Japanese Miracle: Review Article of Chalmers Johnson MITI and the Japanese Miracle: The Growth of Industrial Policy, 1925-75

Chalmers Johnson’s book argues that it was one aspect of the Japan-U S relationship, namely, the relatively cheap import of advanced technology, and the ability, largely of the Japanese Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), to ensure the absorption of this technology, which transformed the Japanese industrial structure. The identification of strategic industrial sectors, and policies ensuring the growth of the internal market, helped the Japanese export strategy, and led to the Japanese "miracle". This industrial development strategy was pushed through at a heavy cost to the people of Japan, and also to medium and small enterprises. It was the big firms, evolved from the Zaibatsu conglomerates, which were the beneficiaries of Japanese industrialisation strategies, both before and after the war. The second feature of Japanese industrialisation strategy was the sustained realisation (and this realisation was politically sustainable) that it was the development of the internal market that was crucial to economic growth