This is a short piece that asks a very interesting question. There are a few anecdotal statements about how other cultures have witnessed large levels of looting during catastrophes.
Gee, I don't know, but one has to look at the vast differences between an almost entirely homogenous Japanese society, where almost all of the population is brainwashed from birth to act in cooperation and those of a vastly multicultural society where the majority of the wealth has been held almost exclusively by a homogenous segment of the population who have used this wealth and influence to socially and economically stigmatize the other groups to isolate them while profiting at their expense. This has led to a perpetual stimulation of racial, ethnic and economic strife which when given the chance to manifest itself unpunished, will do so and on a large scale.<p>The looting is all counter-productive of course, because once tensions settle down, the wealthy elites will use the past uncivil behavior as further reasoning to impose even more drastic measures against the oppressed by instigating fear, uncertainty and doubt in the minds of those who view themselves as potential victims and co-opting them into participating in a new round of legalized ethnic and socio-economic cleansing. See New Orleans, Detroit, Los Angeles, New York, et al.