Accountability, how strange. I have doubts that such a poor performance would always cost the job of an American CEO. We have learned to insulate our governing and corporate classes from the petty pain of suffering for their actions.
Here’s a news story about the resignation.
Here’s another take on the issue, discussing whether or not the company can continue.
I fully agree with the author. Fairewinds has been the best source of information about the disaster that I have been able to find. I am a subscriber to the site and I recommend you sign up as well. It’s intelligent and full of information usually backed up by photography and films. I visit regularly.
James Pilant
Removing top soil from school grounds to reduce radiation is a positive step. It does however provide a small harbinger of the enormous cost this disaster is going to impose in Japan for as much future as humans can reasonably foresee.
Generally nations recover from floods, chemical spills, rock slides, etc. and dare I say it, combinations of tsunami and earthquakes. Japan may recover economically but the damage to the land is permanent unless you look at history in terms of periods like the Jurassic.
It is questionable business ethics to promote PR that claims such disasters unlikely or impossible. It is questionable business ethics to subvert the government into downplaying or covering up incidents at your nuclear plants. It is questionable business ethics to pretend certainty when you don’t have any.
I expect giant corporations to lie, exaggerate and steal if at all possible. (Small corporations are much less likely to have these faults and are in many cases, excellent examples of morality and patriotism.) But permanently destroying the landscape has to considered unethical in an extreme sense.
James Pilant
What are the business ethics problems revealed in this particular news article? First we have a with holding from the residents of critical information about their exposure to radiation. Second, we have worker safety issues on a very large scale. Workers have already died at the site. Third, we have a continuous underestimate of the radiation being released. It seems every time, TEPCO gives the public radiation numbers, it is later discovered to be too low.
It seems that the Japanese government and the utility, TEPCO, are in full damage control mode. They now hold one press conference a week. They invite only establishment press. They limit access to the site, not so much for safety’s sake but to prevent independent coverage.
As a business ethics disaster, these events will be featured in textbooks for generations.
James Pilant
The more kinds of radioactive material can be reasonably assumed to mean more leakage from the plant. Fortunately strontium is bad but not as bad as many other nuclear deposits.
James Pilant
via
This post discusses the defacto censorship by the Japanese government and TEPCO, the Japanese utility that owns the plants. There are also charges that dangerous levels of plutonium exist around the plant. Since No. 4 reactor ran hotter than any of the other nuclear plants because it was using a hybrid fuel of regular uranium and plutonium, it would only stand to reason that there must be some contamination.
There are also fairly lengthy discussions of Chernobyl, independent journalism and government censorship. It’s lengthy but it has to be to provide so much information.
James Pilant
via Udolicko’s Blog
It appears that Fukushima will be generating stories for some time. It seems our old favorite No. 4 reactor is trying out a new crisis on the world.
One of the more interesting parts of the story is that the Japanese government has decided that children living near the plant can have the same exposure as a nuclear plant worker. That’s right, the local children are in the same boat as nuclear workers when it comes to radiation exposure.
Time marches on and as the disaster becomes more and more boring to the public, it slips away from view. But radiation and nuclear disaster don’t depend on publicity to function.
James Pilant
via Follow The Money
Flying cuttlefish picayune is staying on the Fukushima story with tenacity. I admire this. I’ve tried to follow it everyday but my recent cable loss knocked me off pattern. (As a writer it is fascinating to watch how your style and approach are varied by things you never would have thought of as having an effect.) Following this blog has recommitted me to following the story and I will begin going back to daily or once every two days posting.
I will be going to the international media because our corporate, news of the strange focused, press is fairly useless in dealing with any complex issue in any persistent or intelligent way. It is utterly astonishing how different the press is outside the United States. I have been looking at the Anna Hazare story news coverage in India (you should too) and the way they confront politicians with difficult questions and follow-up gives me pride in the field of journalism, a pride which has been steadily diminishing as I have watched the wretched posturing, incompetence and brazen profit seeking of American media.
My warm thanks to my fellow blogger, flying cuttlefish picayune!
James Pialnt
This documentary is chilling look at the Chernobyl disaster with all the benefits of hindsight. I was familiar with the original coverage – this is way beyond this. Fron just a serious nuclear incident in the popular press, this documentary shows you a cataclysm that Gorbachav explains was one of the causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Please watch it!
James Pilant
You can get this video at –
This is a very good summary of the situation as of today. This is, however, a “gotcha” video where they veer off into obscenity laden rants. There is no problem – just click out a little after three minutes into the video.
James Pilant
Pilant's Business Ethics Blog 
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