STAGNATION TECHNOLOGY STARTLING * : JAPAN'S PRECIS

IF you want to see the consequences of economic stagnation, there is no better example than Japan.

After growing by leaps for decades, the country's economy started to stagnate in the 1990s. Until then, it had been at the center of most innovations.

Matt Alt, in his book PURE INVENTION : How Japan made the Modern World, does an incredible job of tracing Japan's major contributions to innovation and technology.

But then it all stopped.

A number of political economists believe it was America, the country's chief benefactor after the Second World War, which deliberately slowed Japan's growth out of fear of a pre-war political relapse.

Whatever the reasons, it is clear that the society suffered and showed us the consequences of such stagnation.

The World Students Society thanks Farrukh Khan Pitaffi.