Race for the Exits: The Unraveling of Japan's System of Social Protection

by Leonard J. Schoppa

Contrary to all expectations, Japan's long-term recession has provoked no sustained political movement to replace the nation's malfunctioning economic structure. The country's basic social contract has so far proved resistant to reform, even in the face of persistently adverse conditions. In Race for the Exits, Leonard J. Schoppa explains why it has endured and how long it can last. The postwar Japanese system of "convoy capitalism" traded lifetime employment for male workers against government support for industry and the private (female) provision of care for children and the elderly. Two social groups bore a particularly heavy burden in providing for the social protection of the weak and large firms, which committed to keeping their core workforce on the payroll even in slow times, and women, who stayed home to care for their homes and families. Using the exit-voice framework made famous by Albert Hirschman, Schoppa argues that both groups have chosen "exit" rather than "voice," depriving the political process of the energy needed to propel necessary reforms in the system. Instead of fighting for reform, firms slowly shift jobs overseas, and many women abandon hopes of accommodating both family and career. Over time, however, these trends have placed growing economic and demographic pressures on the social contract. As industries reduce their domestic operations, the Japanese economy is further diminished. Japan has also experienced a "baby bust" as women opt out of motherhood. Schoppa suggests that a radical break with the Japanese social contract of the past is becoming inevitable as the system slowly and quietly unravels.

Genres: Japan

272 pages, Paperback

First published February 9, 2006

Reviews

[Ivan · Rating 2 out of 5]

If there were a person as un-selfaware, clueless, beholden to an agenda driven by a single country and unable to examine his own bias as a researcher, as to give harmful Chicago-school of economics-styled advice to governments, that would be Leonard Shoppa.

The whole book felt like someone gave him a take-home assignment, and he had to endure it, despite thoroughly and wilfully misunderstanding both the nature of how the Japanese economic system came to be, why it changed, which market forces it was under for the significant events in its historical timeline, why its population complied or rebelled against those forces or why they went along with them.

It is , in fact such a didactic book, that along with my previous review on the "Liberalizing German economics after reunification" and the disaster that was the liberalisation of the Soviet economics, it represents a case study in what political figures should not do under any circumstance.

1 star for the contents + 1 star because it's a study document really to gain an insight into how the "disciplined men" think.

[extended review with quotes coming up]

[Kris Pengelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was the inspiration for my master's significant research project (SRP). It made me truly appreciate the costs associated to society and the economy when one adds the gender variable to the equation of a problem.