Every spring, the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan sends a delegation to Washington, D.C. to meet with senior U.S. administration officials and key members of Congress to discuss issues of concern to the U.S. business community in Japan. Participating in the ACCJ visit last month for the seventh consecutive year (nine times since 1991) provided me an excellent opportunity to reflect on the continuities and changes — what I call the "Three Phases" — in the U.S.-Japan relationship since the inauguration of the administration of U.S. President Clinton in January 1993.

The administration came into office giving high priority to economic issues, as reflected in the 1992 campaign slogan, "It's the economy, stupid!" The view in the United States then was that Japan was a formidable economic rival that persisted in exporting to far more than it imported from the U.S.

With this as a backdrop, phase one of the administration's policy toward Japan understandably focused on market-opening trade negotiations. This began with Clinton's first postinauguration trip to Japan in July 1993 for the G7 Tokyo Summit, when he met with then-Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa to conclude the "Framework Agreement." The Feb. 11, 1994 meeting between Clinton and then-Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa ended in failure but attracted much media attention as the "first time in postwar history that a Japanese prime minister said 'No!' to America." Phase one effectively came to an end on June 28, 1995 with the bilateral settlement in Geneva on autos and auto parts.