선의 실제 역사

선의 황금시대
오경웅 지음, 류시화 옮김 / 경서원 / 1986년 12월

선을 다루는 서적이 대개 그렇듯이 이책 역시 선이 태어나던 시기인 당나라 시절을 다룬다. 원래 영어로 쓰여진 이책은 불교에 낯선 서구인들에게 선을 소개하는 것이었다. 다시 말해 선 입문서이다. 스즈키 선사의 'An Introduction to Zen Buddhism'이 그런 목적으로 쓰여진 책으로는 초기의 저술이고 또 가장 유명하다. 그러나 이책은 스즈키와는 조금 다르다. 스즈키와 마찬가지로 이책 역시 선 입문서의 표준을 따라간다. 공안을 나열하고 연관된 일화를 소개한다. 그러나 스즈키와 달리 저자는 이야기꾼이 아니라 해설자의 입장을 취한다. 이야기꾼은 선을 소개할 때 가장 고전적인 방법이다. 그러나 그런 식으로는 초보자가 선이 무엇인지 알수가 없다. 그러므로 저자는 왜 선이 중국에서 일어날 수 밖에 없었는가부터 시작한다. 그는 도교의 영향을 지적한다. 도교의 이해없이 선은 이해할 수 없다고 말한다. 스즈키의 경우 선을 불교의 전통에서 설명한다. 그러나 선은 역사적 배경에서 이해할 때 더 쉽다. 원래 영어로 쓰인 원저도 쉬운 영어로 되어 있고 번역도 잘되어 있다.

다음은 내가 아마존에 썼던 리뷰이다. 

This book deals with the heyday of Zen Buddhism, Tang dynasty. The purpose of this book is introducing the Westerners to the Zen Buddhism. In other word, this is a Zen primer. Zen master Suzuki¡¯s ¡®An Introduction to Zen Buddhism¡¯ is widely read for this purpose. But this book is somewhat different from Suzuki¡¯s. Just like Suzuki¡¯s book, this book follow the standard format of Zen primer. Listing koans (about the koan, see my review on Suzuki¡¯s book) chronically with the related anecdotes. But unlike Suzuki¡¯s, Wu takes the stance of interpreter not of storyteller. Storytelling is the classic way to introducing Zen Buddhism (for the reason, see my review on Suzuki¡¯s). But in that way, beginners can¡¯t grasp even the basic of Zen Buddhism. So Wu approaches somewhat differently. He begins with why Zen should take place in China, not in India. He points out the influence of Taoism. Taoism has, in fact, affinity to Buddhism and it¡¯s the mindset the Chinese understood foreign thought, Buddhism. So Wu argue that we can¡¯t figure out Zen without understanding basic principles of Taoism. Suzuki¡¯s book, for example, represents and explains the principles of Zen from the tradition of Buddhism. But unfortunately it seems not that good way to figure out Zen. Like other thoughts, Zen could be best understood against the historical backdrop. And it¡¯s the way this book employs and the beauty of this book: each principle of Zen is explained against Taoism and historical backdrop. Thought could be fully understood when the behind motives are grasped, I think. Yep, such works are not hard to see in Buddhology. But this book is written in the plain English to be steadfast to the intention of Zen primer.

사회과학도를 위한 교과서

Statistics for Social Data Analysis (Hardcover, 4)
Knoke, David / Wadsworth Pub Co / 2002년 1월

고급통계교과서는 아니다. 통계학과에서 배우는 것처럼 함수도출을 수리적으로 한다든가 하는 것은 나오지 않는다. SPSS나 SAS를 쓰는데 필요한 정도의 지식만 제시된다. 그 통계적 방법의 의미만 건드리는 것이다. 사회과학 통계서적이 다 그렇다. 이책의 장점은 설명이 명료하고 간단하면서 실제 사례가 풍부하게 제시되었다는 것이다. 그러나 실제 리서치를 할 때 유용하지는 않다. 실제 분석에선 이책에 소개된 것보다 더 고급을 쓰게 되기 때문이다. 초보자에게는 좋지만 실제 연구자에게 유용한 것은 아니다.

다음은 내가 아마존에 썼던 리뷰이다 

This book is a statistics textbook for students of social sciences, not high-end users. I read earlier edition of this book in undergraduate statistics course. In that course, only basics of statistics were instructed. In social sciences, they don't need to know A to Z of statistics for all they have to know is what the function of SPSS or SAS means and what kind of data is needed and how the data would be analyzed in the statistics packages. There is no need to derive the functions in the textbook mathematically as they do in the courses of statistics department. We should understand what the function means, not how it is derived. This book is written in this regard. Unlike orthodox statistics textbook, this book tackles only the meaning of the statistical methods. In doing so, this book illustrates the methods with various field works and SPSS exercises. This is the stance most textbook written for social scientists takes. It seems that this book succeed in achieving the goal. Explanations are succinct and examples are apposite.
But this book is not that useful when you should do real research. Most social sciences articles use more advanced methods than what this book introduces. This book is good enough to beginners, but not so to who would be real researcher. At that point, you should have read more advanced ones already. If not, you couldn't read a piece of article in the common journals.  

It's the politics, stupid

Industrial Policy in an Era of Globalization: Lessons from Asia (Paperback) - Lessons from Asia
Marcus Noland / Peterson Inst for Intl Economics / 2003년 3월

 소책자이다. 이론적 프레임을 제시하는 것이 목적이 아니라 OECD나 IMF에서 공짜로 다운해 볼 수 있는 워킹페이퍼와 비슷한 성격의 정책제안서이다. 자세한 것은 아래에 내가 전에 영어로 쓴 리뷰를 보라

 다음은 내가 아마존에 썻던 리뷰이다.

This booklet is intended not to be theoretical breakthrough or carving out amazing new facts, but to be a policy recommendation in the style of working papers from OECD or IMF which could be downloaded freely from their website.
East Asian developmental states of Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, or their policy tool dubbed as industrial policy garnered enviable encomiums in the 1980s and the early 1990s. There were so many speculations on whether its industrial developmental experiences could be copied into the contexts of other developing countries. World Bank¡¯s ¡®The East Asian Miracle (1993)¡¯ was a good example of such trend. Even the stalwart of lasses-faire capitalism, the States, tinkered with the idea. Government-led establishing of SEMATECH was the instance. Now you can witness the stratospherical-scale experiment in China. But the more-than-a-decade-protracted stagnation in Japan, spectacular debacle of Asian financial crises seeded the suspicion about the model and it blossomed to the full-blown denial at the turn of the century. This monograph is another nail in the coffin.
The industrial policy is the policy set of promotion/protection. The state nurtured target industries which could be internationally competitive to step up the ladder of international comparative advantages. The targeted industry should be protected from the hostile environment up to being internationally competitive, and promoted with directing national resources to that industry. This, of course, bucked the basic premises of market economics with distorting the flow of resources. But authors are not concerned with principles, but whether this policy tool was effective at all. In a nutshell, they are skeptical. According to their econometric data, targeting served to shorten economic recovery, at best. It could be claimed that in the early stage of postwar recovery, the state intervention contributed to some degree. But it¡¯s dubious whether its efficacy could be extended after the initial takeoff stage, in Rostow¡¯s words. The industrial policy is more than economics but it¡¯s the issue of political economy, in other words it¡¯s prone to be captured by vested interests. It¡¯s the de facto consensus that since the 1970s, Japan could not be called as the developmental state: the political economy swayed to negative way to the efficiency of economy since then and it¡¯s the fundamental cause of Japan¡¯s stagnation. The point is summed up as ¡®Two Japans¡¯: the inefficient sectors are parasites on the efficient sectors like electronics, auto. This has dragged the overall efficiency of the economy down. Authors argue that the applicability of industrial policy i.e. promotion/protection is not hindered by WTO regime for there a lot of loopholes available under current rule books. The issue at hand is the efficacy and the political economy. The efficacy is questionable according to data. And it would be next to impossible to overcome the issue of political economy which could insulate the state from the vested interest.
The points this monograph poses are not that unknown. But the manner presenting in the form of literature is the problem of this book. Econometric data are interesting and inspiring. But they are employed to support points. I think they could have organized the points in more straightforward way. Points are scattered, not seamlessly sorted out.

일본전자산업 입문

The Japanese Electronics Industry (Paperback)
Wataru Nakayama / CRC Pr I Llc / 1999년 6월

 일본전자 산업에 관한 객관적 소개서이다. 수치와 도표로 채워져 있고 드라이한 서술이다. 읽기 따분하다. 그러나 입문서로서는 산업을 개관하기에 좋은 책이다.

다음은 내가 아마존에 포스팅했던 리뷰이다. 

This is a Japanese part of the series dealing with Asian electronics industry from Korean, Taiwan, Chinese, and Singapore. Asian economies excel at electronics and IT industries. You must have at least one product made in that area. It¡¯s no wonder that there has been a flood of books on the electronics industry of those economies. The Japanese one, in particular, has been the centre of attention for its spectacular performance. Nobody hasn¡¯t heard of the brand names like SONY, Toshiba, or Panasonic. But most interests are directed to the secret formulae of their success stories or the devastating impacts on their domestic industries of US or Europe. There are rare cases of impartial and comprehensive mappings. This book is intended to plug this gap. This book is neither academic works nor impression-driven journalistic sketch, but is intent on informing basic facts and instilling the outlook of the industry in the readers. In doing so, this book begins from basic features of Japan in general, the overview of Japanese economy, the share of the industry in the overall economy and the history of the industry, to the present of the industry. Their presentation of the industry is loaded with statistic and cases of individual companies. Authors do their best to provide readers the concrete image of the industry. Sure, the writing style is bound to be dry and, at worse, boring. But this book is the good enough step to begin with.

수평 케이레스의 네트웍 분석

Alliance Capitalism and Corporate Management : Entrepreneurial Cooperation in Knowledge Based Economies (Hardcover)
John H. Dunning / Edward Elgar Pub / 2003년 1월

 일본경제를 이해하려면 케이레스를 빼놓을 수 없다. 우리말로 계열이다. 그러나 전전의 재벌과 다른 느슨한 네트웍으로 묶인 기업집단이다. 요즘은 유명무실에 가까워졌지만 90년대 이전까지는 유효한 개념이었다. 이책은 케이레스에 대한 저술로는 오래된 편이다. 1992년에 나왔다. 그러나 아직도 유효하며 가장 좋은 책의 하나이다. 케이레스는 수평 케이레스와 수직 케이레스로 구분된다. 수직 케이레스는 도요타와  같은 예이다. 수평 케이레스는 이보다 휠씬 느슨하다. 주거래 은행과 거래처들사이의 네트웍과 같은 것이 그 예이다. 이책은 수평 케이레스에 관한 것이다.훌륭한 네트웍 분석이다.

다음은 내가 아마존에 포스팅했던 리뷰이다.  

There has been the deluge of books and articles on Japanese keiretsu. But this book published a decade ago (1992) is still one of the best. There are so many good enough accounts on the vertical keiretsu appeared in the Toyota¡¯s value chain. But not so, when it comes to the horizontal keiretzu. There is no shortage of materials but most of them are no more than anecdotal case studies or, at best, cursory impressions. I can¡¯t capture why they form such a long-term ties based on what interest at all, for example. The advantage of vertical keiretsu is obvious and well described. But what is the economic foundation of horizontal keiretsu? Is it mere social club of economic elites? Nobody could think so. The network structure (or network form) of horizontal keiretsu is well documented, such as main bank, cross shareholding, sacho-kai, and the preferential trading. But those are merely links forming the network. The network is more than the sum of links. It¡¯s the linkage of links and it has contents. Links reproduce itself for something flows between nodes. This book plugs the gap systematic explanation of horizontal keiretsu with network analysis. In doing so, the author mobilizes not only qualitative data from interviews and business history but also extensive quantitative data to generalize his remarks to level of the population of the Japanese businesses. The author begins with describing the network structure of keiretsu from chapter 3 to 4. Then the remaining chapters deal with how the network formed and how it operates in real business environment. Namely, those chapters deal with the contents of network. Now you might retort ¡®what¡¯s the difference from other materials? This book would supply better and well-organized illustration of keiretsu. But aren¡¯t those features common in other works?¡¯
Maybe. But the most inspiring piece lies in the use of image. Keiretsu is the interfirm network and it¡¯s not unique on Japan but the ubiquitous phenomenon all over the world. Usually, they use the image of coalition, as it has developed in the game theory. The interfirm network, however more stable it is than arm¡¯s length trading, is usually depicted with the image of coalition. The coalition, particularly in the form of game theory, is relatively fluid relationship. The coalition comes and goes according to the logic of strategic self-interest. This is the reality of business such as strategic alliance. Yesterday¡¯s foe could be today¡¯s friend. For example, Apple shook hands with IBM to make PowerPC. But such an image doesn¡¯t fit into the long-term relationship of horizontal keiretsu over more than a generation. Affiliation in a keiretsu group is considered as permanent one. Instead, Gerlach uses the metaphor of alliance to illustrate the features of Japanese keiretsu. The image of alliance comes from anthropological fieldworks. It suggests long-term social relationship that links kinship groups over generations. The self-interest is also the driving-force in the kinship alliance. Kinship groups establish the long-term ties with other kinship groups through swapping women. Through this tie, they exchange resources like calling on in times of need or for protection of one¡¯s own group. Those are valuable resources in primitive societies, with no doubt, and this relationship is long-term by nature. But in such a relationship, self-interest is tempered by the central role played by group history.
Horizontal keiretsu emerged from the self-interest of member firms to stabilize the flow of resources. So at the center of group have lain the bank and sogo shosha. During the early postwar period, the capital and raw materials were scarce and most needed resources to be secured, and that, affiliation in the group opens doors to trade with other group members, and with the trading partners those firms have. But once the network is put into action, it takes the life of its own: It was instutionalized in the routine of business. Just as firms seek to position themselves advantageously in their industry and in the broader business community, so too do groups as a whole. Keiretsu network, for instance, expands itself with new memberships. Most of expansion has involved the firms that compete against firms in other keiretsu. Keiretsu compete against keiretsu for positioning in the business community. By expanding to include group-level representation in a broad variety of fields, the group simultaneously preempts market opportunities, enhances its prestige in the larger business community, and diversifies risk across a spectrum of industries. The power and prestige of the group make the individual member firm more appealing to prospective business partners and improves its status in the larger business community. The fortunes of group and companies are in this way intertwined. In other words, affiliation in group translates into marrying with the group. The individual firms act as if they are the members of the clan. This kind of interfirm network could be facilitated for the unique Japanese business history. 3 out of outstanding 6 (now 4) groups are ex-zaibatsu (industrial group). And some influences in early postwar period are crucial in forming the keiretsu.
But this is the problem of this book: no convincing explanation about why such alliance is found only in Japan? This book offers good enough description of the phenomenon. I can¡¯t help asking ¡®Is this enough explanation?¡¯ Unfortunately I don¡¯t think so. If you have this kind of question, I recommend, Ulrike Schaede¡¯s ¡®Cooperative Capitalism¡¯. This book has a very long-term standpoint from Tokugawa period to the present. This book is not about keiretsu. But you could understand the institutional background of Japanese business.