From the back cover: Richard Wright's study chronicles and analyses the Japanese business presence in Canada. It reveals several distinguishing characteristics of Japanese investment, which should help allay some traditional Canadian concerns about foreign investment. Japanese investment is small in proportion to the total volume of Canada-Japan trade. Moreover, unlike other traditional foreign investors, who generally seek to gain direct control of affiliated companies in Canada, Japanese investors aim primarily to secure reliable flows of raw materials. Because the Japanese emphasis is on trade rather than on investment flows, a high proportion of Japanese investment is in the form of loans rather than equity, and the Japanese often take minority holdings or enter into joint ventures. The role of Japanese investment is thus a very different one from that which has been a source of concern about foreign ownership in Canada.

After two decades of reinvention, Japanese companies are re-emerging as major players in the new digital economy. They have responded to the rise of China and new global competition by moving upstream into critical deep-tech inputs and advanced materials and components. This new "aggregate niche strategy" has made Japan the technology anchor for many global supply chains. Although the end products do not carry a "Japan Inside" label, Japan plays a pivotal role in our everyday lives across many critical industries. This book is an in-depth exploration of current Japanese business strategies that make Japan the world's third-largest economy and an economic leader in Asia. To accomplish their reinvention, Japan's largest companies are building new processes of breakthrough innovation. Central to this book is how they are addressing the necessary changes in organizational design, internal management processes, employment, and corporate governance. Because Japan values social stability and economic equality, this reinvention is happening slowly and methodically, and has gone largely unnoticed by Western observers. Yet, Japan's more balanced model of "caring capitalism" is both competitive and transformative, and more socially responsible than the unbridled growth approach of the United States.

The economic futures of the United States, Canada, and Japan are tightly linked by the extremely powerful trade network these nations share. Yet because of trade and domestic policies aimed at preserving economic and, some argue, cultural integrity, there has at times been considerable friction among the three nations. Much of the recent trade animus of the U.S. has been aimed Japan, the country with the largest trade surplus with the United States. Canada, the largest trade partner of the U.S., maintains fiscal policies which resemble those of Japan, but has not been the focus of similar concern. Since the actions of each nation reverberate throughout the network, a full and accurate understanding of these complex relations will be essential if ongoing trade negotiations, policymaking, and international relations are to be constructive. The papers in this volume were developed from a conference that addressed the need to discover which structural determinants and policies shape the close economic ties among these nations. Leading experts on trade and macroeconomics from all three countries examine disproportionate saving rates, exchange rate volatility, varying industrial policies and levels of financial innovation, the effects of present tax policies and proposed reforms, and the dynamism of major Pacific nations and the leadership role Japan may play in U.S. relations with that region. Several important conclusions are reached by the contributors. They assert that Japan's trade barriers are relatively low overall and are comparable to those maintained by the United States and Canada, and that divergent fiscal policies have been the major source of macroeconomic imbalances between the United States and other major countries in the 1980s. They also conclude that current trade imbalances may persist for some time. The analyses offered here are likely to prove influential in future policymaking and will be of interest to a wide audience, including academic economists, government officials, and students of theoretical and policy issues of international trade, investment, and finance.

The Dutch East India Company was a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state that attempted to thrust itself aggressively into an Asian political order in which it possessed no obvious place and was transformed in the process. This study focuses on the company's clashes with Tokugawa Japan over diplomacy, violence, and sovereignty. In each encounter the Dutch were forced to retreat, compelled to abandon their claims to sovereign powers, and to refashion themselves again and again—from subjects of a fictive king to loyal vassals of the shogun, from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from insistent defenders of colonial sovereignty to legal subjects of the Tokugawa state. Within the confines of these conflicts, the terms of the relationship between the company and the shogun first took shape and were subsequently set into what would become their permanent form. The first book to treat the Dutch East India Company in Japan as something more than just a commercial organization, The Company and the Shogun presents new perspective on one of the most important, long-lasting relationships to develop between an Asian state and a European overseas enterprise.

The papers in this volume were developed for an informal symposium held in Vancouver in April 1988. The papers range from descriptions of possible realigned world political orders to questions of international trade and domestic economic priorities; and from the "greying" of the population of the industrial world and associated social policy issues such as health care and pensions to the imperative of implementing sustainable economic development worldwide.

Changes in the economy required business professionals and researchers to learn about new sources of information, as well as to expand their understanding of international business subjects. The sources, language, document coding, and definitions are different -- truly foreign. International Business Information was written to help business ......

This newly updated and expanded edition of a reference bestseller is the only work available that guides business researchers and librarians to the most valuable sources for information on international business--and shows how to interpret and use that data. The authors discuss the best available resources and how to use them to find answers to a wide range of questions about international business. They also describe business practices in various regions and countries, the basics of international trade and finance, international business organizations, and relevant political departments and agencies. Many exhibits and tables are included, and the book's appendices include glossaries, checklists for evaluating sources, and sample disclosure documents.