Technological change, sectoral institutions, and policymaking: Japanese responses to United States pressure in high technology industries.

摘要

My dissertation investigates under what conditions Japan maintains or abandons its long-standing pursuit of autonomy in the face of U.S. pressure. The desire for autonomy has been manifest in various areas such as low trade dependence, national R&D consortia, protection of domestic market, and preferential procurement policy. It also has constituted an important element of Japanese industrialization strategy: autonomous development policy. As Japan's technological sophistication has posed a serious challenge to American high technology industries, Japan's excessive pursuit of autonomy has been a major source of conflicts with the United States. Since the mid-1980s, U.S. trade policy has focused on deterring Japan's autonomous development policy in its nascent stage.; The conventional wisdom predicts that Japan will respond to U.S. pressure systematically in order to maintain autonomous development strategy of high technology industries to ensure future industrial dominance. Rather than responding strategically, however, Japan showed a variety of responses to U.S. pressure---maintenance of autonomous development or unexpected change to international cooperation. In order to explain Japan's varying policy choices, I construct a theoretical model drawing on three variables: technological change, institutional structure in a given industry, and the nature of U.S. pressure. First, technological change influences Japan's policymaking in two ways: (1) by affecting the existing incentive and regulatory systems, or (2) by bringing in new players. Second, I examine how sectoral institutions filter technological change and U.S. pressure. Third, I examine U.S. pressure brings a divisive impact onto the Japanese policymaking.; The case of the space industry demonstrates how key actors' interests further diverge under U.S. pressure, which ultimately leads to an end to autonomous development policy. By contrast, the case of the supercomputer industry shows that when all the key actors are locked into existing sectoral institutions through various incentive systems, they are inclined to stay with the existing policy even under intense U.S. pressure. The case of the aircraft industry illustrates that policy shift toward international collaboration occurs as new actors skillfully take advantage of technological change and U.S. pressure, but momentum for autonomous development remains alive because the benefits from it still persist.