This award will support a long-term visit by Professor Richard Samuels, Department of Political Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology to Japan to carry out joint research with the Techno-Economics Group of the Mitsubishi Research Institute (MRI) which is one of Japan's leading think tanks. While at Mitsubishi he will have complete access and cooperation with researchers from Government and industry (including the Japan Defense Agency, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry), as well as defense contractors from within and from outside the Mitsubishi Group. Professor Samuels study will explore the intellectual and practical underpinnings of a Japanese technology strategy that, without regard for artificial differences between military and civilian applications has positioned Japan on the threshold of global power. It will explain how Japanese planners made strategic choices that enhance the national capacity for innovation. The research will provide valuable information on (1) Japanese politics (2) the Japanese techno-military sphere, and (3) the relationship between military technology/industry and economic development, processes and institutions in advanced industrial societies in general. The relationship between civilian and military technology is extremely relevant to the future of U.S. and world economic growth. Professor Samuels is one of a very few American scholars in the area of contemporary Japanese politics and society. Mitsubishi Research Institute is a first rate institution in the area of techno-economics studies and thus is the ideal organization for Professional Samuels to undertake his research. The research should result in a significantly enriched understanding of the nature and extent of defense techno development in Japan. It may also provide the groundwork for U.S. reevaluations about the social and political organization and priorities of both our civilian and military technologies.
