Karel van Wolferen
Essay
Sep/Oct
1993
Cracks in Japan's political edifice have excited hopes in the United States that reforms are on the way. What American's fail to grasp is that the Japanese politicians do not count for much. In the absence of a strong civil society, and protected by the press, Tokyo's government ministries call the shots. Washington should press Japan to write a new constitution strengthening politicians vis-a-vis the bureaucracy. Until Japan reshapes its political system, the split in the Liberal Democratic Party will remain no more than fractures in a facade.
Essay
Fall
1990
A Dutch commentator calls for an end to US wishful thinking that Japan will ultimately conform to Western ways given continued pressure to do so, and urges the creation of a 'new institutional framework' for global trading relations, based on a mutual recognition of national realities.
Essay
Winter
1986
The growing economic disputes between the USA and Japan could develop into a serious political conflict. The 'Japan problem' is rooted in two fictions (1) that the Japanese state has central organs of government which bear ultimate responsibility for economic and political decision-making, whereas the Japanese system is a collection of different hierarchies without a centre (2) that Japan has a free-market capitalist economy, whereas it is actually a 'capitalist development state', characterized by a partnership between central bureaucrats and entrepreneurs. Fixed trade commitments could be part of the solution.
