Natural Disaster and Nuclear Crisis in Japan

Natural Disaster and Nuclear Crisis in Japan
Author: Jeff Kingston
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 364
Release: 2012-03-12
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1136343474

The March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan plunged the country into a state of crisis. As the nation struggled to recover from a record breaking magnitude 9 earthquake and a tsunami that was as high as thirty-eight meters in some places, news trickled out that Fukushima had experienced meltdowns in three reactors. These tragic catastrophes claimed some 20,000 lives, initially displacing some 500,000 people and overwhelming Japan's formidable disaster preparedness. This book brings together the analysis and insights of a group of distinguished experts on Japan to examine what happened, how various institutions and actors responded and what lessons can be drawn from Japan’s disaster. The contributors, many of whom experienced the disaster first hand, assess the wide-ranging repercussions of this catastrophe and how it is already reshaping Japanese culture, politics, energy policy, and urban planning.

Japan's Lost Decade

Japan's Lost Decade
Author: Gary Saxonhouse
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2004-03-05
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9781405119177

This volume explores the origins of Japan’s current economic crisis and assesses the country’s prospects for recovery. An exploration of the origins and consequences of Japan’s current economic crisis. Examines the collapse of the equity and real estate market bubbles in the late 1980s. Analyses the failure of Japanese monetary and fiscal policies to reverse the ensuing economic decline. Evaluates unorthodox options available to policy makers that might enable Japan to recover from its ‘lost decade’. Suggests that Japan’s prospects for economic recovery are still uncertain.

From Crisis to Recovery

From Crisis to Recovery
Author: Zongxian Yu
Publisher: World Scientific
Total Pages: 532
Release: 2001
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9789812810496

It is interesting to note that after two years of recession in East Asia, almost all the countries in this region are rising again. In the wake of that sudden onslaught on the economies of East Asia, many new questions have come to the fore (and are waiting for the right answers), such as: How could the Asian countries have become so weak as to totally succumb to the financial crisis? What were the real causes of the crisis? What policy measures have the affected countries taken to combat the crisis and how effective have they been? As for the argument of OC hands-off policyOCO versus OC government interventionOCO, which approach was more appropriate for curbing the expansion of the crisis? What are the policy implications of resolving the crisis? Why is East Asia rising again after the two-year recession?. The editors of this volume organized a research team composed of 12 leading economists from the ten East Asian countries: Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, mainland China and Japan. One expert from the United States was also invited; he was responsible for making an aggregate analysis of the interdependence of the region in the context of a financial crisis. Two meetings were held OCo the first in April 1999, the second in January 2000. Sample Chapter(s). Chapter 1.1: Introduction (97 KB). Chapter 1.2: the Importance of the Issue: The Financial Crisis in East Asia (86 KB). Chapter 1.3: Various Explanations of the Causes of the Financial Crisis (96 KB). Chapter 1.4: The Impacts of the Financial Crisis in East Asia (204 KB). Chapter 1.5: External Debt and Financial Crisis (124 KB). Chapter 1.6: Corruption and Nepotism Between Officials and Enterprises (143 KB). Chapter 1.7: A Model Used to Explain the Financial Crisis (117 KB). Chapter 1.8: The Role of the Government (89 KB). Chapter 1.9: The Function of the IMF (120 KB). Chapter 1.10: East Asia''s Recovery (84 KB). Chapter 1.11: The Purpose of this Volume (103 KB). Contents: An Overview of the Financial Crisis in East Asia (T-S Yu); Japan: Japan''s Bubble Economy and Asia (H S Lim); China: Financial Crisis and Chinese Economy (D-Q Xu); Korea: Korean Financial Crisis OCo The Crisis of a Development Model? (J Lee); Singapore: Coping with the Asian Financial Crisis OCo The Singapore Experience (K-J Ngiam); Hong Kong: Financial Crisis in the Case of Hong Kong OCo Last In, Last Out? (C Tuan & L F Y Ng); Taiwan: Financial Crisis in East Asia (T-M Huo); Thailand: 1997 Thai Financial Crisis (C Leenabanchong); Malaysia: Financial Crisis in Malaysia (M Ariff & M M-C Yap); Indonesia: Indonesia''s Responses to the Recent Economic Crisis (A Nasution); Philippine: The 1997-1999 Philippine Economic Downturn OCo A Preventable One (E A Tan); Recursive Dynamic CGE Analysis: The Road to Economic Recovery in Asia (Z Wang & D-Q Xu); Conclusion: Lessons and Policy Implications (T-S Yu & D-Q Xu). Readership: Professors and graduate students in economics and economists working in financial institutions such as the World Bank, IMF, ADB and commercial banks."

Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience

Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience
Author: Ryōichi Mikitani
Publisher: Peterson Institute
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2000
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780881322897

Japan is only one of many industrialized economies to suffer a financial crisis in the past 15 years, but it has suffered the most from its crisis--as measured in lost output and investment opportunities, and in the direct costs of clean-up. Comparing the response of Japanese policy in the 1990s to that of US monetary and financial policy to the American Savings and Loan Crisis of the late 1980s sheds light on the reasons for this outcome. This volume was created by bringing together several leading academics from the United States and Japan--plus former senior policymakers from both countries--to discuss the challenges to Japanese financial and monetary policy in the 1990s. The papers address in turn both the monetary and financial aspects of the crisis, and the discussants bring together broad themes across the two countries' experiences. As the papers in this Special Report demonstrate, while the Japanese government's policy response to its banking crisis in the 1990s was slow in comparison to that of the US government a decade earlier, the underlying dynamics were similar. A combination of mismanaged partial deregulation and regulatory forebearance gave rise to the crisis and allowed it to deepen, and only the closure of some banks and injection of new capital into others began the resolution. The Bank of Japan's monetary policy from the late 1980s onward, however, was increasingly out of step with US or other developed country norms. In particular, the Bank of Japan's limited response to deflation after being granted independence in 1998 stands out as a dangerous and unusual stance.

Human Security and Japan’s Triple Disaster

Human Security and Japan’s Triple Disaster
Author: Paul Bacon
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 229
Release: 2014-06-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 131774747X

Japan has been one of the most important international sponsors of human security, yet the concept has hitherto not been considered relevant to the Japanese domestic context. This book applies the human security approach to the specific case of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident that struck Japan on 11 March 2011, which has come to be known as Japan's ‘triple disaster’. This left more than 15,000 people dead and was the most expensive natural disaster in recorded history. The book identifies the many different forms of human insecurity that were produced or exacerbated within Japan by the triple disaster. Each chapter adds to the contemporary literature by identifying the vulnerability of Japanese social groups and communities, and examining how they collectively seek to prevent, respond to and recover from disaster. Emphasis is given to analysis of the more encouraging signs of human empowerment that have occurred. Contributors draw on a wide range of perspectives, from disciplines such as: disaster studies, environmental studies, gender studies, international relations, Japanese studies, philosophy and sociology. In considering this Japanese case study in detail, the book demonstrates to researchers, postgraduate students, policy makers and practitioners how the concept of human security can be practically applied at a policy level to the domestic affairs of developed countries, countering the tendency to regard human security as exclusively for developing states.

The Japanese Banking Crisis

The Japanese Banking Crisis
Author: Ryozo Himino
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 127
Release: 2021-01-07
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9811595984

This open access book provides a readable narrative of the bubbles and the banking crisis Japan experienced during the two decades between the late 1980s and the early 2000s. Japan, which was a leading competitor in the world’s manufacturing sector, tried to transform itself into an economy with domestic demand-led mature growth, but the ensuing bubbles and crisis instead made the country suffer from chronicle deflation and stagnation. The book analyses why the Japanese authorities could not avoid making choices that led to this outcome. The chapters are based on the lectures to regulators from emerging economies delivered at the Global Financial Partnership Center of the Financial Services Agency of Japan.

From Crisis to Recovery

From Crisis to Recovery
Author: Zongxian Yu
Publisher: World Scientific
Total Pages: 526
Release: 2001
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9810244347

Readership: Professors and graduate students in economics and economists working in financial institutions such as the World Bank, IMF, ADB and commercial banks.

Value and Crisis

Value and Crisis
Author: Makoto Itoh
Publisher: Monthly Review Press
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2020-12-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1583678980

Analyzes Japanese contributions to Marxist theory Marxist economic thought has had a long and distinguished history in Japan, dating back to the First World War. When interest in Marxist theory was virtually nonexistent in the United States, rival schools of thought in Japan emerged, and brilliant debates took place on Marx’s Capital and on capitalism as it was developing in Japan. Forty years ago, Makoto Itoh’s Value and Crisis began to chronicle these Japanese contributions to Marxist theory, discussing in particular views on Marx’s theories of value and crisis, and problems of Marx’s theory of market value. Now, in a second edition of his book, Itoh deepens his study Marx’s theories of value and crisis, as an essential reference point from which to analyze the multiple crises that have arisen during the past four decades of neoliberalism. One contribution of the original Value and Crisis was to bridge Japan and the world in the field of Marxian political economy. Itoh’s second edition demonstrates an even wider-ranging familiarity with major schools of Marxist thought, summarizing and assessing viewpoints of such theorists as Hilferding, Bauer, Kautsky, Bukharin, Luxemburg, Grossman, Sweezy, the Japanese Marxist Kozo Uno, together with the relevant parts of Capital and a section on the 1930’s Great Depression. Given today’s current emergencies of world capitalism and socialism, says Itoh, we need to work together to resolve new global problems, articulating new issues of Marx’s theories of value and crisis. The promise of Marx’s theories has not waned. If anything—given the failure of Soviet-style socialism and the catastrophe of neoliberalism—it grows daily.

Restoring Japan's Economic Growth

Restoring Japan's Economic Growth
Author: Adam Simon Posen
Publisher: Peterson Institute
Total Pages: 216
Release: 1998
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780881322620

Criticism of current Japanese macroeconomic and financial policies is so wide spread that the reasons for it are assumed to be self-evident. In this volume, Adam Posen explains in depth why a shift in Japanese fiscal and monetary policies, as well as financial reform, would be in Japan's self-interest. He demonstrates that Japanese economic stagnation in the 1990s is the result of mistaken fiscal austerity and financial laissez-faire rather than a structural decline of the "Japan Model." The author outlines a program for putting the country back on the path to solid economic growth - primarily through permanent tax cuts and monetary stabilization - and draws broader lessons from the recent Japanese policy actions that led to the country's continuing stagnation.

Black Wave

Black Wave
Author: Daniel P. Aldrich
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2019-07-10
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022663843X

Despite the devastation caused by the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and 60-foot tsunami that struck Japan in 2011, some 96% of those living and working in the most disaster-stricken region of Tōhoku made it through. Smaller earthquakes and tsunamis have killed far more people in nearby China and India. What accounts for the exceptionally high survival rate? And why is it that some towns and cities in the Tōhoku region have built back more quickly than others? Black Wave illuminates two critical factors that had a direct influence on why survival rates varied so much across the Tōhoku region following the 3/11 disasters and why the rebuilding process has also not moved in lockstep across the region. Individuals and communities with stronger networks and better governance, Daniel P. Aldrich shows, had higher survival rates and accelerated recoveries. Less-connected communities with fewer such ties faced harder recovery processes and lower survival rates. Beyond the individual and neighborhood levels of survival and recovery, the rebuilding process has varied greatly, as some towns and cities have sought to work independently on rebuilding plans, ignoring recommendations from the national government and moving quickly to institute their own visions, while others have followed the guidelines offered by Tokyo-based bureaucrats for economic development and rebuilding.