Japan’s high exposure to a variety of geographical, meteorological and man-made risks ranks it third in the world. Major emergencies over the past three decades — including the 1995 Kobe earthquake and the 11 March 2011 triple disaster — have taken tens of thousands of lives and required hundreds of billions in recovery costs.

Despite persistent challenges, including over-reliance on technology, a trust deficit and excessive confidence in physical infrastructure, policy-driven disaster risk reduction practices stand out. These policies — not cultural factors — explain much of Japan’s success in keeping residents safe. The two most important involve a bottom-up engagement with disaster preparedness and response, and improvement over time. And, because these approaches are not solely rooted in culture, they can be exported to countries around the world, both developing and developed.

Much of the Japanese success in mitigating disasters comes from a bottom-up engagement with disaster preparation and response. It involves far more than the free disaster manuals and disaster apps available to all. In Tokyo, residents participate in annual disaster training drills, learning to use diesel-powered pumps to put out fires and practicing tying tourniquets. In urban centres, even small communities have their own sheds filled with firefighting and rescue gear which volunteers are trained to use.

Children, parents and teachers in tsunami-prone areas take part in regular tsunami evacuation drills. This likely resulted in the ‘miracle’ of widescale successful evacuation at schools in Kamaishi during the 2011 tsunami. As some communities tragically discovered, failure to mitigate risk through evacuation drills and adequate planning can lead to extreme consequences including high casualty rates.

School curriculums at all levels include discussions of floods and training to prepare for other likely shocks. Many communities hit by disasters have their own museums about the event — one study counted more than 10 museums and learning centres in Tohoku alone. Residents are serious about not forgetting lessons from these shocks.

Perhaps most importantly, most neighbourhoods across Japan have multiple social infrastructure sites where people can maintain and build social ties. These include children’s halls, community centres and elder care facilities, often run by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that build connections and enhance coordination during shocks. Research has shown that communities with a higher density of social infrastructure better mitigate the impact of shocks.

Japan has also been able to keep people safe despite hazards ranging from tsunamis to volcanoes because officials at the local, regional and national levels have invested in improving responses over time. Well before the 21st century, authorities pushed architects and engineers to make buildings safer. After major shocks — such as the 1923 Tokyo, 1995 Kobe and 2011 Tohoku earthquakes — construction firms have upped their engineering game. Even the 2024 Noto earthquake has pushed the government towards even more revisions of seismic standards.

Along with physical infrastructure improvements, the government has gone from often ignoring NGOs during disaster planning to integrating them into the process. After the 1995 Kobe earthquake, local governments recognised the dangers of individual relocation of the elderly after such shocks — which resulted in ‘lonely deaths’ (Kodokushi) — and moved to group relocation. After more than a century of improvements in planning and design, deaths in Japan due to earthquakes are far rarer than in other nations facing weaker seismic shocks.

Of the more than 20,000 lives lost during the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, less than 2 per cent died as a result of the earthquake itself. Homes and businesses were still standing after the 9.0 magnitude earthquake. The most common cause of death was drowning, not building collapse.

In short, the private and public sectors have been willing to ratchet up safety and response procedures as new data and approaches become available.

Japan’s experiences with bottom-up engagement with disaster preparedness and response alongside continuous improvement over time can be exported to other cultures and nations. Japan regularly provides disaster risk reduction training to neighbouring countries through the Japan International Cooperation Agency, and its NGOs, such as PeaceBoat, are frequent actors in humanitarian aid and disaster relief.

Given the increasing frequency and intensity of shocks and disasters, Japan can serve as a model for other nations seeking to build resilience.

Daniel P Aldrich is Director of the Resilience Studies Program and Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at Northeastern University.

Image by Iliya Pitalev and sourced from Wikimedia Commons here.