JAPAN AND PROTECTION the Growth of Protectionist Sentiment and the Japanese Response

Recently, the extent of Japanese export penetration into other Western economies, particularly the USA, has become a matter of great international concern. There have been increasingly strident demands for Japan to reciprocate on imports, for the Japanese market to be 'opened up' and, by some people, for sanctions or a trade war if the Japanese do not respond. This book examines the growth of protectionist sentiment and the Japanese response to it. It examines in detail the debates within Japan and discusses the measures which the Japanese have actually taken, including the voluntary export restraint measure in the motor sector. It concludes that, broadly, the Japanese are indeed responding to world demands for their market to be opened up but that successful exporting to Japan depends equally on efforts by Western companies to service that market, which they have so far been relatively slow to do.

Syed Javed Maswood teaches at Griffith University.