Two academics specializing in Japanese affairs forecast disparate futures for Japan in the latest edition of the journal Foreign Affairs, predicting either 21st-century prosperity or continued economic stagnation.
In two articles — "Japan: A Rising Sun?" by U.S. scholar Diana Helweg, of Southern Methodist University, and "Japan: A Setting Sun?" by Aurelia George Mulgan, of Australia's University of New South Wales — that appear in the July-August issue, the two see either prosperity driven by an economic revolution or continued blockage of crucial reforms by conservative bureaucrats and politicians. The magazine hits newsstands July 3.
On Monday, Foreign Affairs issued a press release about its latest issue on its Web site.
Helweg wrote that today's structural reforms of the Japanese financial system are "quietly setting the stage for an economic revolution" and that present changes are "more fundamental than anything the country has ever seen."