Japanese Investment in the World Economy: A Study of Strategic Themes in the Internationalization of Japanese Industry - By Roger Farrell (original) (raw)

THE ECONOMIC CRISIS IN JAPAN: Mainstream Perspectives and an Alternative View

Critical Asian Studies, 2003

Various explanations have been proposed for Japan's deepening economic crisis: (1) the country's "anticapitalist" economic institutions, (2) the failure to clean up bad bank loans and bankrupt companies, (3) a deflationary liquidity trap, (4) upward pressures on the value of the yen, and (5) balance-sheet adjustments instigated by the collapse of the 1980s "bubble economy." Our critical survey suggests that the kernel of truth in all these perspectives lies in their common (mostly unstated and unconscious) implication that Japan faces a crisis of capitalist maturity involving a worsening trade-off between economic stagnation and the exploitative, wasteful, and destructive utilization of productive capacity. This dilemma can only be overcome through an explicit rejection of capitalist priorities and a movement toward a more worker-community-centered economy. As recently as the early 1990s, the Japanese economy was the envy of the West. "Japan Inc.," with its system of collaborative labor-management relations based on "lifetime employment," its state-directed industrial policies (especially planned credit allocation), and its less-militarized international relations, was widely viewed as a model for a more equitable and competitive twenty-first-century capitalism. The more free-market, shareholder-oriented, worker-unfriendly, and militarized capitalism of the United States was thought to be less in tune with the requirements of a high-tech post-cold war era. 1 What a difference a decade makes. With its cascading business bankruptcies, its banking system in shambles, and its skyrocketing government debt alongside deflation and rising unemployment, the Japanese model is now almost universally viewed as being in terminal crisis. Most striking is how previously cele

Introduction: Japan at an Inflection Point

Asia Pacific Business Review , 2012

Japan, inadvertently, has become the outstanding forerunner in a new set of global developments that can be described under the three headings of deflation, downsizing, and demography. New ‘lessons from Japan’ are to be discovered here, and these are not only admonitory ones. Far from it, for recent Japanese practice exemplifies the new ‘choose and focus’ strategies that can make an era of general, quantitative business slowdown into one of remarkable sectoral and qualitative development. The implications touch upon wide domains of activity, particularly strategic planning and finance. This introduction surveys some relevant and under-appreciated features of this recent history, in order to understand and project a few main lines of present and near-future developments in connection with the contributions that make up this special issue.

The Current State of the Japanese Economy and Remedies*

Asian Economic Papers, 2002

Japan has reached the limits of conventional macroeconomic policies. Lowering interest rates will not stimulate the economy because widespread excess capacity has made private investment insensitive to interest rate changes. Increasing government expenditure in the usual way will have small effects because it will take the form of unproductive investment in the rural areas. Cutting taxes will not increase consumption because workers are concerned about job security and future pension and medical benefits. Expanding the monetary base will not induce banks to increase investment loans because the proportion of nonperforming loans in their portfolios is growing because of the prolonged economic stagnation. In order for sustained economic recovery to occur in Japan, the government must change the makeup and regional allocation of public investments, resolve the problem of nonperforming loans in the banking system, improve the corporate governance and operations of the banks, and strengthen the international competitiveness of domestically oriented companies in the agriculture, construction, and service industries.

The Economic Crisis of Japan Lost Decade

Since World War II, Japan has transformed into one of the countries with a fairly stable economy. Almost after 1945 Japan is rare experienced an economic crisis, especially in the 1960s Japan experienced rapid economic development. But with status as one a country with a strong economy, does not guarantee Japan is spared to the economic crisis. In exactly 1990 the Japanese economy experienced stagnation and crisis that lasted for a decade. It is then known with the term decades gone. The crisis is causing an inflation asset prices in Japan before 1990. Coupled with the emergence of that condition known as zombie firms ie the conditions under which the company has a level high debt and unable to pay it off even though it has been declared bangkrut.Krisis that hit Japan is quite long because in addition to magnitude asset price bubbles are also accompanied by the size of bank loans which is beyond expectations. In addition, the role of the less effective government also becomes a separate factor for the survival of the crisis. Thus can the author present the research that the length of the crisis is so great asset price bubbles that can not be controlled by the government. Japan's economic condition after World War II

The japanese economic system under the global crisis: Change and continuity

Society and Economy, 2011

The current Japanese economy has continued to grow, albeit at a low rate, through the drastic changes in the Japanese economic system. The global crisis has seriously affected the Japanese economy, despite it causing only slight damage to the banking sector. The current global economic crisis will have far-reaching consequences on the economic system and structure. In this study, the economic characteristics following the bubble economy and the sustainability of the Japanese economic system are examined.

Japan´s lost decade: on the development of the Japanese economy in the 1990s

Medzinarodne Vztahy, 2012

Cílem článku je popsat a analyzovat hospodářský vývoj, shrnout a vysvětlit nejvýznamnější faktory, které pravděpodobně vedly k celkovému oslabení a dlouhodobé nestabilitě japonské ekonomiky v 90. letech 20. století (tzv. ztracená dekáda). Zásadní vliv na další vývoj měl rozpad bubliny na trzích aktiv na počátku 90. let 20. století. Rozpad této bubliny vyvolal nebo posílil další negativní a velmi komplikované procesy v japonské ekonomice, zejména počínající deflaci a nedostatečnou domácí poptávku. Rozpad bubliny také negativně ovlivnil japonský finanční sektor, výrobu a investiční aktivitu japonských společností atd. Existují však i faktory strukturálního a institucionálního charakteru, které limitují efektivitu proticyklických opatření hospodářské politiky a rozvoj nabídkové strany japonské ekonomiky.