Great Kanto Earthquake

539 Words3 Pages
After the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923, Tokyo and Yokohama were ruined with almost half of the buildings and houses collapsed or burnt and over hundred thousands of causalities recorded. The state was engaged in heated debate on the scale of capital reconstruction. There were basically two parties holding opposite views: Goto hoped for a large-scale transformative reconstruction plan for Tokyo while other government officials preferred the ideas of doing it in a small scale. In other words, the major contestation arouse was how large and how much changes should be implemented in rebuilding the capital Tokyo. The majority of government officials and parliamentarians at that time insisted to minimize the money investment and time needed for this reconstruction project, particularly in times of economic recession. They preferred spending money on absolute needs like roads and government buildings rather than whole-city transformation. On the other hand, Goto believed that post-disaster was a golden opportunity to transform Tokyo into a more manageable capital with better urban planning (e.g. better road system, fire-proof building structure) on top of restoring originality of Tokyo. And ultimately achieved a safer place for Japanese to live in. Contestation arouse here also because Goto's proposal of reconstruction (which proposed to take over private lands for urban planning) was badly criticized by the private land owners. I think the reasons why such contestation aroused after the Kanto Earthquake were a lack of financial support and political support and the desperate urge of common people to resume their original life. Government officials and parliamentarians, especially those military officials and rural representatives, were strongly objected the idea of large-scale reconstructing Tokyo because they both got their own interests in serving their represented
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