The Japanese politician Shintaro Ishihara in a 1989 book co-authored with Sony co-founder Akio Morita called ‘The Japan that can say No’, recalls how Cabinet Ministers found a discussion on the competitiveness of industry so boring that many members appeared to fall asleep.
The Japanese politician Shintaro Ishihara in a 1989 book co-authored with Morita called ‘The Japan that can say No’, recalls how Cabinet Ministers found a discussion on the competitiveness of industry so boring that many members appeared to fall asleep.
“I turned to the Minister for Home Affairs, Mr. Kajiyama, who was sitting beside me, and asked what was going on here”, said Ishihara, “everybody is thinking it's just great that business isn't prospering that much.”
Ishihara’s conclusion was that the huge trade surpluses being thrown up by Japanese success in the electronics industry were becoming such an embarrassment to the Japanese political class that they would prefer it if Japan's industry could become rather less successful in order to avoid trade friction
The three previous decades had demonstrated unparalleled industrial success as Japan moved rapidly up the industrial scale from agriculture to manufacturing, and from manufactures such as textiles to higher productivity manufactures such as machinery.
GDP per worker grew from $3,500 in 1955 to $13,500 in 1973. Living standards quadrupled.
However the attitude of Tokyo’s political elite in 1989, described by Ishihara, led to a 1990s ‘Decade of Wandering’ when there was a loss of direction in both industry and government.
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