The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington

the distinctive character of the Japanese economy? Among major industrialized countries, the Japanese economy is unique because Japanese society is uniquely non-Western. Japanese society and culture differ from Western, and particularly American, society and culture. These differences have been highlighted in every serious comparative analysis of Japan and America. [29] Resolution of the economic issues between Japan and the United States depends on fundamental changes in the nature of one or both economies, which, in turn, depend upon basic changes in the society and culture of one or both countries. Such changes are not impossible. Societies and cultures do change. This may result from a major traumatic event: total defeat in World War II made two of the world’s most militaristic countries into two of its most pacifist ones. It seems unlikely, however, that either the United States or Japan will impose an economic Hiroshima on the other. Economic development also can change a country’s social structure and culture profoundly, as occurred in Spain between the early 1950s and the late 1970s, and perhaps economic wealth will make Japan into a more American-like consumption-oriented society. In the late 1980s people in both Japan and America argued that their country should become more like the other country. In a limited way the Japanese-American agreement on Structural Impediment Initiatives was designed to promote this convergence. The failure of this and similar efforts testifies to the extent to which economic differences are deeply rooted in the cultures of the two societies.
    While the conflicts between the United States and Asia had their sources in cultural differences, the outcomes of their conflicts reflected the changing power relations between the United States and Asia. The United States scored some victories in these disputes, but the trend was in an Asian direction, and the shift in power further exacerbated the conflicts. The United States expected the Asian governments to accept it as the leader of “the international community” and to acquiesce in the application of Western principles and values to their societies. The Asians, on the other hand, as Assistant Secretary of State Winston Lord said, were “increasingly conscious and proud of their accomplishments,” expected to be treated as equals, and tended to regard the United States as “an international nanny, if not bully.” Deep imperatives within Ameri p. 227 can culture, however, impel the United States to be at least a nanny if not a bully in international affairs, and as a result American expectations were increasingly at odds with Asian ones. Across a wide range of issues, Japanese and other Asian leaders learned to say no to their American counterparts, expressed at times in polite Asian versions of “buzz off.” The symbolic turning point in Asian-American relations was perhaps what one senior Japanese official termed the “first big train wreck” in U.S.-Japanese relations, which occurred in February 1994, when Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa firmly rejected President Clinton’s demand for numerical targets for Japanese imports of American manufactured goods. “We could not have imagined something like this happening even a year ago,” commented another Japanese official. A year later Japan’s foreign minister underlined this change stating that in an era of economic competition among nations and regions, Japan’s national interest was more important than its “mere identity” as a member of the West. [30]
    Gradual American accommodation to the changed balance of power was reflected in American policy toward Asia in the 1990s. First, in effect conceding that it lacked the will and/or the ability to pressure Asian societies, the United States separated issue areas where it might have leverage from issue areas where it had conflicts. Although Clinton had proclaimed human rights a top priority of American foreign policy toward