Multinationalism, Japanese style: the political economy of outward dependency

Japan has suddenly emerged as a powerful home country for multinational corporations, offering a new form of competition in the world market. For a number of reasons, Japan has taken up direct overseas production as a national desideratum. Terutomo Ozawa analyzes the motivating forces behind this trend from new theoretical perspectives and explores the problems and successes it has encountered
Examining the rapid deterioration of the conditions for domestic production the appreciation of the yen, rising labor and energy costs, environmental decay, and of industrial sites the au thor shows how such factors prompted Japanese firms to transfer production facilities abroad. He further reveals how these firms, enhanced by the developing countries' aspirations toward industrialization and their eagerness to attract Japanese capital and technology, have been aided by Japan's government and by its powerful trading companies. Professor Ozawa finds important connections be tween the Japanese government's pro grams designed to assist Japanese firms and those designed to assist economic development in neighboring countries.