>This is from "THE USE AND ABUSE OF JAPAN AS A PROGRESSIVE MODEL"
>by Paul Burkett and Martin Hart-Landsberg
>http://www.yorku.ca/socreg/burkett-landsberg96.txt
>
>The Japanese Investment Regime
>
>"The left-liberal consensus also considers Japanese capitalism more
>progressive than U.S. capitalism insofar as Japanese capital is or has
>been relatively patient and planned, and relatively less speculative and
>anarchic than U.S. capital. Here, the assumption is that Japanese
>capital's greater patience and more `efficient' planning has little to
>with the fact that both the goals and the process of accumulation and
>industrial policy formulation (including the planning operations of
>government agencies like the Ministry of International Trade and
>Industry) are undemocratically determined. It assumes, in other words,
>that even if the basic priorities to be served by accumulation and the
>planning process were democratically determined, capital would (or
>could, presumably given the right constellation of political forces) be
>just as patient. By contrast, it seems more likely to us that the
>relative patience of Japanese capital was based firmly on the relative
>weakness of the Japanese working-class, i.e., on the strictly
>subordinate status of workers' priorities in the Japanese political
>economy. Indeed, Steven (1990: pp.12-3) suggests that the nationalist-
>industrialist form and ideology of the post-World War II Japanese state
>were based on Japanese capital's complete domination of the Japanese
>working class, which allowed the state to focus on external
>competitiveness and the management of inter-imperialist rivalry more so
>than in any other developed capitalist country.5"
>
>and also:
>
>"It is also necessary to briefly comment on the argument that Japanese
>capitalism has gained a progressive-competitive edge over the U.S.
>because it is less dependent on military power. We believe that the
>recovery of Japanese imperialism in the post-World War II era occurred
>symbiotically with the evolution of U.S. imperialism, as the U.S., in
>order to redistribute the costs of its own hegemonic activities,
>encouraged and supported Japanese efforts to reconstitute its sphere of
>influence in East Asia. This symbiotic development occurred
>interactively with, but was by no means reducible to, the post-World War
>II boom of the Japanese economy generated by U.S. military spending
>associated with the Korean and Vietnam Wars (Halliday and McCormack,
>1973; Sweezy, 1980; Tsuru, 1993). One could even say that Japan enjoyed
>many of the benefits, but none of the drawbacks, of the powerful U.S.
>military-industrial complex and global-imperialist network. This history
>challenges the misguided notion (or wishful thinking along the lines of
>the pre-World War I Kautsky) that military power has been eclipsed by
>some kind of militarily-unconnected economic power.13"
>
>Jonathan
I sez:
Basically the same argument that Arrighi makes. Since the late 1960's/early 1970's, each successive time that E Asian regional production and sourcing networks are broadened (geographically) and deepened (i.e. higher c/v ratios) Japanese capital goods manufacturers take it to the bank. State-society relations, industrial policy, corporate organization are key to maintaining the advantage with each new round, but Pax Americana (not just US opening markets, bearing defense burden, and doling out military contracts to E Asian suppliers, but also helping big bad Japanese bourgeoisie reconstitute itself under SCAP in the late 1940's and giving Japanese capital goods manufacturers carte blanche in S Korea and Taiwan in the 1960's) was crucial in getting it all started.
John Gulick