Changing Japanese Capitalism: Societal Coordination and Institutional Adjustment

Description

Economic crisis tends to spur change in the 'rules of the game' - the 'institutions' - that govern the economic activity of firms and employees. But after more than a decade of economic pain following the burst of the Japanese Bubble Economy of the 1980s, the core institutions of Japanese capitalism have changed little. In this systematic and holistic assessment of continuity and change in the central components of Japanese capitalism, Michael A. Witt links this slow institutional change to a confluence of two factors: high levels of societal co-ordination in the Japanese political economy, and low levels of deviant behaviour at the level of individuals, firms, and organizations. He identifies social networks permeating Japanese business as a key enabler of societal co-ordination and an obstacle to deviancy, and sheds light on a pervasive but previously under-explored type of business networks, intra-industry loops. Includes a foreword by Gordon Redding.

Michael Witt is Assistant Professor of Asian Business and Comparative Management in the Economics and Political Science Area of INSEAD.

'Michael Witt has made here an excellent contribution to our understanding of Japanese capitalism, by focussing on societal co-ordination and institutional adjustment. Witt's initiative is to draw attention to what he has defined as 'intra-industry loops', a phenomenon taken for granted in Japan as natural or commonplace. Thanks to Witt's assessment, we can begin to see reasons for Japan's slow pace of change, and also how its economic circumstances are related to critical issues of institutional reform and capitalist diversity.' Professor Harukiyo Hasegawa, Doshisha Business School, Kyoto 'Changing Japanese Capitalism provides a superb portrayal and somber assessment of firms and industry-level adjustments. Suitable for business majors, sociologists, economists, and political scientists alike, this book is certain to raise the standards of the ongoing debate on the real changes within Japanese capitalism.' Professor Nobuhiro Hiwatari, Institute of Social Sciences, University of Tokyo