All over the world proactive public policy in business is now under siege. Economists and policy-makers claim that the era of `Big Government' is over. However, nobody denies the fact that government has historically played a critical role in modern economic development. Given the profound changes of public policy agendas, this is an appropriate time to review the dynamic interaction between government policies and industrial developments from an international and historical perspective.

Focusing on the so-called `Golden Age of Capitalism' the 1950s and 1960s and studying prime-mover countries (the US and the UK), followers (Germany, France, and Italy), and latecomers (Japan and Korea), Competing Policies for Competitiveness addresses the crucial questions to be asked; what appropriate roles should government be assigned, and which government actions are useful public policy and which represent unnecessary and harmful intervention? The book also attempts to utilize the Japanese case as an analytical reference against which experiences of other economies are examined.