Recently, I read Mark Pendergrast's e-book "Japan's Tipping Point." Pendergrast is an American writer who received a grant to study in Japan shortly after the Great East Japan Earthquake. He arrived in Japan expecting to find a country at the forefront of developing renewable energy technology and energy conservation. Instead, he found that Japan lags far behind almost all other developed countries in these areas. Here's a quote from Pendergrast himself:
"Japan is at a crucial tipping point and I discovered that I had been naive in thinking that the country was ready to make a massive change. The Japanese boast of their eco-services for eco-products in eco-cities and yet they rely primarily on imported fossil fuel and nuclear power, live in energy-wasteful homes, and import 60% of their food. That may be changing in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. Maybe. But as I documented, Japan lags far behind Europe, the United States, and even (in some respects) China in terms of renewable energy efforts. And Japan is mired in bureaucracy, political in-fighting, indecision, puffery, public apathy, and cultural attitudes that make rapid change difficult."
In some ways, Pendergrast's book makes a good companion piece to Alex Kerr's "Dogs and Demons," for it shows how the country is literally being strangled to death by entrenched bureaucracies and cultural inertia. For anyone with an interest in Japan's future, I strongly recommend this book. You can find out how to purchase it on Mark Pendergrast's site.
