Introduction

This book focuses on the crisis in Japanese professional baseball, which is indicative of the squeeze placed on postwar Japan's political economy by a variety of changing factors as the Heisei era began. Given the nature and length of the crises that beset Japan it was easy to cast the Heisei era as a narrative of decline. However, looked at through the lens of the crisis in Japanese professional baseball the story of Heisei Japan is much better understood as one of resilience.