Population and Resources in Japan: A 1949 Forecast

Abstract

In a recent article in this Review, Nathan Keyfitz argued that looking up and studying failed forecasts, however embarrassing these may be to the practitioner and to the profession, should be an important methodological tool in trying to understand how social processes work (Vol. 6, 1, pp. 62-63). Few topics provide more notable specimens of the clouded crystal ball than past prognoses on the population and resource problems faced by Japan. The paper reprinted below, an example of the genre, was presented at a conference in 1949 under the title Future adjustments of population to resources in (Modernization Programs in Relation to Human Resources and Population Problems, Milbank Memorial Fund, New York, 1950, pp. 142-153). Its author, Warren S. Thompson (1887-1973), a noted American demographer, was director of the Scripps Foundation for Research in Population Problems from 1922 to 1953. (A long-time student of the Far East, after World War II he also served briefly in Japan on the staff of General MacArthur as an advisor on census and population policy.) In a book published in 1930 (Danger Spots in World Population), Thompson posed the question: can Japan become a great manufacturing nation? His answer was a barely qualified no. Returning to this theme 20 years later his conclusions on Japan's economic propsects were no less pessimistic. In retrospect, it is easy to see where Thompson went wrong. He failed to foresee the productivity gains that were to be achieved by Japanese agriculture, exaggerated the importance of materials and mineral resources in industrial development, and greatly underestimated the qualities of the Japanese labor force and Japanese entrepreneurship and organizational ability. His crucial misjudgment, however, concerned the framework in which international economic relations were to be conducted in the years to come. Thompson