This volume focuses on cross shareholding - or mutal shareholding - between corporations in the Japanese economy. It analyses contemporary trends and the reasons behind these, discusses the implications for the entire Japanese economic system and highlights relevant public policy.

This book illuminates the characteristics of the Japanese economy comprehensively and analyses how and why they have been changing. The contributors to this fifteen-paper volume are internationally-known and leading researchers of the Japanese economy. Following the overview chapter, the book covers such areas as the Japanese firm, the labour market, consumption and saving patterns, financial markets, macroeconomic policies and international economic relations.