The influence of Japanese money is so pervasive that there is even a name for it: the demonstration effect. …
When it comes to the demonstration effect, nothing rivals the example set by Japan’s most recent political coup: the hiring of former President Ronald Reagan as a Japanese public relations shill. In October 1989, former President Reagan hired himself out to Fujisankei Communications Group, a $5.5 billion conglomerate then headed by its founder, Nobutaka Shikanai, a right-wing, controversial tycoon who owned Japan’s largest radio network, a national newspaper, and the country’s most successful television chain.
For $2 million, America’s former chief of state went to work for Fujisankei for one week. He made two 20-minute speeches, gave exclusive interviews to Fujisankei’s newspaper and television stations, and, in the process, parroted the Japanese line about U.S.-Japan trade frictions. The bilateral trade friction, Reagan told the Japanese, was America’s fault, caused by “trade protectionists” in Washington—whom he “had to fight every day.”
That was the message of Reagan’s trip to the Japanese; the message to public officials back in Washington was different. To them Reagan’s $2 million trip was the pinnacle of the demonstration effect—proof that anyone can be bought by the Japanese if the price is right and permission for others to do the same. After all, if a former president can go to work for the Japanese, why not a lower level bureaucrat?