Read this the day it went up and had to react immediately — no time to let it settle, which I think is a compliment to the piece. The "failed help is better than successful help" inversion is what got me: the idea that the bureaucracy's incompetence at promotion has been quietly load-bearing for the whole ecosystem. Once the state has to defend the culture, it ends up defending the worst of it — a trap I hadn't seen articulated so cleanly.
If I can offer the other end of the telescope, as someone watching Japan from the outside as a place an artist might one day want to grow: I keep snagging on the fact that the $130B is a market-size target, not a check being written. A check funds an approved list — directed, legible, exactly the capturable thing you're warning about. A growth target mostly works by de-risking private capital, and a thicker stack tends to spill over to the fringe it isn't aiming at — infrastructure built for the mainstream, adjacent paid work, more density pulling in patrons and collaborators.
So maybe the capital and the capture are the same event seen from two ends. The piece made me hold both at once on first read — that's the most I can ask of an essay. Grateful for it.
Thanks for your thoughts. One of the most frustrating things about all of these announcements is how little in the way of concrete detail details there have been, despite all the enthusiastic reporting, and Onoda’s comments haven’t instilled confidence.
One of the biggest issues is that manga in particular, but a lot of Japanese pop culture in general, have traditionally been counterpoints to the authorities and the mainstream. That tension is arguably what makes so much of it so good. One might argue that that is a factor of Japan’s pop cultural industries having “grown up” rapidly in the postwar era world order, and that times have changed. But once the authorities become dependent on it, can it retain its soul? It is a fundamental, structural conundrum.
I like the evolutionary perspective you are invoking here. And it resonates, like all around us there’s constant change and the industries are also subject to inception, growth, golden eras, and eventual decline in relative terms. What has risen, will eventually fall, and vice versa.
Highly recommend ‘The End of Cool Japan: Ethical, Legal, and Cultural Challenges to Japanese Popular Culture’ edited by Mark McLelland for folks interested in going deeper. This topic has definitely been a long time coming.
Great analysis, Matt. I have trouble imagining Japanese government intervention going any way but the way past such interventions have gone (thinking of JLPP) whereby a list, often arbitrary and conceived by a single individual, determines what gets funded and promoted. There are knock-on effects—paying for a translation of a book that no one will read still helps a translator who may go on to do more impactful work stay afloat & hone their craft—but it’s hard to see how they achieve a broadly effective promotion effort without a dramatically different approach (words you don’t often hear associated with government programs in any country, least of all Japan).
Speaking of translators, one wonders how they intend to bring this content to a global audience? Let the constellation of private companies figure it out? Mass adoption of AI translation tools? Seems like another important, traditionally ignored, part of the puzzle that needs figuring out.
Surely Matt in order to be or not to be a fan, you had to judge at some critical point? Or is fandom/nonfandom capable somehow of bypassing such deliberations altogether?
Great read, Matt! I appreciate the distillation of the core conundrum you highlight - all of the talk of government boosterism and very little detail about how that will practically function w/o interfering with the creatives who make that happen. Brings up sour memories of the sensational headlines around the US’s National Endowment for the Arts in the 80s.
How much of this effort is focused on fostering more things like the (highly successful) Shonen Jump production model?
Read this the day it went up and had to react immediately — no time to let it settle, which I think is a compliment to the piece. The "failed help is better than successful help" inversion is what got me: the idea that the bureaucracy's incompetence at promotion has been quietly load-bearing for the whole ecosystem. Once the state has to defend the culture, it ends up defending the worst of it — a trap I hadn't seen articulated so cleanly.
If I can offer the other end of the telescope, as someone watching Japan from the outside as a place an artist might one day want to grow: I keep snagging on the fact that the $130B is a market-size target, not a check being written. A check funds an approved list — directed, legible, exactly the capturable thing you're warning about. A growth target mostly works by de-risking private capital, and a thicker stack tends to spill over to the fringe it isn't aiming at — infrastructure built for the mainstream, adjacent paid work, more density pulling in patrons and collaborators.
So maybe the capital and the capture are the same event seen from two ends. The piece made me hold both at once on first read — that's the most I can ask of an essay. Grateful for it.
Thanks for your thoughts. One of the most frustrating things about all of these announcements is how little in the way of concrete detail details there have been, despite all the enthusiastic reporting, and Onoda’s comments haven’t instilled confidence.
One of the biggest issues is that manga in particular, but a lot of Japanese pop culture in general, have traditionally been counterpoints to the authorities and the mainstream. That tension is arguably what makes so much of it so good. One might argue that that is a factor of Japan’s pop cultural industries having “grown up” rapidly in the postwar era world order, and that times have changed. But once the authorities become dependent on it, can it retain its soul? It is a fundamental, structural conundrum.
I like the evolutionary perspective you are invoking here. And it resonates, like all around us there’s constant change and the industries are also subject to inception, growth, golden eras, and eventual decline in relative terms. What has risen, will eventually fall, and vice versa.
Highly recommend ‘The End of Cool Japan: Ethical, Legal, and Cultural Challenges to Japanese Popular Culture’ edited by Mark McLelland for folks interested in going deeper. This topic has definitely been a long time coming.
Amazing read as always, Matt!
Interesting read !
Great analysis, Matt. I have trouble imagining Japanese government intervention going any way but the way past such interventions have gone (thinking of JLPP) whereby a list, often arbitrary and conceived by a single individual, determines what gets funded and promoted. There are knock-on effects—paying for a translation of a book that no one will read still helps a translator who may go on to do more impactful work stay afloat & hone their craft—but it’s hard to see how they achieve a broadly effective promotion effort without a dramatically different approach (words you don’t often hear associated with government programs in any country, least of all Japan).
Speaking of translators, one wonders how they intend to bring this content to a global audience? Let the constellation of private companies figure it out? Mass adoption of AI translation tools? Seems like another important, traditionally ignored, part of the puzzle that needs figuring out.
They are investing heavily in AI translation companies. It’s another problem that I should probably touch on in a follow up piece.
Ah, of course. That makes sense because everyone knows the best entertainment is created with AI. Please do follow up!
I'm reminded of the famous Reagan quote
“The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help.”
Not quite sure how you translate that into Japanese but I think it would be worth doing so.
Surely Matt in order to be or not to be a fan, you had to judge at some critical point? Or is fandom/nonfandom capable somehow of bypassing such deliberations altogether?
Great read, Matt! I appreciate the distillation of the core conundrum you highlight - all of the talk of government boosterism and very little detail about how that will practically function w/o interfering with the creatives who make that happen. Brings up sour memories of the sensational headlines around the US’s National Endowment for the Arts in the 80s.
How much of this effort is focused on fostering more things like the (highly successful) Shonen Jump production model?