"(The novels) depict Japanese business as nasty and businessmen as villains. As the books sell in large numbers in Japan this is presumably how ordinary Japanese view the driving force of the world's second biggest economy". -- The Economist

"(The novels) depict Japanese business as nasty and businessmen as villains. As the books sell in large numbers in Japan this is presumably how ordinary Japanese view the driving force of the world's second biggest economy". -- The Economist

Japanese Business Culture and Practices presents detailed insights and descriptions on the proper ways to conduct business with contemporary Japanese. It focuses on the traditional and nontraditional business-related practices, including the internal mechanisms of promotion and decision-making in Japanese corporations. From advice on how to avoid cultural misunderstandings and how to develop trust with Japanese colleagues, readers will gain insights on how to communicate, negotiate, entertain, and socialize with Japanese as well as the minutiae of correct behavior. Using linguistic examples to facilitate how Japanese themselves view their work environment, authors Isao Takei and Jon P. Alston describe the social etiquette and protocols Japanese expect all foreigners to adopt in order to successfully conduct business. With a glossary of terms and practical real-life experiences, this is an essential guide for anyone who wants to forge deeper business relationships with Japanese.

The Routledge Handbook of Japanese Business and Management provides a comprehensive overview of management and business processes and practices in Japanese companies. The contributors combine theoretical findings and research results with a practical and contemporary view on how corporations and firms are managed in Japan. The handbook is divided into eight sections covering: historical perspectives on Japanese management; structure and theory of the Japanese firm; the corporate environment in Japan; the Japanese work environment; the Japanese market; manufacturing and logistics; interaction and communication; the future of Japanese management. This book is an essential reference resource for students and scholars working on Japanese companies, the Japanese market-place, Japanese consumers, or management processes in the Japanese firm. The book also provides an interesting and informative read for managers who need to deepen their knowledge on Japanese business processes.

Our work life is filled with emotions. How we feel on the job, what we say we feel, and what feelings we display—all these are important aspects of organizational behavior and workplace culture. Rather than focusing on the psychology of personal emotions at work, however, this study concentrates on emotions as role requirements, on workplace emotions that combine the private with the public, the personal with the social, and the authentic with the masked. In this cross-cultural study of "emotion management," the author argues that even though the goals of normative control in factories, offices, and shops may be similar across cultures, organizational structure and the surrounding culture affect how that control is discussed and conceived.

In the late 1980s, Japan's strong economic performance put it on a the verge of becoming a major player in regional and global affairs. But nearly a decade of economic stagnation, a mounting of bad debts, and a continuing stream of scandals have tarnished the country's distinctive economic model. At the turn of the millennium, the Japanese economy remained mired in a pattern of stagnation. As this disappointing condition dragged on, the government pursued policies to restore economic health. Yet Japan has been slow to embrace the systemic reform on which a robust economic recovery depends. In Arthritic Japan, Edward J. Lincoln examines the causes and implications of this weak response. Concluding that Japan is unlikely to pursue the vigorous reform necessary for economic growth, Lincoln warns of serious consequences: a stumbling economy bedeviled by recession and financial crisis, eroding leadership in economic and security issues, a continued defensive trade posture, and a disgruntled population that could turn a more nationalistic stance in foreign policy.

The analyses and literary portraits in this text elucidate the existing realities of Japan's postwar history. They address, in chronological fashion, major social, environmental, and feminist issues and conflicts that have attended to Japan's postwar economic miracle.

In order to regain its competitiveness, Japan is restructuring and globalizing its business and economics system, as well as other aspects of society. How it is resolving this is of huge interest to its global trading partners. With contributions from well-known North American and Japanese academics, this book discusses these issues from historical, analytical and empirical perspectives.

From being the last country in the world to open its doors to global trade in the 1850s to becoming the second industrialized nation in the 1960s, Japan has experienced impressive economic and social development over the last two centuries. In the last three decades, however, it became entrenched in a long phase of economic stagnation, dropping from second to third place in the global economy, having been overtaken by China in 2010. Inspired by the recent works on the history of capitalism, this history of business shows that the Japanese company was not the product of a unique national culture. Japanese capitalism was largely shaped by a political, economic, and institutional environment, which offered a variety of new opportunities to entrepreneurs, who also played a central role in the process of change. Rural capitalism that formed during the period of national seclusion shifted to industrial capitalism after the opening of the nation to global trade: this form of capitalism was close to those observed in other late industrializing countries, and was characterized by the monopolistic domination of large business groups or zaibatsu during the interwar years. The Second World War saw the emergence of wartime capitalism with the central government as the dominant actor in the economy, and, after 1945, the need to reconstruct the country and catch-up with advanced Western economies gave birth to a new form of capitalism based on a cooperative relationship between business and the state: communitarian capitalism, more broadly known as the Japanese Business System. The liberalization and deregulation brought new changes in the business system, marked by the emergence of financial capitalism in the 1980s and 1990s.