Jean-Pascal Bassino, Stephen Broadberry, Kyoji Fukao, Bishnupriya Gupta, Masanori Takashima, The CAGE Background Briefing Series No. 47, July 2016

Japan was the first Asian nation to achieve modern economic growth. This column discusses new evidence suggesting that Japan’s growth started from a lower level than Britain’s and grew more slowly until the Meiji Restoration. The key to understanding modern economic growth seems to lie in identifying the forces that dampened growth reversals, rather than the forces responsible for growth itself.

Economic History