Industrial Policy in Japan and the Policy Choices for Central and East European Countries - A Commentary on Some Controversial Issues

Nobuko Inagawa has written an excellent paper on the relevance of Japanese experiences for a successful integration of Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs) into the world economy. Talking about the case of Japan is particularly interesting - and potentially controversial - compared with the experiences of other leading economies or successful late-industrializers. The reason is that Japan - or rather: a significant part of its political, bureaucratic and academic establishment - currently is the only major challenger to the so-called „Washington consensus“ on how to go about structural change in developing and post-socialist transition economies. Here, I want to concentrate on three issues, which could be seen somewhat controversially when utilising Japan´s experiences and drawing policy lessons for CEECs: 1. Did Japan ever experience a „transformation“, suitable as a „tertium comparationis“ with today´s CEECs? 2. Are such experiences helpful with respect to the policy problems of today´s CEECs? 3. To what extent is the experience „translated“ into theory and to what extent is it made use of by Japanese institutions and researchers?