ABSTRACT
By the 1970s, exporting goods to the wider world had rendered Japan a major economic power, ushering in an era of intensifying trade conflict between Japan and the United States. This chapter examines the origins and outcomes of that conflict, assessing the extent to which new economic competition in the international order altered the power and influence of the hegemonic power. The rise and fall of the US–Japan trade conflict tells us that the process of globalization not only changes economic relations between nation-states, but also creates new economic relations between interests groups and governments within nation-states. In particular, US planners envisioned installing an American-style capitalism based on open competition, free trade, and a clear separation of public and private interests. As postwar planning began, American free-trade advocates called for the lowest possible national barriers to trade. Theories linking free trade to international peace and stability had a long history that extended back to the Scottish Enlightenment and Adam Smith.
