accepted the use of nuclear power
plants in order to join the coalition government with the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP) and the New
Party Sakigake. At the same time, information regarding many nuclear accidents and scandals surfaced, and
social movements were activated especially at the local level. Isolated nuclear incidents continued to occur, for
example, the Tokaimura nuclear accident at a JCO2plant in September 1999, which was estimated to have
reached “level four” on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES) (Kawana, 2013: 276). In response, the Act
on Special Measures Concerning Nuclear Emergency Preparedness was enacted in the same year.
After the Fukushima accident in March 2011, Japan’s nuclear energy policies entered a complicated phase,
however it seems that the disaster did not engender fundamental policy changes. In September 2012, Noda
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
111
2Formerly the Japan Nuclear Fuel Conversion Co., which is now defunct. Source: World Nuclear Association (2013)
Tokaimura Criticality Accident 1999 (http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Safety-and-Security/Safety-of-
Plants/Tokaimura-Criticality-Accident/) (Access date: September 20, 2015).

Yoshihiko, a DPJ (Democratic Party of Japan) politician and the former prime minister from September 2011 to
December 2012, devised new energy and environmental strategies that included halting the operation of all
nuclear power plants by the 2030s. Also, new regulatory standards were formulated in 2013, and nuclear safety
regulations were strengthened substantially (Yamaguchi, 2013: 1, 8-9). However, Noda decided to restart the
nuclear power plants which were sitting idly after the Fukushima Disaster in order to meet energy demand, and
the ¯
Oi nuclear power plant located in Fukui prefecture was restarted in July 2012. Also, the Sendai nuclear
power plant located in Kagoshima prefecture was restarted in August 2015, based on a decision made by prime
minister Abe Shinzo.
Japan and Germany have been part of international environmental and anti-nuclear movements since the
early post-war era and political responses towards environmental issues have prominently figured in news
coverage. Even though Japan experienced nuclear accidents prior to Fukushima, even afterwards, anti-nuclear
movements have struggled to encourage public discourse which could influence political decisions. Yet strong
ties between the LDP-led government and economic ministries with industry contacts have dominated the
discourse (Hartwig et al. 2014). In contrast, the energy industry in Germany has been active in promoting
renewable/clean energies and favors nuclear phase-out, which, in tur n, has been reflected in environmental/anti-
nuclear public opinion in the mass media.
2. Literature Review
(1) Determinants of Japan’s nuclear policies
There are numerous studies that focus on both domestic and international factors that determine nuclear
policy in Japan. First, we focus on studies that point to domestic factors. Honda Hiroshi (2005, 2014) analyzed
the political process of Japan’s nuclear energy policy from the perspective of social movement theory. More
specifically, he focused on not only the dominant political actors such as the bureaucracy, the ruling party and
industrial associations, but also opposition parties, civic movements, labor unions and local governments that
potentially have opportunities to change nuclear policy. The major results from his studies have been that (a)
opposition parties and labor unions that have supported movements were split in half and this led to weakening
the anti-nuclear movements by the 1980s; (b) pro-nuclear political actors that were supported by economic
groups seized power after 1990s; and (c) many nuclear accidents garnered publicity and social movements were
activated especially at the local level (Honda, 2005). The Fukushima Dai’ichi incident promoted reactivation of
pro-nuclear groups as well as anti-nuclear groups (Honda, 2014). The restart of the ¯
Oi and Sendai nuclear power
plants suggests that Japan’s nuclear policies have been determined by the attitudes of political elites3.
On the other hand, there is also the question as to whether international factors, for example, the
international system or international policy changes, have played a role in determining Japan’s nuclear policies.
Shibata and Tomokiyo (1999) argued that Japan’s public opinion has tended to be more cautious about nuclear
energy after major nuclear accidents such as the 1979 Three Mile Island accident and the 1986 Chernobyl
disaster4. Sagara (2009) suggested that international policy changes and discussions have some impact on
Japan’s political decision-making regarding nuclear energy. Suzuki (2014) focused on import and export policies
of nuclear technology and analyzed historical changes in the international system that promote the use of
nuclear energy. As a result of her analysis, she claimed that there has been a major impact in decision-making
processes by the U.S. government and its nuclear power industries, but the impact of the Soviet Union under the
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3At the same time, we cannot argue that Japan’s anti-nuclear movements have been necessarily weak. As Honda
Hiroshi noted, anti-nuclear movements have some impact especially at the local level (2005, 2014).
4At the same time, when we focus on the policy level, the Chernobyl disaster has not lead to fundamental political
change to Japan’s nuclear policies (Wakao & Honda, 2012, Introduction).

Cold War and China in the 21st century cannot be ignored as well. After the Fukushima Dai’ichi incident, there
have been numerous publications that focus on nuclear and energy policy or energy security strategies in
various countries from both pro-nuclear and anti-nuclear groups (Kawaguchi-Mahn, 2013; Kawaguchi, 2015).
International factors are frequently specified through international organizations, treaties or international
accidents, and may have had some impact on Japan’s decision-making regarding nuclear policy.
(2) Characteristics of news coverage of 3.11 in Japan and Germany
Numerous studies about media, communication and journalism have pointed to the vital role that the mass
media plays in shaping political discourse and public opinion in modern democratic countries such as Germany
and Japan. Whereas the media landscape in Japan is considered to have a characteristically high influence on
determining public opinion and political discourse (Takeshita & Takeuchi 1996), studies analyzing
characteristics of Japanese and German mass media in the aftermath of the Fukushima incident provide a solid
basis for our research. To address the question whether the effect of Fukushima on international energy and
nuclear policy shows evidence of pressure through a reverse effect in changing its own domestic nuclear energy
policies, it is necessary to summarize the most important findings about Fukushima news coverage in Japan
and Germany.
Considering Germany to be a special case in regards to its domestic responses to Fukushima in terms of
changing its nuclear-policy decisions, how did the German media report about Fukushima? In comparison to
the Chernobyl news coverage, using a quantitative historical approach, Nienierza (2014) found that the general
frames of both events in German news coverage are almost the same, yet a positive frame of nuclear energy
existed after Chernobyl, whereas after Fukushima, no positive frame could be found. Wolling and Arlt (2014)
explained that because the accident in 1986 happened in a technologically less-developed country, the effect of
Fukushima was much more drastic, as Japan is a technologically advanced country and known for its safety
measures. Similar to Nienierza, Seiffert and Fähnrich (2014) identified the same anti-nuclear energy frame after
Chernobyl and Fukushima, and argued that the pre-existence of that negative frame was responsible in part for
the “Fukushima effect,” using a qualitative approach in analyzing German newspaper.
Hayashi (2013) showed that while Germany’s main television broadcasts featured extensive news coverage
about the Fukushima disaster, its emphasis was on Japan’s political and social responses along with the effects
on Germany itself. Moreover, about 40% of the Fukushima disaster news coverage was strongly connected to
Germany’s domestic political responses, which focused on opposition party and governmental opinion from the
beginning, increasing from comprising approximately one-third to more than half of the main texts of major
news broadcasts, suggesting that the Fukushima incident was being closely tied to domestic politics in
Germany. Judging from those findings, Germany appears to be an anti-nuclear dominated society and its anti-
nuclear political stance affects public opinion. Arlt and Wolling (2015: 3) identified the “Fukushima Effect,”
using this phrase to describe “international findings on attitude changes towards nuclear power as a result of
the Fukushima accident” focusing on political and social responses, yet showed only a moderate impact of
Fukushima in terms of attitudes towards nuclear energy based on an analysis of German mass media coverage
in combination with survey data.
Drawing from quantitative and qualitative content analyses as a common tool for media studies, Abe (2015)
identified the general debate over nuclear energy after Fukushima in Japan as filling the void between simple
anti- or pro-nuclear energy debates with more nuanced content by identifying in-depth debates about nuclear
energy in newspaper editorials. Whereas the Asahi and Mainichi advocated denuclearization appealing to
democratic values and criticizing undemocratic administration of nuclear energy, the Sankei and Yomiuri
opposed it with technological nationalistic values arguing Japan needs nuclear energy to keep its economic-
technological leading position in the international society. Abe identified that news attention in the context of
nuclear energy in the aftermath of 3.11 in the Yo m iuri, for example, focused on technological-nationalistic
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
113

attitudes against nuclear phase-out, arguing that Japan’s advanced technology was vital to ensure the safety of
international nuclear management (Abe 2015: 100). In news items about the weekly anti-nuclear movements in
front of the Prime Minister’s residence in 2012, and movements against restarting the ¯
Oi and Sendai nuclear
power plants, by using anti-nuclear keywords (datsugenpatsu or hangenpatsu), Yoshino (2013: 97) identified
major differences between the Asahi, which covered five to ten times more news articles in a short one-month
period, and the Yomiuri, which appeared to take a stance closer to that of the cabinet office and the ruling party
DPJ in covering these issues.
While studies are focused around the implications of analyzing how the mass media in each country reacted
in their respective social contexts through international comparison, there is a research gap in studies analyzing
international news in Japan concerning Germany’s energy policy shift after Fukushima. Our analysis shows
that the news coverage about Germany’s anti-nuclear energy policy in Japanese mass media reflects these
general findings, but reveals certain characteristics.
3. Framing the narrative of the Fukushima effect
While catastrophic events such as earthquakes and tsunamis are not constructed, the extent to which the
nuclear accident was man-made is not addressed here; rather, in order to understand how a natural disaster
affecting societies is narratively constructed and framed in a media context to make it perceivable and how this
influences society and politics, is a crucial aspect that needs to be addressed.
Nisbert and Newman (2015) define frames as “interpretive storylines” and suggest that defining themes
influences the amount of attention an issue receives. Members of the public rely on frames to make sense of
complex issues, and frames found in media coverage influence public opinion as they rely on what they refer to
as mental models about a certain issue, which in turn define what frames people look at when reading through
newspapers. Identification of frames by news covering nuclear energy policies and the reaction of nuclear-
energy-generating countries is crucial when trying to find evidence whether nuclear energy policy decisions of
other countries in the aftermath of Fukushima could shape Japan’s public opinion on nuclear energy and
eventually channel international pressure towards political decision-making processes.
Nuclear energy, environmental and climate issues are image-loaded topics and the meaning of such
catastrophic events is constructed by societies and the “process of assigning meaning to an event essentially
requires the discursive ‘work’ of claims-makers” (Hansen 2010). As natural disasters, earthquakes and tsunamis
cannot be controlled thus cannot be avoided, but it is possible that nuclear power and energy policy can be
determined to mitigate the effects of natural disasters in the future.
Based on Hansen (2010), considering the “constructed” nature of public communication we find in mass
media, framing and narrative theory provides fundamentals to analyze and understand why certain issues are
being recognized over others (2010: 34). Social problems are always subjective and become recognized as such
only through communication which constructs them as being a problem for public and political concern (2010:
14). Analyzing the characteristics of information coverage by mass media over a specific issue and finding
differences between newspapers, can be analyzed while drawing from the narrative theory approach, where the
information regarding social relevant issues are put together into a frame according to framing theory and
build a narrative (story) intended for a certain audience. As each newspaper has its main readership, the
predefined opinion, in other words mental model as explained by Nisbert and Newman (2015), people have
about a public issue, influence their choice which information provided by different newspaper to follow.
After the Fukushima incident, Germany turned back to its recently abolished anti-nuclear energy policy. In
the following section we investigate how the influence of this event on Germany’s cause of action appeared in
Japanese mass media and whether Germany’s political changes show the potential to influence Japan’s decision
making regarding its nuclear energy policy, an effect we would label the “reverse Fukushima Effect”.
Journal of International and Advanced Japanese Studies University of Tsukuba Volume 8 / February 2016
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4. Utilizing a mixed methods approach to analyze news coverage of German nuclear energy
policy in Japanese mass media in the aftermath of 3.11
(1) Sampling the text data
Since the environmental movements of the 1960s, mass media has become a crucial actor in influencing
political decision-making processes in environment-related topics based on how the environment and
environment-related issues are presented to and perceived by the public (Hansen, 2010). Mass media can be
considered as a central channel through which information about other countries reach society and, in the
context of this research, whether the “Fukushima Effect” eventually had a reverse impact. In this paper, we
assess how Germany’s sudden shift in its energy policy to become nuclear free by 2022 as a reaction to the
Fukushima incident was perceived through four major Japanese newspapers: The Asahi (circulation of 6.8
million for the morning edition and 2.2 million for the evening edition) and Mainichi (circulation of 3.2 million
for the morning edition and 939,000 for the evening edition), known to take an anti-nuclear energy/pro-
denuclearization stand, and the Nikkei (circulation of 2.7 million for the morning edition and 1.4 million for the
evening edition) and Yomiuri (circulation of 9.1 million for the morning edition and 2.9 million for the evening
edition) 5, known to be in favor of upholding nuclear energy technologies in order to ensure Japan’s international
leading economic-technological role (cf. e.g. Abe 2015, Yoshino 2013). From a methodological perspective, our
research draws on a combination of content analysis and sentiment analysis, and investigates on the one hand
how often news articles concerning nuclear power in Japan referred to the German case in the six-months
period from March 11 to September 11, 2011, and, on the other hand, identifies the main policy actors involved
and assesses if the coverage was positive or negative.
As preparation for the content analysis, we investigated the databases of the four newspapers with a set of
keywords consisting of “nuclear energy” (genshiryoku) and “political measures” (seisaku) together with country
names based on the list of nuclear energy generating countries provided by the World Nuclear Association6to
get an overview how international nuclear energy policies appear in Japanese mass media. Our main interest
was to investigate how Germany’s energy policy in the aftermath of 3.11 was perceived through Japanese mass
media, and thus, we narrowed our results down and focused our attention for the content analysis on articles
where Germany was mentioned. We chose the time period of March 11 to September 11, 2011 as it covers the
immediate aftermath of the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear plant accident as well as the time frame leading up to
the June 2011 legislation to phase-out nuclear power in Germany.
(2) Qualitative analysis of text data
Methodological advice from Charmaz’s (2012) Constructing Grounded Theory, drawing from methods based
on the grounded theory approach of constructivists on how to analyze a great amount of text data, provides us
with a heuristically appropriate tool to handle our sampled data in a short period of time. It is important to note
that we are not building on a theoretical construct and applying it to the data. Rather, we draw from
communication studies’ framing and narrative theory to explain the results from our coded data, which will be
explained in the following section.
Coding text data in fragments, certain words, lines or segments, to identify the sentiment laying in news
coverage of the “Fukushima Effect” on an international scale allows us to focus our attention on certain issues
emerging from the data, identifying the frame and narrative constructed by the newspaper and providing us
with the possibilities of raising analytical questions. Furthermore, we also considered the possibility of finding
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
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5Reference for newspaper circulation numbers: http://www.kokusyo.jp/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/MDK151006b.pdf
(access date: 2015/11/30)
6http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Facts-and-Figures/Nuclear-generation-by-country/ (access date: 2015/09/17)

evidence of international pressure (gaiatsu), which we later call the “reverse Fukushima Effect” channeled
through mass media. The critically assessed subjectivity regarding this method and the problems of
assumption-generation on text-data in order to identify e.g. latent traits and evaluate their “usefulness” in
measuring their “real quantities”, our method is validated through the findings by Lowe and Benoit (2013), who
validated human judgment as a benchmark for qualitative content analysis of political text-data, in terms of
“semantic validity” and that the quantity being scaled from qualitative and sentiment text analyses reflects the
quantity that was intended to be measured. While using tools within the analytical program NVivo 10, designed
for qualitative research, we performed a sentiment analysis through an attribute value matrix query based on
our coded content. For this, it was necessary to define attribute values to the data. These attribute values
basically consist of elements of a coding sheet for newspaper content analysis.
5. Results: Evidence of a “reverse Fukushima Effect”?
(1) General findings
Table 1 shows the results of performing newspaper article database searches using the methodology
described in the previous section. In terms of the number of articles overall, three out of the four newspapers
published over 1,000 articles each during the six-months time period that was reviewed. Among the three, the
figures for the Asahi and the Yo m iuri newspapers are the highest. In all four newspapers, the percentage of
articles covering Germany in the context of nuclear energy policy was less than 10%, with the Asahi having the
highest percentage of 8.3% (n=1124) and the Yomiuri having the lowest percentage of 4.6% (n=1116), while the
Yom iuri has the fewest number of articles (n=941) followed by the Nikkei (n=1005). Among all four newspapers,
there were few articles that focused on Germany in the context of nuclear energy policy. The next four sections
describe the article contents, which focused on nuclear energy policy in Germany in more detail for each of the
four newspapers. Considering the prescribed standpoints towards nuclear energy for these major newspapers,
the leading role of the Asahi in comparison with the Yo m iuri at the bottom, represents the general findings of
previous studies. The analysis will show, that the nuclear energy technology favoring Nikkei with a higher rate
of 7.3% (n=73) in comparison with the pro-denuclearization favoring Mainichi with a rate of 4.9% (n=46),
draws from the institutionalized anti-nuclear policy of the Green Party in Germany negatively to promote its
pro-nuclear energy technology path for Japan, what affirms Abe’s findings (2014) about the Nikkei to promote
positive aspects of nuclear energy for the wealth and stability of Japan.
(2) Asahi: Reluctantly positive
Germany, along with France and the U.S. figured prominently in political reactions to the Fukushima disaster
as a matter of interest in the Asahi’s news coverage when it assessed changes in international nuclear energy
policies (or the lack thereof) in the aftermath of 3.11. During the six-months period, we found a total of 1,124
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Table 1 Number of articles in the context of nuclear energy policy and Germany between
March 11 and September 11, 2011

articles in the Kikuzo II Visual database (the Asahi newspaper company’s database), referring to the issue of
nuclear energy and political measures. Slightly less than one-quarter (241 articles out of 1,124) referred to
nuclear energy in the context of political measures and nuclear energy generating countries. In 93 articles,
Germany’s situation was mentioned, while 22 articles referred to Germany in the context of nuclear energy
policy as their main theme. The highest numbers of articles compared to the other three newspapers as shown
in the following sections.
Table 2 summarizes the attitudes towards nuclear phase-out in the context of Germany’s shift in nuclear
energy policy and how the general view on that topic differs in the Asahi newspaper in comparison to each
newspaper’s section. In terms of comparability, we labeled the sections for all four newspapers with these terms,
as the section titles between the newspapers differ. Showing only a small rate of positive agreement towards
Germany’s political decision to abandon nuclear energy completely as an electricity-supplying source of energy
by 2022, it is still the highest rate among the four newspapers. The standpoints between negative and neutral
towards Germany’s political change after Fukushima is somewhat balanced in the major sections. This is also
evident where the Asahi has a rather balanced coverage between the German ruling party (CDU/CSU) and the
major opposition party (SPD).
While the Asahi implemented expressions describing the legal implementation of the nuclear phase-out citing
German media, which reflects a rather positive attitude, the narrative of describing the “Fukushima Effect” on
Germany is reluctantly positive on the one hand, but presenting a rather critical view on the question as to
whether Japan should pursue a similar path. Major themes such as changes in energy policy and the narrative
of Germany’s uniqueness in terms of legal fundamentals provided by both the European Union as well as
domestic politics with the emergence of the Green party in 1980 and the effect of the Chernobyl incident of 1986
on political and social attitudes towards nuclear energy are prominent. These are experiences that pertain only
to the German situation as explained in section 1. The question arose whether these fundamental differences,
and the attention by the international society towards Japan during the Fukushima crisis can eventually
channel pressure to promote political and social change.
Social responsibility and a strong civil society, a long history of persuasive environmental movements in
Europe7in contrast to Japan’s weak civil society as assessed by the Asahi are emphasized when discussing the
existing fundamentals for successful political change in Germany. Technological capabilities to increase the
electricity imports as a substitute for electricity supplied by nuclear energy reactors from its neighboring
countries are seen as a further advantage8. Thus, even though Japan’s responsibility to consider the same path
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
117
Table 2 Attitude towards nuclear phase-out in the context of Germany’s nuclear energy policy
shift: Asahi
7E.g. Asahi, March 16, 2011
8E.g. Asahi, June 7, 2011

as Germany is part of the discussion, the cognitive distance put between them prevents direct pressure on
politics and society in Japan to supersede Germany in the role of forerunner in energy policy matters, noting
Fukushima as a chance for change. With 54 nuclear reactors, Japan faces a greater challenge of being able to
provide substitutes for nuclear energy as its main energy source compared to Germany, which is considered to
be more likely capable of succeed with its energy shift, having only 17 nuclear reactors to substitute with other
energy sources and a strong legal framework for renewable energy sources along with consensus between the
public and the government. In this context, the wide gap between public opinion and the government in Japan
as a key aspect was supported by a survey conducted by the Asahi among seven major nuclear countries
(Japan, US, France, Russia, Korea, Germany and China) aiming at assessing attitudes towards nuclear energy
and its further use after Fukushima9. According to this poll, 73% of the Japanese public was against the further
use of nuclear power. However, consideration of Germany’s historically deep anti-nuclear “green” ideology in
terms of environment and energy policies, as well as the major role of the German government under Chancellor
Merkel (CDU) in strong cooperation with the BMUB during the respective time period, provides the ground for
successful implementation of a new legal framework, which led ultimately to nuclear phase-out. The actual
“reverse Fukushima Effect” by Germany’s sudden shift in energy policy, is limited to longitudinal economic
effects, which was hardly mentioned in the Asahi but plays a much greater role in the Mainichi newspaper.
(3) Mainichi: A hollow frame
For the investigation of the Mainichi, we used the Maisaku Mainichi database provided by the Mainichi
newspaper company. In a total of 941 articles in the context of nuclear energy policy measures, there were 178
articles focusing on international news coverage of nuclear-energy-generating countries and nuclear-energy
policy measures in the context of 3.11. Roughly one-quarter (46 of 178 articles) mentioned Germany, but only 7
articles featured Germany as a main theme. The possibility of a “reverse Fukushima Effect” can considered
negligible assessing the quantity of the news coverage regarding Germany’s energy policy decisions. However,
in regards to how previous study positioned the Mainichi in the overall nuclear energy debate in Japan together
with the Asahi as pro-denuclearization, the results were unanticipated.
The articles in the Mainichi appear to have taken a political economic standpoint regarding international and
domestic political measures on energy policies under the “Fukushima Effect”. Table 3 demonstrates this clearly,
as the attitudes that arose in the context of Germany’s nuclear phase-out appear to be strongly negative.
Concern with the economic repercussions for Japan due to Germany’s energy shift, along with environmentally
Journal of International and Advanced Japanese Studies University of Tsukuba Volume 8 / February 2016
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9Published on May 27, 2011.
Table 3 Attitude towards nuclear phase-out in the context of Germany’s nuclear energy policy
shift: Mainichi

strong European institutions on a broad scale, prevent forming conclusions as to a direct “reverse Fukushima
Effect” in terms of promoting a more robust anti-nuclear energy policy in Japan. Moreover, the news coverage of
international influence in the Mainichi newspaper is almost non-existent.
While former Prime Minister Kan Naoto assessed the possibility of implementing a new energy policy
framework in early April 201110, the Mainichi emphasized the necessity of fulfilling international responsibility
towards climate change and decreasing CO2 emissions, noting that Japan depends on nuclear-energy electricity-
generating reactors. Moreover, Japan would have to increase its efforts to fulfill the 2020 target set by the
international society in order to tackle climate change.
The Mainichi is similar to the Asahi in referring to the lack of a strong anti-nuclear movement in Japan. A
few anti-nuclear sentiments in Japanese society can be found, but in general, the articles suggest that there is no
strong anti-nuclear movement in Japan present to catalyze change, because society does not raise its voice11.
Nuclear power is discussed in regards to energy policy being strongly connected to the economy and is
institutionally distant from environmental institutions. This is a major difference compared to Germany where
nuclear energy regulation has been located in the environmental ministry since 1986. The energy ministry’s
anti-nuclear policy as defined by the SDP and any capabilities for political change in Japan regarding energy
policy are topics that were not addressed in the Mainichi articles. However, to pose the hypothesis of whether to
detect an attitude to change governmental institutions in Japan, the analysis provides evidence that the
Mainichi promotes the status quo, as its articles appear to favor the economy.
As the German government under Chancellor Merkel (CDU) decided to postpone its nuclear phase-out policy
after successful lobbying by nuclear-energy-generating industries a few months prior to the Fukushima
accident, which was already defined by the 1998-2005 government of Germany’s SPD/Green Party coalition, the
nature of the Mainichi’s “Fukushima Effect” regarding Germany may be referencing how Germany came clear
with its antagonistic policy regarding its postponed nuclear phase-out. While indicating the required increase of
electricity import from its neighboring countries to compensate for the lost energy source of nuclear reactors,
the Mainichi shows a general skepticism towards Germany’s anti-nuclear energy policy. Putting pro-nuclear
countries in a more dominant position in the context of issuing Germany’s energy policy supports a weak
image of the German government. This aspect is focused on more closely by the Nikkei.
(4) Nikkei: Strong frame of Germany’s anti-nuclear green party to promote a pro-nuclear
path in Japan
The number of articles appearing in the Nikkei is similar to that of the Asahi. We found a total of 1005
articles using the Nikkei Telecom 21 database. In 73 articles, Germany appeared in the context of nuclear
energy and political measures, while 18 had Germany as the main theme. Table 4 shows that the Nikkei is more
reluctant to show a strong attitude towards Germany’s decisions regarding its energy policy under the influence
of the Fukushima disaster, as the attribute values of the coded content is focused around the “neutral”
characterized sentiment. Where in comparison the Asahi shows more evidence to be positive and the Mainichi
to be negative opted. An interesting result is the Nikkei’s attitude in the section “Politics”, where the newspaper
is divided between positive (17.4%), negative (48.6%) and neutral (34%).
In general, the Nikkei shows a strong sentiment towards the major anti-nuclear party in Germany, Bündnis
90/Die Grüne, referring on various occasions to one of its founders Jürgen Trittin12 and constructing news
coverage of nuclear energy policy measures regarding Germany around this image. However, in assessing the
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
119
10 Issued on April 5, 2011.
11 E.g. Mainichi, August 7, 2011
12 Since the 1980s, Jürgen Trittin has been one of the main political actors of the Green Party and was a Diet member
until 2013.

question whether a fundamental political change would be possible for the high technological Japan13, the
Chernobyl-experienced Germany with its strong environmental lobby could be compared to Japan’s economic
lobby in relation to political decision-making processes regarding energy issues. This may suggest that similar
measures in Japan would require social and institutional changes.
While assessing the possibility for the European Union to strengthen its position regarding environmental
and energy policies towards its member states through Germany’s influential power, strengthening
environmental anti-nuclear power movements in European politics, the Nikkei emphasizes the effect that
Fukushima had on anti-nuclear sentiment in supporting parties among European member states, particularly
in Germany but also in France. Where the Nikkei emphasizes the need to increase electricity imports from
France and Russia by Germany to compensate for shutting down nuclear reactors and putting the burden of
increased costs to proceed with its anti-nuclear policy on its neighboring and economically smaller countries
such as the Czech Republic throughout its news coverage, constructs a negative frame around Germany’s
energy policy decisions. In addition, the argument of a total nuclear phase-out in Germany would be only a
label, because a complete phase-out is not possible considering its increased import rate from its neighboring
countries, supporting our findings shown in table 4. Thus, the positively shaped image through the focus on the
major anti-nuclear party of Germany must be evaluated with caution.
The issue of high costs for political change is a strong frame in the Nikkei, considering the intense financial
burden for the country due to the Fukushima disaster. Quantitatively similar to the Asahi, the Nikkei places
more attention towards Germany’s situation under the Fukushima effect but is far more critical in assessing its
nuclear phase-out. While emphasizing Germany’s cause of action to be no option for Japan due to high costs in
terms of energy sources and questioning the actual validity of Germany’s political shift, the main frame of the
Fukushima effect focuses on Germany’s critical economic situation for both society and industry due to the
political decision of the nuclear phase-out. However, the framework for a successful implementation of its new
energy policy fits into Germany, but would not be applicable in Japan.
(5) Yomiuri: Renewable-Nuclear-Energy mix
Through the Yomidasu Rekishikan database of the Yomiuri, of a total of 1,116 articles, 164 articles appeared
in the context of nuclear energy policy measures taken in nuclear-energy-generating countries. Germany
appeared in that context in 51 articles, where only 5 had Germany as a main theme, but figured a rather
neutral/positive attitude towards Germany’s political decisions and is less negative in general than findings of
previous researches expected.
Journal of International and Advanced Japanese Studies University of Tsukuba Volume 8 / February 2016
120
Table 4 Attitude towards nuclear phase-out in the context of Germany’s nuclear energy policy
shift: Nikkei
13 E.g. Nikkei, June 2, 2011.

The results in Table 5 suggest that Germany was not a major issue in the Yomiuri in the respective time
frame we investigated after the Fukushima disaster occurred and shortly after Germany set its legal framework
of an anti-nuclear energy policy. In the newspaper articles, mentions of Germany were quite few. Thus, the
analysis shows attitudes towards Germany’s nuclear phase-out as being generally neutral, if mentioned at all,
and the role of the “Fukushima effect” in the discussion is negligible.
While the issues of financial burden on the nation to implement its energy policy measures and Germany’s
anti-nuclear policy-driven influential power on European institutions appeared in the Yom iuri (similar to the
Nikkei), the Yomiuri put a stronger focus on the topic of renewable energies compared to the other three
newspapers and emphasized expectations of changes in attitudes towards nuclear energy in Japan as well as
internationally. Even though the Yomiuri sees validity in pursuing the discussion to eventually promote
renewable energy in Japan, due to Fukushima’s impact on reconsidering renewable energy possibilities on a
global scale, it will not become a nuclear free country, considering nuclear disaster experienced nations such as
the U.S. (referring to the Three-Mile Island accident in 1979) and European nations (Chernobyl in 1986)
developed nuclear energy technologies as their main energy source14.
In general, the issue of nuclear energy safety and pressure from focused international attention towards
Japan are put in the center of the frame, where international responsibility in terms of measures against climate
change dominates the discussion. The strong negative amplitude shown in Table 5 in the politics section is
rooted in a frame where information regarding an anti-nuclear phase-out movement in Germany consisting of
the nuclear-energy industry (RWE, E.On), diet members within the ruling party (CDU) and social movements.
But because of the actual strong consensus among politics, society and eventually industry in Germany
regarding anti-nuclear energy policy decisions, this frame did not appear repetitively. The questionable
journalistic value of the Yo m iuri regarding news coverage in the aftermath of 3.11 previous studies assessed,
cannot entirely be affirmed, if we compare the framing of the news coverage about Germany’s nuclear energy
decisions in the aftermath of 3.11 by Yo m iuri with the Nikkei or the Mainichi, but the little number of articles
covering Germany, may present a false image and must be addressed with caution, when assessing Yom iuri’s
journalistic value.
Germany is put into the narrative of renewable energies while pointing out difficulties to implement a similar
framework in Japan as high costs are involved. Where the Nikkei saw the issue regarding Germany’s measures
to increase the import rate of electricity from its neighboring countries very critically, the Yomiuri saw this
option as an advantage to implement a new political framework. Considering the result of Fukushima to lead to
a complete abolishment of nuclear energy, this would have a great impact on climate change15. Implementing
higher safety measures for nuclear energy is considered to be a more realistic solution.
HARTWIG, OKURA, TKACH-KAWASAKI, and KOBASHI, Identifying the “Fukushima Effect”
121
Table 5 Attitude towards nuclear phase-out in the context of Germany’s nuclear energy policy
shift: Yomiuri
14 E.g. Yom i uri, March 25, 2011
15 E.g. Yom i uri, March 24, 2011

6. Conclusion
Ultimately, the instrumentalized Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear plant crisis propelled the issue of nuclear energy
policy, including safety, from being a national policy concern to an international topic. During the six-months
period following the Fukushima accident, Germany became a forerunner in abolishing nuclear energy and
became an international ideal with its Energiewende. However, in comparison, Japan has not taken a similar
step. Our findings do not clearly indicate if news coverage of international nuclear power decisions exerted
pressure on the DPJ’s attempt to abolish nuclear energy or, in the larger picture, canalize international pressure
on Japan to change its nuclear policy. However, our comparative analysis of the coverage in the four Japanese
newspapers with regards to Germany and nuclear energy policy show diversity in attitudes and opinions in the
coverage of Germany’s experience, as well as diversity in the policy dimensions in which the topic of nuclear
energy policy is discussed.
While framing theory suggests a way of constructing a frame of how one event influences how a topic is
perceived by the audience and eventually affects political decision-making processes, in this case, it might be
more appropriate to categorize what the frames do not include. When assessing the quantitative news coverage
of international nuclear energy policies and their influence on attitude change, the level of interest among the
newspaper readership is a major factor. The research reported within does not address that element, and this
may be considered a weakness. However, this also suggests a further line of inquiry as research progresses in
this area. In addition, in terms of assessing the “Fukushima Effect,” the few number of articles in each
newspaper suggests that the German case was quantitatively not represented strongly enough to have a
qualitative impact. In fact, if we look at the aggregate number of articles covering the issue of nuclear energy
policy in general during the six-months period, as well as including those covering nuclear energy policy in
relation to nuclear-energy-generating countries, the impact rate of news articles covering the case of Germany
must be considered negligible. This in itself poses a possible future direction in this research trend to assess if
nuclear power policy is considered to be solely a domestic issue or an international issue.
In terms of differences among the newspapers in general, while the articles in the Yo m iuri and the Mainichi
did not appear to emphasize news coverage of Germany’s sudden energy transition as a reaction to the
Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear disaster, Germany’s situation was a common thread among the articles in the
Asahi. Whether this difference could be explained in terms of each newspaper’s ideological background (the
Asahi is considered to be the most liberal of the four newspapers) is also an avenue for further investigation.
The critical voice of the Nikkei towards Germany’s shift in abolishing nuclear energy to sustain itself through
renewable energies, while putting its neighboring countries in a weaker position and forcing more burden on
them to sustain Germany’s energy demands in the transition phase until it can sustain itself with renewable
energy technologies, reflects Japan’s cultural and geographical background as an island state and its immediate
need for self-sustainability. The anti-denuclearization Yo m iuri showed a more neutral/positive attitude towards
Germany’s Energiewende than previous researches suggested. However, the negative frame of Germany’s anti-
nuclear policies were closely tied to Japan and its lacking capabilities to pursue a similar path, while the
neutral/positive majored narrative in the Yomiuri emphasized the individual position Germany is having, in
regards to the different conditions in Japan.
In conclusion, our assessment of the frames and attitudes concerning nuclear energy policy in Germany as
reported in Japanese newspaper articles revealed major differences in the coverage of international energy
policy and its possible influence on future policy directions in Japan.
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