Japan’ economy has experienced a period of very rapid economic growth in the 1950-1973
years, a partial slowing down of the rate of growth up to the end of the 1980s and then a
prolonged severe structural crisis in the last two decades. The paper gives an overview of Japan’s main economic trends and policies in the post-war period and tries explaining the period of rapid growth and the period of structural crisis with an interpretative framework that can in part account for both phases.