LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- A J.P. Morgan analyst in Tokyo was quoted by The Globalist (Dec. 21) as saying, "Japan now faces the choice: either restructure its economy or become the Argentina of the 21st century -- a spent power." One would not have imagined even just a very few years ago that Japan and Argentina would be uttered in the same breath. The comparison, which of course must not be pushed too far, is nevertheless intriguing, for various reasons.
Sir Harry Parkes, who was the chief British diplomat in Japan in the dying days of the Tokugawa feudal regime (1603-1868) and for the first dozen years of the Meiji Era (1868-1912), advised the Japanese government in its early stages of reform and modernization that it should emulate the Argentine "model." Historians have had a good chuckle over that remark, at least until recently.
In fact, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Argentina appeared to be an outstanding success story. It ranked as one of the world's 10 richest countries in GDP per capita, and Buenos Aires featured as a civilized, cosmopolitan and quite glorious capital in architecture, elegance, quality of life, literature, music and the arts. Argentina stood out in quite stark contrast with most of the rest of Latin America, just as Japan stood out for many decades in quite stark contrast with the rest of Asia.