According to the common wisdom (in economics, that is), Japan has essentially been in recession since around 1990. I remember the 1980's – everyone talked about Japan the way people now talk about China: it was going to take over the world, it was breaking all the economic rules, etc., etc. And now, everyone in economics circles seems to view Japan as a "has been."
So it's unarguable that Japan has been in a sustained recession. But I have two observations.
First, it really doesn't seem that bad here. I know that as a tourist, and as a person who is only visiting a fairly small corner of the country (Kyushu's major cities), I'm not getting the full picture. But countries with depressed economies feel depressed. There's a dispiritedness in the people, which I was, for example, even conscious of during my driving around the US, last fall. I don't really feel that, here. You'd think, after 2 decades of supposed economic "failure," the people would seem broken down and miserable, but the country doesn't really feel that way. That's my personal, uneducated, anecdotal observation.
My second thought is much more philosophical. There is so much talk of "sustainability," these days. And everyone acknowledges that in the very long term, constant material economic growth is unsustainable. There's a limited amount of stuff on the planet (and in the solar system, and in the universe). So looking out over thousands or millions of years, assuming our civilization keeps going… at some point, material economics is guaranteed to break down.
So why don't we begin questioning the received wisdom of the need for economic growth? We can look at Japan as an example of not just a sustained recession, but, perhaps, a sustainable one? More simply… why does Japan need to start "growing" again? Can't it just sort of move along, not growing, maybe even shrinking a bit? The people seem to be dealing with it pretty well. Who wrote the book that says that economic growth is necessary?
These are just reflections of someone with no training in economics, but with an interest in such matters.