What the bomb has done: victim relief, knowledge and politics 1

This chapter examines the politics of classification of survivors of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki through three cases of contestation: (1) hibakusha seeking recognition as “A-bomb disease” sufferers; (2) Nagasaki survivors who were outside the eligible zone at the time of the bombing demanding the official hibakusha status; and (3) Hiroshima survivors exposed to fallout (“black rain”) seeking the hibakusha status. These cases involve ongoing lawsuits, where the official accounts that highlight established scientific knowledge and international standards clash with survivor narratives anchored in personal experience and scientific knowledge provided by counter-experts. The chapter argues that these disputes have been a site of struggle over the characterisation of what the bomb has done, and consequential to nuclear governance in Japan and beyond.