Kaminoseki

Kaminoseki is a port-town and fishing town on the Inland Sea coast of Yamaguchi prefecture (formerly Suô province). It is situated across three islands and a small peninsula of "mainland" Honshu, and incorporates a number of formerly distinct villages, including that of Murotsu. A major regional harbor not only for local/regional traffic but even for foreign voyagers, Kaminoseki or areas immediately nearby appear in records as early as those written by ambassadors from Silla in the 8th century, recorded in the Man'yôshû, as well as records associated with Korean and Ryukyuan embassies to Edo in the 17th-19th century, and in diaries and journals of Western travelers such as Carl Peter Thunberg in the 1770s, and Robert Fortune in the 1860s.

Today, the town is perhaps most known for the nuclear power plant which was proposed to be constructed in the 1980s, and which as a result of local protests, has been delayed and delayed, essentially blocked, and today more than 30 years later still has not been built; many of those opposing the construction of the power plant argue that they do so, in part at least, in order to protect their hometown (furusato), though there are also many in favor of the power plant who argue similarly that its construction will help revive the town, which has seen considerable decline as have many rural areas in Japan in recent decades.

References

• Martin Dusinberre, Hard Times in the Hometown: A History of Community Survival in Modern Japan, University of Hawaii Press, 2012.