In other words, the reforms delivered an overarching framework for making economic policy choices. 8  One example among many is as follows: “There is almost no power on earth which will prevent politicians (and certainly not ANC politicians) from taking large bags of money if their constituency is frantic for houses and jobs and the money is on offer.
The second important difference between the German and the Japanese banking sector is the real estate bubble that still plagues Japanese banks, but never existed in Germany in the first place. A major portion of Japanese collateral diminished to virtual non-existence and thus accounts for the bulk of bad loans in Japan, but not in Germany.