EARLY POSTWAR JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL POLICY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR INDUSTRIALIZING LDC'S TODAY

Abstract

The vital role that a government has played in shaping and directing Japans foreign trade is widely discussed. Governments pervasive power and influence over business activities have resulted in rapid internal economic development associated with foreign trade expansion. However, despite this, the Japanese economy has never been subject to a total planning of the socialist type, but is rather the outstanding Asian example of successful private enterprise.

Postwar Japan has skillfully striven to extend her participation in most world trade organizations and has sought, through those organizations, to adapt her foreign trade and to eliminate or at least relax trade barriers while executing her intensive industrialization.