Japan: State and People in the Twentieth Century - Papers presented at the STICERD 20th Anniversary Symposium in July 1998

The four papers and comments in this volume deal with different aspects of the relationship between state and people in twentieth century Japan. Ben-Ami Shillony's paper is concerned with religious aspects of this relationship, in particular concerning the role of the emperor, while Barbara Molony is concerned with the position of women. Sheldon Garon's paper deals with the state's propaganda to promote saving, while Werner Pascha addresses the broader issue of the position of central government and the possibility of Japan's moving towards more of a federal structure.Japan, religion, emperor, women, saving, federalism

Are the Japanese Unique? An Analysis of Consumption and Saving Behavior in Japan

In this paper, I conduct an analysis of consumption and saving behavior in Japan, looking both at trends over time and comparisons with the other industrialized countries. I find that some of the conventional wisdoms (that the Japanese are asset-rich and hold conservative portfolios) still hold but that others (that the Japanese are high savers and shun borrowing) no longer hold and that the Japanese are not unique, with the United States and the other Anglo-Saxon countries being the true exceptions in many respects

A Survey of Household Saving Behavior in Japan

This paper presents data on Japan's household saving rate, considers the reasons for Japan's high household saving rate in the past and the reasons for the recent decline therein, projects future trends in Japan's household saving rate, and consider the implications of my findings. It finds that Japan's high household saving rate was a temporary phenomenon and that it was high in both absolute and relative terms during the 1955-95 period (especially during the 1960s and 1970s) but that it was not unusually high during the prewar and early postwar periods or after 1995; second, that Japan's temporarily high household saving rate was due not to culture but to temporary economic, demographic, and institutional factors; third, that the decline in Japan's household saving rate since the mid-1970s is due to the weakening of these factors and that Japan's household saving rate can be expected to decline even further as these factors become even less applicable and that the rapid aging of Japan's population has played the most important role; and fourth, that there is nothing to worry about even if Japan's household saving rate falls to zero or even negative levels

Japan: state and people in the twentieth century - papers presented at the STICERD 20th anniversary symposium in July 1998

The four papers and comments in this volume deal with different aspects of the relationship between state and people in twentieth century Japan. Ben-Ami Shillony's paper is concerned with religious aspects of this relationship, in particular concerning the role of the emperor, while Barbara Molony is concerned with the position of women. Sheldon Garon's paper deals with the state's propaganda to promote saving, while Werner Pascha addresses the broader issue of the position of central government and the possibility of Japan's moving towards more of a federal structure. Edited by Janet Hunte

Transnational History and Japan’s "Comparative Advantage"

The growing field of transnational or global history spotlights connections among nations and empires. This essay suggests ways in which historians of modern Japan might contribute to transnational history, taking advantage of their Japanese subjects’ determined emulation of ideas and practices in other nations. Thinking transnationally about Japan not only challenges myths of Japanese exceptionalism but also enriches transnational history by going beyond Euro-centric and U.S.-centered accounts to illuminate global currents. To demonstrate the potential benefits, I draw on several transnational studies of Japan as well as my own global history of saving money and current research on the “transnational home front.

The state and labor in modern Japan

In this meticulously researched study, Sheldon Garon examines the evolution of Japan's governmental policies toward labor from the late nineteenth century to the present day, and he substantially revises prevailing views which depict relations between the Japanese state and labor simply in terms of suppression and mutual antagonism