Ulrike Schaede

From developmental state to the ‘New Japan’: the strategic inflection point in Japanese business

Between 1998–2006, Japans political economy underwent a strategic inflection point, anchored on legal changes so profound that they are irreversible. These reforms sought to enable large companies to shift from the post-war priority on sales and market share toward a new focus on profitability. The arrival of powerful low-cost Asian competitors in assembled goods, and a drastic change in the shareholder structure in Japan brought the end of the ‘developmental state’ approach and necessitated repositioning into innovative, high-margin sectors. The congruence model posits that a successful shift in critical tasks requires a realignment of formal organization, people and culture. For Japans highly diversified companies, to compete as efficient innovators meant making clear choices what businesses to compete in, and then to restructure to focus on winning in those few businesses. For Japan as a country, the shift in formal organization came through a wholesale change in the underlying approach to law-making and regulation, as well as corporate law. The 1990s were not so much a ‘lost decade’ for Japan as one of renewal and repositioning.

The Strategic Logic of Japanese Keiretsu, Main Banks and Cross-Shareholdings, Revisited

This paper introduces recent fundamental changes in Japan’s political economy, and analyzes how these have affected the country’s industrial architecture in terms of business group organization. Whereas previously, long-term, stable relations with other firms, banks and shareholders afforded great advantage to many companies, the new dynamic environment has led more and more banks and companies to turn away from stable “insurance” arrangements. The paper shows that a revision of corporate law towards more managerial flexibility paired with broader powers by shareholders matches this shift towards greater transparency, accountability, and competitive strategic positioning. Therefore, processes of corporate governance are also greatly altered. Our perceived wisdom of Japanese business organization needs to be updated.

Globalization and the Japanese Subcontractor System

This innovative and multidisciplinary book explores Japan’s economic crisis and recovery. Specifically, it analyses the role of corporations, the state, macroeconomic and industrial policy, and the changing status of Japan as an economic role model. The contributors list comprises an international panel of economists, political scientists and international relations specialists. From vantage points across Japan, North America and Europe, they bring together a collection of original studies considering Japan’s economic malaise and the potential for sustained recovery.

Shared Decision-Making in Patients With Prostate Cancer in Japan: Patient Preferences Versus Physician Perceptions

This article adds the Japanese perspective to our knowledge of shared decision-making (SDM) preferences by surveying patients with prostate cancer (PCA) and physicians in Japan. In 2015, 103 Japanese patients with PCA were asked about their SDM preferences by using an Internet-based 5-point-scale questionnaire. Concurrently, 127 Japanese physicians were surveyed regarding their perceptions of patient preferences on SDM. Drivers of preferences and perceptions were analyzed using univariable ordinal logistic regression and graphing the fitted response probabilities. Although 41% of both patients and physicians expressed and expected a desire for active involvement in treatment decisions (a higher rate than in a similar study for the United States in 2001), almost half the Japanese patients preferred SDM, but only 33% of physicians assumed this was their choice. That is, 29% of Japanese physicians underestimated patients’ preference for involvement in making treatment decisions. Patients with lower health-related quality of life (as measured by the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Prostate [FACT-P]) expressed a stronger preference for SDM. The study shows that the worse the medical situation, the more patients with PCA prefer to be involved in the treatment decision, yet physicians tend to underestimate the preferences of their patients. Perhaps in contrast to common assumptions, Japanese patients are as interested in being involved in decision making as are patients in the United States.

Sunshine and Suicides in Japan: revisiting the relevance of economic determinants of suicide

Abstract This paper investigates how exposure to sunshine affects the suicide rate in Japan, especially in relation to economic variables. Using prefecturebased data on socioeconomic variables for the years 1993–2009, the paper confirms existing research in finding a significant correlation between suicides and unemployment, for both men and women. The interaction between sunshine and unemployment is also significant, and further analysis reveals that unemployment is not an important factor for suicide in high-sunshine prefectures, whereas in low-sunshine areas the effect of unemployment on the suicide rate rises. The divorce rate is highly significant and positive for men, but significant and negative for women, suggesting that many Japanese women consider divorce liberating. Current suicide research in Japan with its strong emphasis on economic variables may benefit from an inclusion of measures of general well-being.

Changes in Corporate Restructuring Processes in Japan, 1981-2007

We analyze a large database collected from newspaper articles that report on major episodes of corporate restructuring in Japan between 1981 and 2007. By linking this database with financial data on public firms, we identify changes in the likelihood that a distressed undergoes restructuring, as well as in some measures adopted during restructuring. We find that the way distressed Japanese firms are restructured has changed during this period. The likelihood that a large distressed firm with high levels of debt undergoes restructuring has declined. Those firms that undergo restructuring continue to adopt more aggressive measures in terms of layoffs and cutbacks than other distressed firms, suggesting that “restructuring”, when it happens, involves real adjustments. Banks continue to be important for firms with a clearly identified main bank, and the main bank is more likely to push for more drastic reductions in debt and bank loans than other entities leading a restructuring event. Hoshi and Schaede: School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California, San Diego, NBER, and TCER. e-mails: thoshi@ucsd.edu, uschaede@ucsd.edu; Koibuchi: Faculty of Commerce and Economics, Chiba University of Commerce (CUC), Japan, e-mail: koibuchi@cuc.ac.jp. We received helpful comments from Noriyuki Yanagawa and participants of the ESRI conference in New York in March 2008. We thank Emi Fukuda, Kanako Hotta, Masafumi Iino, Akifumi Irie, Yuichiro Kawai, Yoshikazu Kuki, Kuni Nemoto, Masashi Osakada, Mary Shiratori, Christopher Syling, Kunio Takeda, and Koki Yoshida for research assistance.

Regulatory Reform of Public Utilities: The Japanese Experience by Fumitoshi Mizutani (review)

nology, and society studies (STS), one helpful result of which is the factoring of nonhuman “actants” into an equation involving fi nite nature and infi nite capital. What, then, is the solution? In the end, Stolz does not offer a clear answer. He suggests in very general terms that it might involve “a federation of environmentalists and labor,” “the removal of parts and practices of nature from capitalist exploitation,” and “a union of ‘the dispossessed’” (borrowing from David Harvey); perhaps we need to expand Michel Foucault’s “biopolitics” into something Stolz calls “environmentality” (p. 203). Whatever this understanding might be, the book ends by saying it will destroy a dangerous “mystic fallacy: the desperate assumption that in the end nature will be there to save us—from ourselves” (p. 205). The reader is left wondering: once we achieve this understanding, what exactly do we do? Perhaps Stolz is not sure (who is?), or perhaps he means to remind us that it is up to us.

Conflict and Change: Foreign Ownership and the Japanese Firm (review)

The importance of the so-called “friendship trade” pursued between Japan and China even before diplomatic relations were restored has been well documented. The locating and return of the remains of 5,000 Chinese who died in Japan during the war is less well known. Although this gave the JCFA a good reputation, there could be some question whether this in fact was implementation of “soft power.” The JCFA was active in a number of fi elds both on the local level and with Chinese top-level offi cials. Political and ideological infi ghting in the organization blur the picture of which values it was representing and weakened its ability to play a crucial role in, for example, the normalization agreement. One can also question whether the organization represents the kind of values and ideas that Japanese people in general would like to convey to China. The author ends the NGO chapter by stating that little is known about Japanese NGOs and their work in China. Might this be due to the fact that there are not that many of them and they are not allowed to operate freely? The number of Chinese counterparts— Chinese NGOs that do not face intervention from the state or the ruling Communist Party—must also be considered rather limited. Although the importance of the state agent, the substate agent, and the NGO presented in this book might be somewhat overestimated, the author is right to point out the number of relations at various levels besides those between the governments of Japan and China. These other relations have so far to a great extent been neglected in scholarly research. This book thus fi lls a vacuum. It is good reading and provides a fuller picture of the Japanese-Chinese relationship that currently needs to be put in a global context. We also learn, however, that it takes two to tango. Soft power has its limitations in the sense that it is not a one-way process and it is very diffi cult to impose ideas on others unless they fi nd them useful.

Chapter 10. Conclusions: Permeable Insulation and Japan's Managed Globalization

In the increasingly multilateral trade and policy environment of the twenty-first century, Japan faces several conflicting challenges. Internationally, Japans trade prowess, increasing manufacturing presence around the world, and economic leadership in Asia have made the country an integral member of multilateral organizations such as the World Trade Organization (WTO). Japan is increasingly expected to uphold the norms of free trade and economic openness as articulated in a variety of international treaties, and to assume a geopolitical role commensurate with its global economic position.

Positive Regulierung — Staat und Unternehmen im japanischen Wirtschaftswachstum

Japan hat sich im Verlauf von vierzig Jahren Wirtschaftswachstum vom „Billigprodukteur“ zum „hi-tech leader“ entwickelt. Fur diese steile Entwicklung gibt es viele Erklarungsansatze (vgl. Johnson 1982), und nur wenige bestreiten, das der Staat eine besondere Rolle in diesem Wachstumsprozes gespielt hat. In letzter Zeit werden jedoch insbesondere in den USA vermehrt Stimmen laut, das die nachste Entwicklungsstufe Japans eine Angleichung an die amerikanische Form des Kapitalismus sein mus; d.h. die Annahme amerikanischer Marktgesetze im Sinne von Wettbewerb, effizienten Markten sowie dem Primat von Preismechanismus und Antimonopol-Gesetzen1. Belegt wird dieses Argument mit den ersten Anzeichen in Form des japanischen Regierungswechsels 1993 und damit einhergehenden angekundigten oder auch tatsachlich erfolgten Deregulierungen.