Policies for Economic Development

Abstract

This chapter presents a summary of and reflection on the Japanese experiences with economic and social policies in postwar period and thereby tries to offer a frame of reference for examining and designing development policies in other countries. The success story of Japanese development is not just a demonstration of growth but offers a rich jewel box of policy instruments as well. The main purpose is, therefore, to explain the issues that Japan has faced and the policy measures that she has employed to resolve them. Japanese economic policies have been different from the policies of the United States and Europe in many ways. The latter more or less followed the standard textbooks or, in the case f the English Labor Party, the idea of the welfare state. But Japanese policies have been basically a search for the ways and means to change an underdeveloped economy into an industrial society comparable with those in the West. In this sense they are much more relevant to the policies in Asian and other developing countries. In Asian economies, the human factor played especially a noteworthy role in development In this respect too Japanese experiences seem to offer good precedents along with the weakness. After the discussion on policy problems, some remarks are added on the common features of Japanese and Asian development in two respects: (a) acceleration and deceleration of growth rate and (b) income distribution in Asian economies.