To Whom Does the Sea Belong? Questions Posed by the Henoko Assessment

Part 3 of a 3 part seriesHenoko: The Experts Report and the Future of Okinawa1. Gavan McCormack, Introduction: The Experts Report and the Future of Okinawa2. The Okinawa Third Party (Experts) Committee, translated by Sandi Aritza, Report of Okinawa Prefecture's “Third Party Investigation into the Reclamation of Oura Bay” (Main Points)3. Sakurai Kunitoshi, translated by Gavan McCormack, “To Whom does the Sea Belong? Questions Posed by the Henoko Assessment”PrefaceThe environmental assessment system is a public good indispensable for the sustainable development of Japanese society. The environmental assessment on the Futenma Airfield Replacement Facility Works (hereafter: Henoko assessment) was an illegal assessment that negated the value of this public good and to allow it to stand would be to endanger Japan's future. Many assessment specialists, chief among them being former head of the Environmental Assessment Society, Shimazu Yasuo, have said that, whether in terms of procedure or of substance, the Henoko assessment was the worst in the history of assessment in Japan. This study is intended to evaluate Okinawa Defense Bureau's environmental assessment and the approval for reclamation it subsequently issued under the Public Waters Reclamation Act and to raise the question of “To whom does the sea belong?” for the consideration of this Nago meeting of the National Conference on the Japanese Water Environment.