The Polluted Past of the Whaling Town Hachinohe

Authors

Abstract

Invoking its long history with whales, the port city Hachinohe plans to reintroduce commercial whaling after Japan’s withdrawal from the International Whaling Commission in 2019. However, a century earlier, in 1911, industrial whaling had caused widespread environmental pollution in Hachinohe, leading to the largest Japanese anti-whaling protests and the destruction of the local whaling station. This troubled past challenges the official narrative of the current city government and also affects its decision making.

Author Biography

Fynn Holm, University of Zurich (UZH), Switzerland

Fynn Holm is a research fellow and lecturer at the Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies at the University of Zurich. He has recently finished his dissertation “Living with the Gods of the Sea: Anti-Whaling Movements in Northeast Japan, 1600–1912.” His research interests include Japanese history, historical and modern whaling disputes, and global environmental history.

Photo of a Japanese whaling station in 1910.

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Published

2020-04-23

Issue

2020

Section

Spring

License

Copyright (c) 2020 CC BY 4.0 Fynn Holm

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.