先進国間貿易摩擦と「民間外交」

昭和初期における外交と経済

抄録

It has been a practical rule that trade frictions between the industrialized states have been alleviated and finally resolved by intergovernmental negotiations. However, the trade conflict over Japan's exports of television receivers and other consumer electronic products to the United Kingdom in the early 1970s has been mitigated and settled by so-called nongovernmental diplomacy between both British and Japanese industries concerned, which might be called a rare model case as such.
Japan's exports of colour TVs to the U. K. practically started in 1971 and perplexed the British consumer electronics industry from the very beginning, because Japanese counterpart was already known at that time for having damaged the American industry concerned by their irresistible exports. After many contacts between British government and manufacturers' association, both British and Japanese consumer electronics industries began their own consultation about trade friction on the advice of British Secretary of State for Trade and Industry in 1971 and the regular meetings of their representatives were alternately held in England and Japan once, twice or three times a year until 1988.
Under their government's guidance, Japanese manufacturers had restrained their exports of TVs and audio products called music centres to the U. K. for a couple of years (colour TV from 1973 to 1975, monochrome TV, 1973-74, music centre, 1978-80) to alleviate over-supply of the products in British domestic market and the British rivals' anguish about it.
In addition, they devised, so to speak, confidence building measures like an emergency “hot-line” communication system and unofficial rules for crisis management. They gradually shifted from a relationship of asymmetric interdependence to one of symmetric interdependence by learning that they both had common interests. It can be generally said that there are much more merits in mitigating and settling trade conflicts by flexible interindustry consultations, in other words nongovernmental diplomacy, than by inflexible intergovernmental negotiations.
But the competition laws of some countries have been unfortunately being insuperable obstacles to wide-ranging interindustry consultations. The future developments of transnational relations throughout the world might hopefully change the circumstances of nongovernmental diplomacy.