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Hatsunia (what if Japan actually was a futuristic and progressive society?)

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Pipcard Since: Aug, 2009
#1: Nov 29th 2019 at 6:25:09 PM

For more information: https://www.nationstates.net/nation=hatsunia/detail=factbook/id=1239456

Also, the title should be "what if a country like Japan..."

Edited by Pipcard on Aug 27th 2021 at 6:55:38 AM

DeMarquis (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#2: Dec 2nd 2019 at 8:26:38 PM

What is behind the real Japan's low innovation is the structure of the economy, and some of their cultural values. Put very crudely, in order for Japan to be more innovative, and become more productive per employee, they would have be willing to endure a higher unemployment rate. The version of Japan you are proposing is less collectivist, more competitive on an individual and business level, and more willing to accept risk. In other words, it's Hong Kong before the mainland takeover; or California, if California was it's own country.

Such a place would probably be more independent internationally too. Less likely to be a US ally, more likely to form economic ties with China. It's military would be more assertive, and might actually get into conflict with some of it's other neighbors (like South Korea), yet simultaneously their culture less militarized (since they would have less need for institutions that can enforce conformity). They might very well treat each other in a manner more aligned with individual rights as we understand them, but they might not extend that understanding to people from other countries to the same extent (not unlike the US).

They might admire hard-headed technical expertise, and an engineering mind-set. The softer, more people-oriented consensus building not so much. If so, they would have no patience with "cuteness" in any form.

If you want them to be more oriented toward high technology and software, then their economy has to change in other ways. The real Japan built itself up after WWII by rapidly expanding heavy manufacturing, including ships and automobiles. Your version will have to moderate that to some degree. Agriculture is a non-starter domestically, but I imagine they might be inclined to invest heavily in agricultural technology overseas, in order to secure a cheaper food supply. Cheaper food means less emphasis on working long hours, and that frees up leisure time for intellectual pursuits. There would be a much larger Japanese diaspora overseas as well, to work on these overseas agricultural enterprises. Your Japan imports tractors and combines, not cars, and owns large scale industrial farms in Africa and South America. Brazil may be their most important overseas ally.

Consequently this version of Japan is intellectually more cosmopolitan, and people born overseas of Japanese descent would not be discriminated against so heavily. Even people of mixed ancestry would have higher status than they do now.

Altogether a very different place.

I hope you find my speculation helpful. Since it's your world, feel free to cherry pick ideas from it, or ignore it altogether.

Edited by DeMarquis on Dec 2nd 2019 at 11:29:05 AM

I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.
Pipcard Since: Aug, 2009
#3: Dec 3rd 2019 at 8:54:25 PM

[deleted]

Edited by Pipcard on Jun 13th 2021 at 2:06:05 AM

Ramidel Since: Jan, 2001
#4: Jan 23rd 2020 at 11:25:56 PM

One thing that you might want to try to reconcile is that fictional Japanese development in AI, robotics and spinoff technologies often has Japanese population dynamics underlying it - Japanese people aren't making babies but immigration is nigh-impossible.

So, in a techno-progressive Hatsunia, what's driving the need to automate that's giving Hatsunia its technological strength?

Pipcard Since: Aug, 2009
#5: Mar 27th 2020 at 7:16:58 PM

Automation is meant to increase productivity.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-34667380

...despite the tech-loving public image, much of corporate Japan seems intent on circling the wagons against automation and using people rather than machines wherever possible. After all, those faxes don't pick up themselves.

Such overstaffing may help keep the country's unemployment rate down at 3.4%, but it also keeps productivity down, too - not to mention entrepreneurialism.

Whether such an approach can stave off the rise of artificial intelligence, robots and automation in a world moving from a commodity-based economy to one based on intellectual capital, seems unlikely.

But corporate Japan seems intent on trying.

Edited by Pipcard on Jun 14th 2021 at 11:56:39 AM

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