Japan's Keidanren and political influence on market liberalization

Asian Survey

Volumn 38, Issue 3, 1998, Pages 328-344

  Yoshimatsu, Hidetaka ^a  

^a Intl Ctr Stud of E Asian Devmt   (Japan)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

BUSINESS ASSOCIATION; ECONOMIC POLICY; KEIDANREN; LIBERALISATION;

JAPAN;

EID: 0031784133     PISSN: 00044687     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/2645431     Document Type: Review

References (40)

1. See, for instance, Bela Balassa, "Japan's Trade Policies," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv 122 (1986); Paul Krugman, ed., Trade with Japan: Has the Door Opened Wider? (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991); Robert Z. Lawrence, "Efficient or Exclusionist? The Import Behavior of Japanese Corporate Groups," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 1 (1991); and C. Fred Bergsten and Noland Marcus, Reconcilable Differences? United States-Japan Economic Conflict (Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1993).
2. See, for instance, Bela Balassa, "Japan's Trade Policies," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv 122 (1986); Paul Krugman, ed., Trade with Japan: Has the Door Opened Wider? (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991); Robert Z. Lawrence, "Efficient or Exclusionist? The Import Behavior of Japanese Corporate Groups," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 1 (1991); and C. Fred Bergsten and Noland Marcus, Reconcilable Differences? United States-Japan Economic Conflict (Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1993).
3. See, for instance, Bela Balassa, "Japan's Trade Policies," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv 122 (1986); Paul Krugman, ed., Trade with Japan: Has the Door Opened Wider? (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991); Robert Z. Lawrence, "Efficient or Exclusionist? The Import Behavior of Japanese Corporate Groups," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 1 (1991); and C. Fred Bergsten and Noland Marcus, Reconcilable Differences? United States-Japan Economic Conflict (Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1993).
4. See, for instance, Bela Balassa, "Japan's Trade Policies," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv 122 (1986); Paul Krugman, ed., Trade with Japan: Has the Door Opened Wider? (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991); Robert Z. Lawrence, "Efficient or Exclusionist? The Import Behavior of Japanese Corporate Groups," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 1 (1991); and C. Fred Bergsten and Noland Marcus, Reconcilable Differences? United States-Japan Economic Conflict (Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1993).
5. Kent E. Calder, "Japanese Foreign Economic Policy Formation: Explaining the Reactive State," World Politics 40:4 (1988), p. 518.
6. Leonard J. Schoppa, "Two-Level Games and Bargaining Outcomes: Why Gaiatsu Succeeds in Japan in Some Cases but Not Others," International Organization 47 (1993); and Mikanagi Yumiko, Japan's Trade Policy: Action or Reaction? (London: Routledge, 1996).
7. Leonard J. Schoppa, "Two-Level Games and Bargaining Outcomes: Why Gaiatsu Succeeds in Japan in Some Cases but Not Others," International Organization 47 (1993); and Mikanagi Yumiko, Japan's Trade Policy: Action or Reaction? (London: Routledge, 1996).
8. Aurelia George, "Japan's America Problem: The Japanese Response to U.S. Pressure," Washington Quarterly 14 (1991), p. 16.
9. Zaikai are often described in English as "business world" or "financial circles" but could better be defined as groups "of people who, apart from their identification with specific companies or industries, speak from the capitalist position and exert a strong influence on politics" (Tanaka Yonosuke, "The World of Zaikai," in Politics and Economics in Contemporary Japan. eds. Hyoe Murakami and Johannes Hirschmeier (Tokyo: Japan Culture Institute, 1979], p. 64). The national level zaikai operate through four business federations: the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Nissho); the Japan Federation of Employers' Associations (Nikkeiren); the Japan Association of Corporate Executives (Keizai Doyukai); and Keidanren.
10. Yanaga Chitoshi, Big Business in Japanese Politics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968).
11. Gerald L. Curtis, "Big Business and Political Influence," in Modem Japanese Organization and Decision-Making, ed. Ezra F. Vogel (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1975). For recent research on Keidanren and zaikai, see Heiwa Keizai Kenkyu Kaigi, Zaikai: Sei kan tone, yuchaku no kozo [Business world: Business and its close relationship with politics and bureaucracy] (Tokyo: Ochanomizu Shobo, 1982), and Gary D. Allinson, "Japan's Keidanren and Its New Leadership," Pacific Affairs 60:3 (1987), pp. 385-407.
12. Gerald L. Curtis, "Big Business and Political Influence," in Modem Japanese Organization and Decision-Making, ed. Ezra F. Vogel (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1975). For recent research on Keidanren and zaikai, see Heiwa Keizai Kenkyu Kaigi, Zaikai: Sei kan tone, yuchaku no kozo [Business world: Business and its close relationship with politics and bureaucracy] (Tokyo: Ochanomizu Shobo, 1982), and Gary D. Allinson, "Japan's Keidanren and Its New Leadership," Pacific Affairs 60:3 (1987), pp. 385-407.
13. Gerald L. Curtis, "Big Business and Political Influence," in Modem Japanese Organization and Decision-Making, ed. Ezra F. Vogel (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1975). For recent research on Keidanren and zaikai, see Heiwa Keizai Kenkyu Kaigi, Zaikai: Sei kan tone, yuchaku no kozo [Business world: Business and its close relationship with politics and bureaucracy] (Tokyo: Ochanomizu Shobo, 1982), and Gary D. Allinson, "Japan's Keidanren and Its New Leadership," Pacific Affairs 60:3 (1987), pp. 385-407.
14. Leonard H. Lynn and Timothy J. McKeown, Organizing Business: Trade Associations in America and Japan (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1988), pp. 81-83.
15. William G. Ouchi, The M-Form Society: How American Teamwork Can Recapture the Competitive Edge (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1984), p. 158.
16. The standards and certification systems mean the administrative system imposes regulations on goods and services with an eye to protecting consumers, ensuring the people's health and security, and unifying industrial standards.
17. Funabashi Yoichi, Nichibei keizai masatsu [Japan-U.S. economic friction] (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1987), p. 57.
18. Keidanren jigyo hokoku, 1982, p. 71.
19. Keidanren Review 77, October 1982; Keizai Koho Center Brief (Tokyo), March 27, 1985.
20. Keidanren Review 77, October 1982; Keizai Koho Center Brief (Tokyo), March 27, 1985.
21. The foregoing account is based largely on author interviews, Keidanren, Tokyo, September 1995.
22. While outward investment from Japan has rapidly expanded since the mid-1980s, inward investment has remained at a low level. At the end of 1992, the ratio of outward to inward investment was 1:16 in the U.S., 1:24 in the U.K., and 2:25 in Germany, while the ratio was 15:99 in Japan (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, International Direct Investment Statistics Yearbook [Paris: OECD, 1994], p. 15).
23. Interview, Keidanren, Tokyo, September 1995.
24. Nikkan kogyo shinbun, June 17, 1994.
25. Kusano Atsushi. Daitenho: Keizai kisei no kozo [The Large-Scale Retail Store Law: Structure of economic regulations] (Tokyo: Nihon Keizai Shinbunsha, 1992), p. 240.
26. Keidanren Review 142, October 1993, p. 6; Asahi shinbun, August 9, 1994; and Gekkan Keidanren, June 1995, p. 31.
27. Keidanren Review 142, October 1993, p. 6; Asahi shinbun, August 9, 1994; and Gekkan Keidanren, June 1995, p. 31.
28. Keidanren Review 142, October 1993, p. 6; Asahi shinbun, August 9, 1994; and Gekkan Keidanren, June 1995, p. 31.
29. Keidanren Review (special issue), 1993, p. 2.
30. Ibid., 148, February 1995, p. 4.
31. Other voices in support of this position have come from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and Industry, the Economic Planning Agency, and elements of the media. For the stance of major players on agricultural liberalization, see Aurelia George, "The Politics of Liberalization in Japan: The Case of Rice," Pacific Economic Papers 188 (Canberra: Australia-Japan Research Centre, 1990).
32. Aurelia George and Eric Saxon, "The Politics of Agricultural Protection in Japan" in The Political Economy of Agricultural Protection: East Asia in International Perspective, eds. Kim Anderson and Yujiro Hayami (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1986), p. 102.
33. Ibid., p. 106.
34. The high price of domestic agricultural materials is pointed out in several Keidanren reports. For instance, the December 1986 White Paper on the Food Industry stated that one kg of sugar costs 58 yen in Melbourne, 118 yen in New York, 90 yen in London, and 198 yen in Tokyo, while one kg of skim milk costs 138, 287, 254, and 545 yen, respectively.
35. Bela Balassa, "Japan's Trade Policies," p. 758.
36. Japan Times, January 28, 1987.
37. Honjo Jiro, Dokyumento Keidanren [Document Keidanren] (Tokyo: Kodansha, 1993), pp. 296-97.
38. Daily Yomiuri, June 7, 1994.
39. Zoku (tribe or clan) are "LDP Diet members who exert, formally or informally, a strong influence on specific policy areas mainly in the LDP's Policy Affairs Research Council" (Inoguchi Takashi and Iwai Tomonobu, "Zoku giin" no kenkyu [Research on "tribal Dietmen"] [Tokyo: Nihon Keizai Shinbunsha, 1987], p. 20). These Diet members have accommodated special expertise and influence concerned with policy implementation as well as formulation.
40. Yamamura Kozo, "The Deliberate Emergence of a Free Trader: The Japanese Political Economy in Transition" in Japan: A New Kind of Superpower? eds. Craig Garby and Mary Brown Bullock (Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1994), p. 42.