What Lessons Can Be Learned from Recent Financial Crises? The Japanese Experience

It is my pleasure, and indeed an honor, to be invited to join this panel. At the same time, however, I feel somewhat regretful to have to talk on financial crises in Japan and Southeast Asia, where until a few years ago we had taken pride in our record of financial development and stability as compared with the rest of the world. The common factors behind the recent financial instability in this area are, in my judgment, rapid economic development, the global integration of financial markets, and the failure of government policy to keep pace with these dramatic changes in the internal and external environments.