Japonia. Od mitycznych początków do popkulturowej potęgi

Shortest History

by Lesley Downer, Tadeusz Chawziuk (Translator)

Ceremonia herbaty, sztuka układania kwiatów, ogrody zen, malarstwo tuszem, słynne haiku oraz manga, anime, nowatorskie filmy i niezwykłe gry komputerowe. Japonia znalazła sposób, żeby harmonijnie połączyć przeszłość z przyszłością, nowatorstwo z tradycją. Dlatego, żeby lepiej zrozumieć jej fascynującą kulturę, warto przyjrzeć się także i historii.

Lesley Downer zabiera nas w podróż przez wieki od mitycznych początków Japonii aż do czasów współczesnych. Od bogini słońca Amaterasu, przodkini cesarzy przez legendarną władczynię-wojowniczkę Himiko, walecznych samurajów, przebiegłych mnichów, roninów, gejsze, poetów i drzeworytników aż do bezwzględnych szefów yakuzy i charyzmatycznych polityków. Nie brakuje też mściwych duchów zamordowanych cesarzy i szogunów, które sprowadzają na śmiertelników zarazy, trzęsienia ziemi i huragany.

Kim był ostatni samuraj? Z czego zasłynął cesarz Saga? Kto i dlaczego otrzymywał wynagrodzenie w ryżu? Który cesarz przeniósł stolicę do Tokio? Skąd się wzięły kraby, które mają na skorupach zarys samurajskiej twarzy wykrzywionej w złośliwym grymasie? Jak działa słynna yakuza?

Ale, ale, zacznijmy od początku! A zaczęło się od tańca…

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Japan, Travel, Japanese History, Historical, Politics

248 pages, Paperback

First published June 4, 2024

About the author

I write historical fiction set in Japan - women’s untold stories, largely true and based on meticulous and detailed research, though primarily, of course, good yarns. I’ve just finished The Shogun’s Queen, the fourth of The Shogun Quartet, four novels set in the nineteenth century during the tumultuous fifteen years when Japan was convulsed by civil war and transformed from rule by the shoguns into a society that looked to the west.
Preorder: http://bit.ly/TheShogunsQueen
The second, The Last Concubine, was shortlisted for Romantic Novel of the Year 2009 and translated into 30 languages. The other two novels are The Courtesan and the Samurai and The Samurai’s Daughter. My non-fiction on Japan includes Geisha: The Remarkable Truth Behind the Fiction and Madame Sadayakko: The Geisha who Seduced the West. I’m also a journalist and travel writer, give lectures and teach Creative Writing at City University in London.

Reviews

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 2 out of 5]

A textbook for adults, for the dutiful reader who intends to visit Japan soon, or wants to fill gaps in their education. After a lot of difficulty finding any books about Japanese history in English for a general audience—especially ones including the medieval period, not just 1850 on—I settled on this, which does indeed provide an overview of all of it from prehistoric times. And it basically did what I wanted—I now know the Heians from the Tokugawas, who the shoguns were and what the Meiji “Restoration” was—though I didn’t enjoy a minute of it; it’s as bland and dry and stripped-down as any textbook I ever read in grade school, all the reasons I never enjoyed history as a kid. As an adult who’s now read a lot of popular history and enjoys the subject, I know there must be fascinating stories behind these brief statements:

“Then [Yoshimitsu] persuaded the Southern emperor to abdicate in favor of the Northern, solving at a stroke the issue of the Northern and Southern courts.”

“One day, ten years after the war had started, the Yamana side put down their weapons and went home. The following day, the Hosokawa did the same.”

“Six months later, Emperor Kōmei died of smallpox, almost certainly murder.”

Sadly, we don’t get them here. Being the “shortest” history only leaves room for names and basics of major historical events and the broadest generalizations, no intriguing detail or fun or surprising stories or any analysis on the author’s part. I’d happily have read a book twice as long that included all that stuff—while short, this one is too boring to read fast anyway! But in fairness, it’s probably not trying to be engaging, and if you’re looking for a comprehensive overview from prehistory right up to 2023, this book provides it.

[Casey Pedersen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Genuinely wanted to read this as a primer for japans last 500 years. Tokugawa shogunate? Hideyoshi? Ieyasu? Nobunaga? Meiji restoration? All that good stuff. I feel at least literate enough now to understand all these people and events.
It's short alright, and maybe the ww2 era is a little too short here. The prose can be a little grating at times, stop using the word "swashbuckling"! But I'm glad I read it. 3.5 stars.

[Patrick Tullis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great overview of Japanese History that can be read in a short time. The book does not go into too much detail but does give one a nice overview of the subject. The writing is easy to read and process. I learned a few things and relearned some others. Check this book out if you are at all interested in Japanese history. This book has many layers and gives the reader multiple additional sources to explore, if interested. This concise, short book has to be difficult to write, but I am thankful the author took the time to do it.

I plan to read six books about Japan in 2024. This is the third book I have read about Japan so far this year. I am almost finished with the fourth book (it’s more academic thus taking longer). I plan to read the 2001 translation of Tales of Genji as the fifth book and The Myths of Japan as the final book.

[Alejandro Paulovitch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I haven't been reading much this month as projects and exams are really piling on, I read this book as I am a fan of "popular history books" which you can read in a couple of days, just to let your mind have some bit sized information, but without numbing your brain.
The book itself had some boring feminist passages and overall the book reads like "popular history with a dose of feminism". It isn't liberal historiography but it is a boring perception of Asian history through a Buddhist prism. A problem when you combine Western and Asian into one.
Overall, not great, very biased to some stuff and deliberately left out other things which I found necessary.

[David George · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.6

Comprehensive

[Haydn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Comprehensive although nowhere nearly as well written as Linda Javin’s Shortest History of China. The author’s prose is somewhat inconsistent in style and often jumps back and forth between dates, making things more confusing in an already complicated history. I found Tokugawa Ieyasu’s tactics for uniting Japan pretty interesting especially after watching Shogun.

Might try to read the Murakami book on the Aum Shinrikyo sarin gas attacks next - finally!

[Michael Erickson · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is exactly what it says on the cover: this is the shortest history of Japan. Which is not a criticism because that's what I was looking for and what I was expecting going into this.

I appreciated that a healthy amount of time was dedicated to Japan from prehistory up through the sixteenth century instead of just beginning at, "and then the Europeans showed up!" And special attention was paid to specific buildings/temples/castles that I hope to visit on my trip to Japan next year, so the additional context is already getting me more excited to go. WWII was glossed over concerningly fast even for a book of this tempo, but I liked that it went well past the Plaza Accords and Fukushima to discuss the 2021 Olympics and Shinzo Abe getting got with The Contraption™.

Worth picking up if you're like me and enjoy having a cursory knowledge of many different things, but if you're looking for something with more meat on the bones, you're gonna be disappointed.

[Coral Davies · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very accessible, whistle stop tour of Japan's expansive history.

I've seen complaints that it skims over important moments, but I think that's people being particularly dense about a book called "The Shortest History of Japan". If you want something indepth, don't pick a book that's not even 250 pages long.

[Dzvenyslava Petryshyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

В принципі цієї книжки цілком достатньо щоб розібратися загально з історією Японії.
Мені як людині, яка читала це чисто для ознайомлення, було доволі цікаво, хоча моментами страшенно занудно (як і на уроках історії в школі) на місцях де одні імператори замінювали інших і т.д. Це все очевидно не запамʼяталося. Найцікавішим було 20-21 століття, бо модна робити паралелі з тим що відбувалося в світлі. Стало зрозуміліше про Перл Харбор і стосунки з США. Також більш зрозуміло стосунки з іншими азійськими країнами.
Читала цю книжку після книги «Найкоротша історія Китаю» і це було доволі цікаво ці історії простиставляти, бо вони виявилися абсолютно різними у двох сусідніх країн. Японія власне унікальна своєю «острівністю» і тим що за весь цей час не була колонізованою і мала доволі багато «мирних періодів», якими мало які країни можуть похвалитися.

[Gen Hall · Rating 3 out of 5]

true to its name - each section was very short. But I guess that’s how you cover 13000 years in 200 pages! learned some interesting things

[Henry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super livre !! À lire sans modération avant d'aller au Japon pour avoir des repères mentaux historiques et culturels!!

[kla☾ ✩ · Rating 4 out of 5]

TAKE ME BACK TO JAPAN NOWWW

[BookswithLydscl | · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5*
A little bit dry at times and some sections feel too short in comparison to others but otherwise enjoyed getting an introduction to the whole of Japanese history. An ideal way for newcomers to get to know how Japan came to be.

[Rodrigo Infante · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the title suggests, it offers a great summary of Japan’s most important historical events and figures. By definition, it leaves considerable gaps in context, causes, and consequences. Still, the topic itself makes it a fascinating and smooth read.

[Anjali Anil · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am a huge fan of sushi, anime and those gorgeous traditional dresses 🎎 that make me want to twirl like I’m in a historical drama. Japan is one country that has always been high on my travel list, so when I spotted The Shortest History of Japan by Lesley Downer, I instantly thought Yesss , this is my pre-trip homework! (but the fun kind).

So I went in expecting a dense pile of dates and events (because history trauma from school still exists and tbh I’m very very bad at remembering dates 😅), but Lesley Downer writes like a storyteller. It didn’t feel like “mugging up” facts instead it felt like being guided through Japan’s epic journey.
From emperors claiming descent from the Sun Goddess, to fearless women warriors, graceful geisha, cunning warlords, and clever merchants who built a nation unlike any other.

At one point, I actually paused and imagined strolling through Edo-period streets, kimono swishing, cherry blossoms falling and eating some amazing Japanese cuisine but then remembered I was still on my couch 🥺…

What amazed me most was Japan’s transition between isolation and openness closing itself off completely during the Edo period, then suddenly embracing the West, yet still guarding its traditions like treasures.

I read this book very slowly, not because it was heavy, but because I wanted to savour every detail.

Now, when I finally land in Japan, I won’t just be a tourist snapping pictures, but I’ll be someone who understands the stories behind the temples, the tea ceremonies, and yes… even the sushi 🍣🇯🇵😎

So my final verdict for this book is : Fascinating, vivid, and effortlessly readable. This book will make you fall in love with Japan before you even set foot there.

[Mairead Hearne (swirlandthread.com) · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Shortest History of Japan by Lesley Downer publishes September 10th with Old Street Publishing and has understandably received great acclaim, with Library Journal describing it as ‘a delightful and illuminating read… Downer’s book covers prehistoric times through the present-day… Essential reading for both general audiences and scholars’. Back in 2016 I read The Shogun’s Queen by Lesley Downer and was absolutely blown away by the level of detail and how immersive a reading experience it was. Based on a true story, with most of the characters being real, Lesley Downer wove fact and fiction creating an exquisite piece of work.

In The Shortest History of Japan Lesley Downer takes the reader on an extraordinary journey to Japan, through the annals of time, from approximately 400BCE right up to the present day in less than 300 pages. It’s a testament to her writing that she has captured so much information in such a concise and educational manner, introducing the reader to this country that has the most turbulent and fascinating story to tell across the centuries.

The book is divided into thirteen clearly defined chapters as we travel through the ages. These chapters are intertwined with maps depicting Japan and little gems of stories highlighting certain historical events, people and traditions. There are many many names littered throughout this book and, as a relative newcomer to Japanese history, the majority were unfamiliar to me, but their stories have a fairy-tale quality which I thoroughly enjoyed (and I don’t mean Disney!). Warriors, emperors, shoguns and samurai were fearless in battle with many surviving for only a brief time as they fought off dangerous enemies protecting what they believed in. There was a clear division in Japanese society between the haves and the have-nots and over the centuries this caused much tension and unrest. As Japan fought to maintain its identity blocking any western influence, it also battled internally with maintaining peace and stability.

Lesley Downer has written a compelling book that is well-paced and very engaging. She explores the vastness of Japanese history incorporating their complex feudal period, the Meiji Restoration, Abenomics and more. For anyone with little or no prior knowledge of Japan’s history, Lesley Downer’s explanations, with clear and concise summaries, allow the reader to grasp the key events and figures that have shaped this fascinating nation. Understanding how the past influences contemporary culture and society helps readers appreciate the staggering shifts and social changes that have occurred within Japan across generations.

The Shortest History of Japan is an outstanding resource with a narrative that is enriched by very vivid descriptions and a wealth of information that is sure to delight all with a curiosity to know more about this island nation of legends and contrasts. A literary gem, The Shortest History of Japan, is an illuminating and meticulously researched book, one that’s accessible to all and is an exceptional reading experience.

[Clare Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having never read anything of Japanese history or culture before, i spotted this in a local bookstore and thought i would give it a go.
So glad i did! The book covers Japan from prehistoric times to present day and is nicely sectioned into eras so that you can read it as a whole - as i did - or dip into particular eras of interest. This will also prove useful as i would now love to read more in depth certain eras and figures, i think most other readers will find this useful too.
This book is an overview but the detail (and obvious painstaking research) is amazing, managing to inform without becoming confusing or boring.
This is the first book i have read by the author and found Lesley Downer's novelist style very entertaining and easy to read - i will certainly read more of her Fiction and Non-Fiction books.

[Stefan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A concise book on the history of Japan for everyone who wants to quickly read up. The first half, however, reads like a long list of names and even though it is natural for the book to skim through the centuries for this part, it does not benefit its readability. The second half (from the Edo-period on) is significantly better, where the daily whereabouts of the common folk is also described, instead of solely descriptions of the intrigue happening in aristocratic halls. I’d recommend this book when traveling to Japan or if interested in its history, though it might not be that suitable for someone who is not that into history, as it sometimes assumes some very specific background knowledge on world history.

[Russell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting, definitely short history of the nation of Japan, from its origin mythology through a few years before publication. The majority of the book covers the period before 1900, when Japan was ruled by an emperor or local military leaders called shoguns; this form of government went back and forth several times, before the military essential took control in the early 1900's, leading to a vast expansion of Japan's war-making capability, resulting in World War II, which devastated the nation.

[Corinne Schroeder · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 - I can appreciate the difficulty of fitting the entire history of a country into 225 pages, but it does make the book jumpy or hard to follow at times. It did do what I wanted it to do, however, which was give me a baseline understanding of Japanese history as a jumping off point for further reading.

[Natasha Salmi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good and comprehensive but not as well written as the Shortest History of England (written by someone else, can’t remember the name). While the England Shortest History sometimes overemphasised certain themes as universal, it created a cohesive narrative and added a solid “so-what” which this book lacks.

This book had almost no overt opinion, analysis or cohesive narrative, which made Japan’s fascinating history come off as a bit flat.

Still, as someone who only had a very high level understanding of Japanese history, mostly from the Chinese and Western perspective, this book was super interesting.

[Ben Causey]

The writing is serviceable, not too dry or too flamboyant, and the narrative links are well explained. Chunking out the various periods is well done and each one is given its fair share. Good, not great.

Qualified recommendation: This is a somewhat niche book. If you want something in between the Wikipedia entry and a full-blown history textbook, give it a read.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very informative little book attempting to give a broad overview of Japanese Histories and Periods.
I really liked learning about Yoshitsune, the Mongols and Kamikaze, Roaring 20s, and natural calamities that have struck Japan over the millennia. Often times the author would tell of a great shrine build 1000 years ago and I would realize that I had been there!

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title does not lie, and if you go into this expecting in-depth analysis and detail, more the fool you. Good for anyone that wants a first taste or a refresher.

[Mathias · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the name implies, it's a very short history of Japan, with each chapter covering an overview of each era. It's written in an easily digestible language, and giving enough information to encourage the reader to delve deeper if something sparks an interest. Personally, it gave me lots of topics I'd love to delve deeper, and the bibliography at the end gave me more sources to check out.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Degelijk overzicht van de geschiedenis van Japan.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Captivating from start to finish.

The histories, intrigues, personalities, frailties, closures, disasters, quirks and cultures have enlivened within me a desire to visit Japan, when previously id no desire to do so.

[Margaret Doyle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Turns out I’m not really a big history girl

[Hamish · Rating 3 out of 5]

Exactly what it says on the tin, as the kids say. 225 pages (not counting front and back matter), dawn of history to 2024. By definition, it’s surface-level stuff. Huge swaths of history in a few pages. But it’s also what I wanted, an overview to give me context for what I’m going to experience on my trip, not a deep- (or even medium-) dive into anything. You can tell that Downer is a novelist, as she does a lot to liven up what’s essentially a list of historical facts. It’s breezy and involving, when it could easily have been dry and dull. And largely it left me as disgusted with humanity as all history leaves me.

I used Les Rallizes Dénudés (especially '77 Live) as my reading soundtrack, which I’d highly recommend.

[Abhinav Yadav · Rating 4 out of 5]

This can be the starting point for someone looking for the briefest history of Japan. Having read more detailed works such as Bending Adversity and Embracing Defeat, the book might seem superficial but it extends the range from prehistoric to 2024. Commendable job by the author.

1. can india achieve a rapid and meaningful economic transformation without enhancing citizen freedoms and making knowledge institutions freer and more vibrant?
2. The authors rightly celebrate the achievements of the indian economy while pointing to the difficult road ahead—on the opportunities that shifting global supply chains present for indian manufacturing, the need to export high-value services and the urgent necessity to generate jobs. in these polarized times, Breaking the Mould makes for clear and calm, if cautionary, reading’—Vinay sitapati
3. Too many of our youth don’t have jobs and don’t have a hope of getting one. So they stop looking.
4. India wastes too much of its human capital and is in danger of frittering away its demographic dividend—the supposed dividend from having a growing share of working-age population—because it is not creating enough jobs.
5. The move to develop smart cities that are sustainable and citizen-friendly; the production-linked incentives (PLI) to increase manufacturing in India; the reforms to agricultural markets; the dramatic demonetization of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes in November 2016— have ranged from the ineffectual to the truly damaging.
6. In the early years of China’s liberalization in the 1980s, global firms compared its cheap albeit low-skilled workers with expensive American and European workers when deciding where to produce. It made sense to outsource low-skilled manufacturing—essentially, the task of assembling together imported parts to make final products, like radios and televisions— to China.
7. Since such an export-led manufacturing path, starting with low-skilled assembly, also worked for other East Asian countries, like Japan, Korea and Taiwan, it is natural, then, that India’s current government should think of following this path.
8. China went from poor to middle income in less than four decades.
9. Unfortunately for would-be late developers like India and Indonesia who want to follow the China path, the labour cost advantage no longer exists.
10. The value added in the early services segments of a supply chain, including the R&D and design that go into a product, is very high. The middle segments of the supply chain, that is, the actual manufacturing, adds only a modest amount of value. The end services segments of the supply chain before the product reaches the customer—branding, marketing, advertising, sales, financing and product content—once again constitute a lot of value added.
11. When an iPhone is bought in the store, only about one-third of the value-added is manufacturing, of which a small fraction is assembly, and the profit for this step of the production chain is tiny because it is so competitive.
12. growing rich is not just about services or manufacturing but about acquiring the core aspect of a valuable business around which everything else is built.
13. Ownership of intellectual property, including R&D, design and software that goes into the product, is the high ground in today’s business battles, from which everything else is controlled.
14. In the last full year before the pandemic, agricultural employment increased by 3.4 crore while industry and services employment only grew by 93 lakh, so the share of workers in agriculture actually increased, a rarity for a fast-developing country.
15. Note that this is envisaged to be assembly and some testing, not R&D.8 Even if this leads eventually to some chip manufacture—and that will require significantly more subsidies—it will not be the kind of sophisticated logic chips that power your mobile phone, and India will still be dependent on wafer imports and on imported machinery for chip making.
16. Study after study shows that authoritarianism suppresses innovative thinking—whether in the political arena, where it could challenge the existing power structure, or within research laboratories, where it could subvert the dominant scientific paradigm.
17. Most Indians are like you, enduring the present while hoping for something better.
18. If, instead, we allow our thinking to be moulded by the past experiences of other countries, without accounting for how India is different and how the world has changed, it will be left to our children to lament as they think of the India that might have been.
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20. Historically, services have been hard to export,
21. we will argue that it is a mistake to elevate manufacturing over all else as the means for India to grow. It can also grow by expanding service exports as well as services oriented at the domestic market.
22. What does it mean for a country to be rich? Broadly speaking, richer countries produce more economic output per person—more food, such as grains and milk; more goods, such as cars, clothes, electronics and oil and natural gas; and more services, such as haircuts, doctor consultations, restaurant meals, hotel stays, films and software code.
23. the key to greater incomes is greater production per person, also called productivity.
24. French economist, Jean-Baptiste Say, pointed out that the income from selling all that production becomes the means to buy that production.
25. What allows a worker to produce more? First of all, tools or machines. In preparing the ground for a building’s foundations, a labourer with a spade digs more slowly than the operator of an earth mover.
26. the earth mover operator’s labour is augmented by capital, the earth mover itself.
27. Productivity is much higher in the latter operation, not just because workers use machines but also because workers specialize, and specialists are typically better at their specific tasks than generalists.
28. technology refers to the quality of the capital that augments labour.
29. Labour needs to be educated or trained so that human capital improves; it should be supported with more equipment or capital; the equipment has to get better through technological improvements; and institutions have to be created and strengthened, all with the aim of enhancing production and productivity (the value of production per worker).
30. The use of fertilizers, irrigation, tractors and even giant combines can increase yields, but ultimately there is only so much land.
31. One estimate suggests the share of labour in agriculture in England shrank steadily from around 63 per cent in the 1550s to 35 per cent in the 1750s.
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33. Perhaps most important for longer-run growth was technological progress.
34. So countries grew richer. Between 1820 and 1870, income per person in Western Europe and the United States grew at a rate of 1–1.3 per cent a year. This was painfully slow compared to the growth of per capita incomes in China and India in recent years, but spectacularly fast compared to the previous 5000 years of human history.
35. Why could the early industrializing countries not grow faster? Even though large-scale production was more efficient in the past, a factory owner could not simply set up a gigantic factory and produce at scale.
36. For one, he might not have had the funds or financing to make the investment.
37. In the long run, imperialism was not a sustainable source of demand growth.
38. The starting point was land reform, which distributed land ownership (or rights to its produce in China) to the tiller.
39. This allowed the small farmer to thrive, generating surpluses that could be deployed in manufacturing.
40. Therefore, economies of scale in manufacturing could be achieved by targeting world markets where the developing country’s initial comparative advantage was the cheap labour that richer industrialized countries no longer had.
41. Workers learnt by doing and became more skilled, with more pieces produced per hour, and error rates and spoilage coming down.
42. Managers also learnt by doing, figuring out new and better ways to incentivize workers, configure assembly lines, and manage the logistics of supplies and dispatches. Foreign producers set up base domestically, bringing their productive practices to the country, allowing domestic producers to learn by imitation.
43. First manufacturing expands, drawing workers from agriculture, accounting for a greater share of the total economic output of the country.
44. In short, productivity growth in manufacturing increases the demand for services and eventually reduces the need for workers in manufacturing.
45. In 1961, India’s income per person was $86, South Korea’s was $94 and China’s was $76.
46. India’s income per person today is around $2300, China’s is around $12,500 and Korea’s is around $35,000.
47. Between 1980 and 2018, India’s GDP per capita grew at an average of 4.6 per cent per annum, and the decadal average never fell below 3 per cent.
48. 2.9 per cent, only nine countries make the cut, and only Botswana, other than India of course, comes close to being a persistent democracy.
49. There is another aspect of growth worth noting. We mentioned earlier that the share of workers in manufacturing typically peaks at some point in a country’s development, and then falls.
50. Roughly speaking, China started modernizing its economy a decade before India did in the late 1970s.
51. India’s total economic output today is where China’s was in 2007, so India is about sixteen years behind, even if, going forward, it grows at the same pace that China grew at. Of course, such high growth rates may now be elusive, and catching up will require yet more time even if all goes well for India, since China will not remain stagnant.
52. Communist regimes in the twentieth century typically invested heavily in basic education, partly because of their emphasis on equality, and perhaps also because widespread literacy allowed common people to get acquainted with the Communist scriptures.
53. It takes a certain amount of literacy, numeracy and basic accounting to run a small business, and more Chinese had that when their economy was liberalized. India invested more in education only when liberalization gradually highlighted the need for more educated workers.3 Why did India fare poorly on mass
54. As India liberalized its economy in the 1990s, average years of education moved up rapidly in the population, so that India was only 1.5 years behind China in 2015.
55. Now that India has got the vast majority of its children into schools, it has to improve the quality of their learning.
56. In the case of General Motor’s Shanghai joint venture, assistance included ensuring that all the taxis operating in the city were GM cars.
57. India, by contrast, always had a more centralized system of governance.
58. Local government at the city, municipality or village level was initially neither empowered nor funded nor adequately staffed,
59. Even after constitutional amendments created a third tier of government, too little power has been decentralized thus far.
60. China also needed to give its firms, especially those in the export sector, an edge. There
61. Starting in the 1990s, China worked to keep its exchange rate from appreciating even as its exports and trade surpluses increased. What does this mean?
62. China’s strategy was to keep this exchange rate low, typically through the central bank buying up dollars in the market, so that fewer dollars were being offered to the broader public against renminbis.
63. Of course, this also meant Chinese households would find it
64. Of course, this also meant Chinese households would find it very costly to buy imported goods, which limited their imports and made them buy mainly Chinese goods.
65. The government told banks to set a low bank deposit interest rate for households, which allowed the largely state-owned banks in turn to offer firms cheap loans without losing money on them.
66. The Communist Party controlled the labour unions, and ensured that wages did not keep pace with labour productivity.
67. Ultimately, Chinese households paid the price, because their wages and the returns on their deposited savings were artificially low.
68. in 2010, China’s household consumption as a share of GDP was 34 per cent. The same number for a poorer India was 54 per cent, a richer America was 68 per cent, and somewhat more comparable Korea and Thailand were around the 50 per cent mark.
69. Rich Indians do not want the rupee to be undervalued, hampering their purchase of imported goods, increasing the cost of their children’s tuition in colleges abroad and making foreign vacations more expensive.
70. To keep foreign capital from flowing in and elevating the exchange rate, India
71. To keep foreign capital from flowing in and elevating the exchange rate, India would have to maintain persistently low interest rates.
72. That would upset our middle-class savers. Workers and their unions would also protest quickly about below-productivity wages.
73. The overarching theme here is that any attempt by the government to run roughshod over citizens’ concerns will provoke protests.
74. Korea stayed autocratic for longer in terms of development time—it became a full democracy only when it was richer than the US and the UK.
75. India was unusual in that it started as a democracy even when it was poor.
76. So we cannot conclude that democracy was a mistake in India’s early years, only that it was unusual.
77. Prior to the early 1990s, India, like many other developing countries, attempted an import substitution strategy, where high tariffs (that is, customs duties) kept out imports, leaving the domestic market entirely to Indian producers.
78. The import substitution strategy, a key component of the Licence Raj, or Permit Raj, ensured India stayed poor.
79. Average tariffs came down from 125 per cent in 1991 to 13 per cent in 2014.8
80. Labour laws therefore act as a tax on scale and productivity, ensuring far too many manufacturing firms remain small and unproductive.
81. Most workers thus have precarious temporary work, with firms hesitant to invest in their skills since these workers will have to be let go soon.
82. An important ingredient in making polyester is purified terephthalic acid (PTA). Even while the production of this input by two large producers within India declined, severe import restrictions were imposed on it in 2014.10 Domestic PTA prices shot up, increasing the input costs for Indian polyester textiles manufacturers, making them globally uncompetitive. As a result of such own goals, Bangladesh, Vietnam, and even the Netherlands and Germany have taken up, to a greater extent than India, the global market share that China has given up in textiles and apparel.
83. As farmers grew wealthy, their surpluses set in motion a minor industrial revolution. Ludhiana was locally called the ‘Manchester of the East’. By the early 1980s, it was producing farm implements, hosiery, hydraulic motors, sewing machines, textiles, auto parts, bicycles and more.
84. One of Punjab’s big successes was Hero Cycles, which made reliable, sturdy, popular bicycles.
85. Hero paid suppliers promptly on Saturdays, something unusual in India, where getting paid can be an ordeal in itself.
86. By 1975, Hero was the largest manufacturer of bicycles in India, and had started exporting to much of the world.
87. At the turn of the century, Punjab was the richest state in India in terms of per capita income. Unfortunately, today it doesn’t feature in the top fifteen. What happened?
88. Punjab had a fundamental disadvantage as a location for goods production—given the impaired relations with our neighbouring countries.
89. Punjab is not close to other markets. Consequently, as competition started heating up, Punjab’s higher freight costs started to bite.
90. Agricultural subsidies kept the economic value of growing paddy and wheat artificially high, which prevented a natural transition of small and marginal farmers out of agriculture.
91. The state government further distorted economic choices by offering farmers free power to draw out groundwater, which depleted the water table.
92. In addition to making labour harder to find as fewer farmers left agriculture, power, too, got expensive. Since power supply to agriculture was largely free, the government had to charge higher prices elsewhere to make up for the losses, and industry bore the brunt.
93. One measure of the political apathy towards industry was that between 1960 and 2010, barely 10 per cent of the state assembly debates focused on industry; the main obsession continued to be agriculture
94. ‘We have no money left to invest in the education and skilling of our youth,’ a senior bureaucrat lamented to us. ‘How will you get industry if you don’t have any labour skilled enough to work in
95. In recent years, Punjab’s youths, unable to find options outside agriculture, have started migrating abroad. Among those who have stayed behind, substance abuse has become commonplace.
96. Standardized containers, which are easy to load and unload off ships on to railway wagons and trucks, as well as improvements in logistics and tracking, have reduced the costs of transportation and improved its timeliness
97. According to one estimate, over 10 million lines of programming code went into General Motor’s 2010 car, the Chevrolet Volt, accounting for over 40 per cent of its value.
98. Therefore, as electric vehicles become more like mobile phones, even that most traditional of manufactured exportable products, the automobile, will consist of largely embedded intermediate services.
99. So one reason services have become more tradeable is that they are embedded in tradeable goods. A second reason, however, is that services can now be provided at a distance. Both combine
100. Many high-skilled services are now liberated from the tyranny of space and time.
101. an Italian Dark Roast Americano coffee has a similar taste across the world in every Starbucks franchise, because it is made the same way, using a common recipe, ingredients and equipment.
102. If fixed costs and capital investment requirements are low, scale is not necessary.
103. Not many realize that the largest profit generator in Amazon today is its web services, not its retail business.
104. Since the life of an artisan can be precarious and uncertain, youths are no longer attracted to these crafts.
105. These families had made the jump from lower middle class to upper middle class in one generation, in part because the RBI had employed someone in the family in a low-paying but steady job with decent housing and health-care benefits.
106. There are other problems with generative AI. Its