The intertwining histories of two island monarchies that have far more in common than might at first be thought...
The story of the Japan-UK relationship goes back, of course, deep into history, with its light eras and its very dark ones. The pages in this volume pick up it up over the last four decades as relayed through a series of articles published in The Japan Times. They cover, very roughly and with lots of overlaps, three stages, beginning in the 1980s, then taking us through the first decade of the present century and bringing us up to the current day.
This is the story of an evolving relationship between two island nations - a relationship which could be (and should be) of growing importance as the UK seeks to re-position itself in a totally transformed international landscape. Modern Japan defies Western analysis. It fails to fit into the Anglo-American model of liberal democratic capitalism which used to dominate Western thinking in the 20th century but which now looks shaky. It is collectivist and yet capitalist. It is closed yet open. It is democratic, yet there is something different about the way its democracy works. It is distinctly nationalist and yet very outward-looking. It is traditionalist and bureaucratic and yet breathtakingly innovative. It is centralised and unitary but yet polycentric. It is corporatist and yet overwhelmingly an economy of small businesses. It's industry, wealth and technology qualify it as a superpower and yet it has no superpower pretensions. Through a series of articles, spanning some forty years, David Howell takes us through the story of the relationship between these two islands nations - a story that covers national development right up to the situation today.
...from the foreword by Mr Koji Tsuruoka: "The articles Lord Howell has written over the last decades are consistently based on optimism backed by the intellectual quality of the English gentleman.... The insight to Japan described by Lord Howell in his beautiful writings are telling us the value and potential of our collaboration. From the time Japan opened to the world in late 1800s, Japan followed and learned from UK, and it is now time for Japan to work with UK for global good.
Japanese Ambassador to the United Kingdom
2016-2019
