Search results

Since the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji (Kobe) Earthquake, Japanese society has become accustomed to the presence of volunteers in the pre- and post-disaster environments, more specifically, in preparedness, response and recovery. The present study draws on the disaster research literature in exploring the social contexts in which groups of Kobe earthquake volunteers converged in January 1995 and formed organizations that continued to respond to national and international disasters during the 15 years that followed the 1995 earthquake. Based on the first author's own longitudinal participant observation at a non-profit organization, the Nippon Volunteer Network Active in Disaster (NVNAD), the present study traces the development of the NVNAD over the last 15 years. The study's basic conclusion is that, over the years, organized volunteerism in Japan has witnessed a struggle between the development of formal organizations emphasizing interagency cooperation and coordination of volunteers on one hand and the maintenance of a more affective social support-oriented approach with volunteers being physically and emotionally present to disaster survivors on the other.

The universality versus culture specificity of quantitative evaluations (negative-positive) of 40 events in world history was addressed using World History Survey data collected from 5,800 university students in 30 countries/societies. Multidimensional scaling using generalized procrustean analysis indicated poor fit of data from the 30 countries to an overall mean configuration, indicating lack of universal agreement as to the associational meaning of events in world history. Hierarchical cluster analysis identified one Western and two non-Western country clusters for which adequate multidimensional fit was obtained after item deletions. A two-dimensional solution for the three country clusters was identified, where the primary dimension was historical calamities versus progress and a weak second dimension was modernity versus resistance to modernity. Factor analysis further reduced the item inventory to identify a single concept with structural equivalence across cultures, Historical Calamities, which included man-made and natural, intentional and unintentional, predominantly violent but also nonviolent calamities. Less robust factors were tentatively named as Historical Progress and Historical Resistance to Oppression. Historical Calamities and Historical Progress were at the individual level both significant and independent predictors of willingness to fight for one's country in a hierarchical linear model that also identified significant country-level variation in these relationships. Consensus around calamity but disagreement as to what constitutes historical progress is discussed in relation to the political culture of nations and lay perceptions of history as ...