The Japanese economy has long been divided between world-class manufacturers, on the one hand, and uncompetitive small enterprises, inefficient service industries, and staunchly protected farmers, on the other. Recent economic troubles have made the system's inefficiencies less tolerable,...

"As the Japanese economy languished in the 1990s, Japanese government officials, business executives, and opinion leaders concluded that their economic model had gone terribly wrong. As government officials and industry leaders scrutinized their options, they selected reforms to modify or...