Cool Japan: the relationships between the state and the cultural industries

This thesis fills a gap in the literature on the state-business relations in Japan by examining the relationships between the state and the cultural industries (anime, manga, and video games), a topic that is under-investigated. The concept of the developmental state is used to analyze the Cool Japan policy that the government implements to promote the expansion abroad of the Japanese cultural industries, and to study the reactions of anime studios, manga publishers and video games companies to this policy.

Cool Japan testifies that developmentalism is still alive in Japan. Neoliberalism and the globalization process have not caused the demise of the Japanese developmental state, illustrating its adaptation to a new context. The government still assumes that it has a role to play in order to ensure the competitiveness of the domestic economy by conducting industrial policies such as Cool Japan. The Japanese authorities have institutional links with the sectors covered in this research, in particular with their business associations, and a relative degree of autonomy. These are characteristics of a developmental state.

This doctoral dissertation offers evidence that Cool Japan is another case of the sectionalism of the Japanese bureaucracy. A very large number of state actors is involved in this policy, thereby raising the issue of the collaboration between them. The main gap identified is about the timing of the Cool Japan policy. Indeed the anime, manga and video games industries started the exports of their products before the implementation of this policy. Before the 2000s, the government ignored them because bureaucrats deemed that they were not profitable and unworthy of their interest. These sectors reject state intervention in their products if they receive a financial assistance.