The prestigious Trilateral Commission met here in Tokyo earlier this month, bringing together some 130 influential people from three continents to focus on key world issues and offer some advice to participants in the forthcoming Okinawa Summit of world leaders. The commissioners heard speeches from Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa, former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former U.S. Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul Volcker, Peruvian novelist and activist Mario Vargas Lhosa, Softbank President Masayoshi Son and other stars and founts of wisdom. Former Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi had planned to open the event with a major policy speech, but sadly was struck down by a stroke before he could attend.
What were the chief concerns of this gathering of movers and shakers? They ranged from rising tension over Taiwan to antimissile defense and the future security pattern in Central Asia, from the role of the nation state to the new governing skills needed in a networked world, and on to the multiplying problems now affecting, to varying degrees, the world's global institutions: the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, the European Commission and even the newly minted European Central Bank.
Along the way, time was found to ruminate on winners and losers in the New Economy and what impact the relentless pressures of global competition and increased transparency would have on the more opaque traditional corners of Japanese life.