The Great Disruption

Bibliographic Data

ID4452603
AuthorsClayton Christensen, Clayton M Christensen, Thomas Craig, Thomas D Craig (0000-0001-9342-4723), Stuart L Hart, Stuart Hart (0000-0002-0969-0285)
Year2001
Volume80
Issue2
Pages80
Publication date2001-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueForeign Affairs (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0015-7120 • E-ISSN: 2327-7793
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/20050066
OpenAlexW343404167
LanguageEN
Citations received79

The booming Japanese economy from the 1960s through the mid-1980s was one of the most thoroughly studied and admired phenomena of modern times. From steel to automobiles, consumer electronics to watches, Japanese companies easily overran the fortifications of their American and European competitors. Western scholars praised Tokyo's careful economic planning and the focus of Japan's keiretsu?massive, interlocked networks of companies such as Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Matsushita, and Sumitomo?on building long-term competitive advantages. Other analysts attributed Japan's economic momentum to its workers' selfless dedication to improving produc tivity and to the extraordinarily high savings rates of its consumers. Scholars cited the absence of similar factors in Europe and North America, meanwhile, to explain the stagnation afflicting those countries. In the United Kingdom, for example, the huge share of gnp taken up by government spending was seen as crippling economic growth because it crowded out private investment capital. The fortunes of these economies, of course, have now reversed. America has experienced the longest unbroken economic expansion in its history, and the United Kingdom has achieved levels of prosperity that few could have imagined 30 years ago. Japan, in contrast, has

Business · International trade · Political science · Asian Industrial and Economic Development

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