Asia Times: Defiant Japan fights for its leather industry
In defiance of mounting pressure to fully liberalize imports of foreign leather products, including footwear, Japan is digging in its heels [groan] to safeguard its internationally uncompetitive industry. At first glance, the import restrictions may look like typical protectionist trade measures...But lying beneath the surface of the current issue is the bitter legacy of the feudal hierarchy... The question of whether to level the playing field between domestic and foreign makers of leather products is not a purely economic one. It is also a highly sensitive political and social question that involves burakumin, or hamlet people...But even talk of burakumin - another group of relentless segregated people - has traditionally been considered taboo in Japanese society as a whole...So Japanese trade diplomats seldom touch on the former untouchables publicly when they make their case against fully opening the domestic leather market...more...
