ABSTRACT
The 1970s have been a period of great change for Japan. The economy politics and society as a whole are passing through a transitional period. Two of the major conditioning influences have been Japan’s rise to the position of a major world economic power, which has been consolidated during the 1970s, and the so-called oil shock of 1973. In the 1950s and 60s Japan was first reconstructing and then rapidly developing its industries. Since the late 1960s the economic environment has changed very significantly. For many years the Japanese financial system has been more closely regulated than that of probably any other major industrial country. Government bonds in Japan are allocated in fixed proportions between the members of an underwriting syndicate which is made up from various categories of banks, insurance companies and the securities houses. One could say that Japan’s industry has developed and modernised at a more rapid rate than the financial system which has fed it.
