Enrique Silva, Assistant Professor and Faculty Coordinator in City Planning and Urban Affairs at Boston University’s Metropolitan College, offers the following insight into what the aftermath of today’s earthquake in Japan will be for the Pacific Rim and the impact of disaster preparedness and response systems:
“Together with the February New Zealand earthquake, the earthquake and tsunami that struck the northeastern coast of Japan’s Honshu Island today, provide a stark reminder of the geophysical volatility of the Pacific Rim and the ways in which human settlements all around the Rim from Tokyo to San Francisco, Christchurch to Valparaiso, are linked to one another.
“Today’s event is yet another test of the disaster preparedness and response systems of not only the Japanese, but of all the countries and cities that sit along the Pacific, which is also known as the Ring of Fire. While images from Japan show that there are clear limits to what a city or region can prepare for, there are positive signs that worldwide and domestic alert and response systems were set in motion.
“What we are witnessing today are new heights in public awareness of the global, systemic dimensions of natural disasters. This does not in and of itself guarantee fewer human and material losses, but it does speak to national and global changes in outlook toward disaster and the circulation of knowledge on how best to prepare and respond to them.
“The story after today will not only be about the Japanese resilience to these major events, but also to the ways in which countries, cities, systems and individuals around the Pacific responded and managed the crisis.”
Contact Enrique Silva ersilva@bu.edu or call Lauren Davalla in Public Relations at 617-358-1688
Boston University anthropology professor Merry White, an authority on Japanese culture and society, offers the following cultural view of the earthquake in Japan and its aftermath:
"This event will have a profound effect. Japan is no stranger to calamities and disaster has special, if not unique, meaning there. People have been waiting for The Big One, another Tokyo earthquake, since 1923 whenTokyo was flattened.
"The Kobe earthquake in 1995 had a profound effect because of lack of government preparedness and the immediate civilian response of students and workers. Now the army is immediately there.
"And we mustn't forget Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The mantra is 'we are a narrow island country with little or no natural resources.' There is a sense of national vulnerability, fragility. Moms make padded earthquake helmets for school kids and homes and all have earthquake emergencykits."
The following Boston University professors are available to offer expert commentary, analysis and insight on the earthquake and subsequent tsunami that hit Japan early this morning, as well as the economic, political, and cultural impact on the country.
Colleen Dalton, Assistant professor in the Department of Earth Sciences; Investigates the structure of the Earth’s interior using seismic waves generated by earthquakes
According to reports, European banking regulators will weaken parts of the bank stress tests which were created to raise investor confidence in the banking sector. Boston University law professor Cornelius Hurley, Director of BU's Center for Finance, Law & Policy (formerly the Morin Center for Banking and Financial Law) and a former counsel to the Fed Board of Governors, offers the following comment:
"Early indications are that the European Banking Authority's stress tests will be watered down in terms of Tier 1 capital and stress scenarios. When the purpose of stress testing is to restore market confidence, incredulous stress tests are worse than no tests at all.
"Is it a lack of will at the EBA that is the problem or is it a structural defect caused by the EBA not having the authority to enforce standards across twenty independent countries?"
Boston University law professor Tamar Frankel, an authority on securities law, corporate governance, and legal ethics, offers the following comment on the news that Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein will testify at the insider trading trial of Galleon Group's co-founder Raj Rajaratnam:
"When the CEO of a large investment bank is ready to testify in a case of insider trading against a former director, what does it teach us? It shows that the court of public opinion is in session."
Ahmed Shafiq, Eqypt's Prime Minister and close ally of former president Hosni Mubarak, resigned today just ahead of planned demonstrations to be held on Friday. Boston University international relations professor Augustus Richard Norton, a Middle East specialist and author of "Hezbollah: A Short History", offers the following analysis:
"The resignation of General Ahmed Shafiq as prime minister does not come as a surprise. He was appointed in Mubarak's last tenuous days in power, and it was quite obvious that so long as he remained in place he would be constant provocation to the mobilized opposition.
"While this necessary step is welcome, it would be far more important to see a lifting of the emergency decree that has for three decades provided a rationale for arbitrary arrests, political repression, and a license for political malfeasance and corruption cloaked in security.
"Notwithstanding the inspiring 'revolution' in Egypt, a revolution has not occurred. The military remains in power, as it has been for decades, and it has until now only made concessions at the margins of its power and privilege. As many Eqyptians are now coming to understand, their revolution actually remains to be realized."
Contact Augustus Richard Norton, 617-353-7808, arn@bu.edu, Twitter: @arnorton
The United Nations announced today that global food prices hit a record high in February and warned that rising oil prices will make an already unstable global situation much worse. Boston University professors are available to offer expert analysis and commentary on the impact of this new information.
Michael Salinger, School of Management Professor/Everett W. Lord Distinguished Faculty Scholar, Markets, Public Policy and Law; Expert in industrial economics; Former Director of the Bureau of Economics at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission; Recently quoted in the Boston Herald - "Rising food and gas prices a real downer"
The following Boston University professors are available to offer commentary, expertise, and insight on the assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan's Christian minorities minister. Bhatti was gunned down today in Islamabad.
Colleen Dalton
Thomas Berger
William Grimes
Augustus Richard Norton
Adil Najam
Charles Dunbar
Stephen Kinzer
Joseph Wippl
Robert Zelnick
Farouk El-Baz
Michael Salinger
Adil Najam
Adil Najam
Stephen Kinzer