Rating Japan’s Readiness for an Evolving Digital Economy

Japan seems a complicated place, especially in the context of imagining its future. A generation ago, it was poised to rival the United States as the dominant economic force in the world (Vogel E Reimagining Japan: The quest for a future that works. Viz Media, San Francisco, 2011). Today, it remains one of the three largest economies in the world, despite much of the Western world having spent years anticipating its steady decline due to a plethora of problems. These range from a national debt that more than doubles its GDP, to the world’s most elderly population (median age > 46), which demographers project (Smallwood S Dynamic demographic analysis, population studies, Taylor and Francis Online 71(1):135–137, 2017) will shrink from its peak of 128 million in 2015 to below 100 million by 2050, to natural disasters like the 2011 tsunami, to many choices that outsiders perceive as self-inflicted constraints on remaining a global power – a tolerance for corruption (Tepco, Olympus, etc.), the yakuza, language limitations, and consequences of culture.

Can technology save Japan? Can Japan save itself? Does it need “saving”? This chapter explores these questions, largely by assessing its comparative advantages and challenges. After briefly modeling the unique challenges Japan faces with regard to the international trade for which it likely will become increasingly dependent as its workforce and consumer market continue to shrink, the chapter presents a brief overview for each of the ten comparative studies that examine various dimensions to Japan’s progress relative to other countries in preparedness for success in the evolving global digital economy.