THE RISE OF THE JAPANESE CORPORATE SYSTEM
Japanese Studies
General Editor: Yoshio Sugimoto
Images of Japanese Society: Ross E. Mouer and
Yoshio Sugimoto
An Intellectual History of Wartime Japan:
Shunsuke Tsurumi
A Cultural History of Postwar Japan:
Shunsuke Tsurumi
Beyond Computopia: Tessa Morris-Suzuki
Constructs for Understanding Japan:
Yoshio Sugimoto and Ross E. Mouer
Japanese Models of Conflict Resolution:
S. N. Eisenstadt and Eyal Ben-Ari
The Rise of the Japanese Corporate System:
Koji Matsumoto
Forthcoming
Enterprise Unionism in Japan: Hirosuke Kawanishi
Group Psychology of the Japanese in Wartime:
Toshio Iritani
Changing Japanese Suburbia: Eyal Ben-Ari
Science, Technology and Society in Postwar Japan:
Shigeru Nakayama
Transferred Development: Western Technology and the Industrialisation of Japan: Ian Inkster
First published in 1983 by
Kegan Paul International
This edition first published in 2011 by
Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
Koji Matsumoto 1991
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 10: 0-7103-0407-2 (hbk)
ISBN 13: 978-0-7103-0407-0 (hbk)
Publishers Note
The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent. The publisher has made every effort to contact original copyright holders and would welcome correspondence from those they have been unable to trace.
Preface
In general, Japans economic system is viewed as being capitalism, and there seems to be no room for doubting otherwise. If one glances at the many subsystems that form the Japanese economys foundation, for example, such as private ownership of property, joint stock companies and well-developed markets, one is forced to conclude that yes, indeed, Japan belongs to the group of highly developed capitalist nations.
But just as democratic government is possible within the framework of, say, a monarchy, with the external monarchal form being maintained even as the government becomes democratic over a lengthy period of political evolution, we know there are times when a countrys internal mechanism can differ from the system seen externally. The contemporary Japanese situation can be viewed as a noteworthy example of such a case.
Although not widely recognized yet, a new economic system has developed and been nurtured in Japan inside a shell of capitalism. The new system differs greatly from traditional capitalism, but that does not mean to say it has drawn close to socialism. Nor can the newness of this system be understood by viewing it as depending principally on either market or planning principles, or on the two in combination.
The issue in the new system is not the degree of government interference in the economic process, or the relationship between government and corporations. Rather, it is the new elements that have appeared in the structure of corporations the basic units of the economy and the economic conclusions those elements have brought about. More specifically, the issue is the essential breaking away from a capitalistic corporate structure and, related to that, the disappearance of many capitalistic characteristics from the overall economy.
This new corporate system is the source of the might of the Japanese economy. It provided the propulsive energy that enabled the Japanese economy to expand fifteen-fold between the mid-1950s and the mid-1980s, and to this day it remains the source of the Japanese economys strong vitality.
This book discusses the new corporate system in specific terms, explaining how it differs from the system of orthodox capitalist corporations, in being both more progressive and more fitting for meeting the various conditions of contemporary industrial society. It also explains the circumstances, in the context of the new corporate system, that brought forth powerful corporations for which it is difficult to find comparisons in other countries.
It may seem to some that the interpretation of the contemporary Japanese economy that this book offers contains some quite bold assertions. But the author feels that, if anything, this book should have been written sooner in Japan. And yet it is not as if there were not reasons for the new corporate system not having been recognized sooner.
One is that the system gradually took form over a long period directly from the everyday business reality, in a process of much trial and error. It was not created artificially on the basis of a specific theory or thought system. And during its development, nothing particularly dramatic occurred to attract attention to it.
Another reason it was not recognized sooner was the general mind-set of the Japanese intelligentsia.
Since the second half of the nineteenth century, Japan has continually imported aspects of Western civilization. And although there have been exceptions, most members of the Japanese intelligentsia in every period since then tended to view the special features of Japans economic society that could not be found in the West simply as reflections of Japans backwardness. As Japan progressed, they said, those special features would be absorbed into the Western model, and that was the best thing that could happen.
While aspects of Western civilization had universal value, they said, aspects of Japanese culture were special. Their way of thinking seemed to be the natural approach to interpreting the situation, and it led those people to believe that the distinctively different aspects of Japans economy were diversions from the ideal form, temporary deviations which would disappear with Japans modernization. At the very least, those people did not make the effort needed, based on the Japanese reality, to encourage the creation of a conceptual framework, say, or a system with universal appeal.
This type of thinking is truly trying to gain power with those studying Japan, which is one of the psychological reasons that prevented the discovery of the new economic system.
At any rate, Japan is now approaching the end of a period. In global terms, many Japanese corporations have moved to the forefront of their industries, and although when viewed from the overall economy one can still pinpoint various inefficiencies in many areas, the mechanism that moves Japanese industry today is powerful almost beyond comparison. Given these circumstances, the concept that the special aspects of the Japanese situation will be absorbed into the Western model together with Japans modernization is highly unrealistic.
