Japan according to Michael Zielenziger

I just came back from a discussion with Michael Zielenziger, author of “shutting out the Sun: how Japan created its own Lost Generation” at New American Foundation in Washington DC.

Some of Mr. Zielenziger’s points are:

1. On Japan in general：Even politicians start talking about Japan’s withdraws from deflation, Japan is not back yet. Compared to American’s growth rate of 3-4%, Japan grows at .2%, and national debt is 127% of Japan’s GDP.

Socially, Japan’s young people are isolated into their own world. A survey shows that nearly 50% of people under 25 years old have Zero friends of opposite sex.
Japan’s population is about half as many as that of the U.S but has same suicides.
Young women, called Parasite, live with their parents and don’t marry and bear kids until their 40s.

2. On Hikikomori: like NEET (Not in Education, Employment, Training), a social withdraw group. Most of them are men, and can’t be diagnosed. In his book, Mr. Zielenziger cited a young man called Kenji, who was bullied in school, decided to stay home to relieve social stress, and days turned to weeks, months and years。 Kenji has been locked himself in for two decades.

3. Roots for Japan’s failure: Japan knows how to make computers, cars, but never engages the system of innovation, appetitive for risks, check and balance of a civil society, NGOs and Watchdogs, etc. In Japan, individual expression is nowhere to be seen.

It seems Japan takes the Bullet train from a federal society to an industrialized nation, without a systematic modernization.

How to correct the problem? A Japanese men, who provides schooling for Futoko(refusing to go to schools), told Zielenziger, “there are Two things to teach: 1. choice, 2. responsibility

According to the author, even Japanese people express their frustrations over lack of changes, they say only changes can be done through “Kurofune (black boat)” or “A-bombs”

You can check out a video of the event here.