Japan Swings: Politics, Culture and Sex in the New Japan

In the 1990s a strong yen threatens to strangle Japan's once beefy but now muscle-bound economy; a series of political and natural disasters unearth inept and corrupt politicians, and Japan continues to exacerbate these and other problems by refusing to apologize to its Asian neighbors still suffering from old (war) wounds. McGregor, working in Tokyo as a journalist during the 1990s for Australian media, describes a country swinging, or being torn, between East and West, and inner voice and outer face. Fascinatingly tangled webs of business and political deceits are outlined in detail, and a substantial amount of financial facts and figures create a backdrop for stories of corruption that are a satisfying mixture of economics and evil. So what's a country to do? McGregor details Japan's attempts to fix these problems by courting Australia, and by booting government leaders from office so quickly that one needs a program to keep track of the players--all this while trying to embrace a ""nicer new nationalism."" Or maybe a ""new generation of young men and women"" will solve these problems, but after reading the chapter devoted to ""Bad Girls and Mummies' Boys"" one comes away with the impression that Japan's youth, unimpressed with its elders' foibles, has merely shrugged and walked away. McGregor is a good storyteller but this one writes a whale of a tale and leaves the ending to the reader's imagination. (July)