of oyabun-kobun (parentlike and childlike) relationships, could explain a wide range of characteristically "Japanese" behavior. Such conceptions contained important, but partial, truths; they were later substantially modified and de-emphasized. Still, in contemporary discussions of Japan, different but similarly broad first approximations are heard just as often. The conference on Japanese organization and decision making, held by the Joint Committee on Japanese Studies in cooperation with the Japan Research Institute, was not designed to treat specific concepts-its objective was to provide a broad overview of organizational patterns in various sectors of Japanese society, including government, politics, the economy, education, and journalism. To a considerable extent, however, the papers and discussion as a whole tended to criticize and sharpen a number of current conceptions about Japanese organizational behavior. Some of the popular conceptions most strongly attacked at the conference were: Ringi sei. Many analyses of Japanese organizational behavior have focused on the process by which a document is prepared at lower levels and then circulated among all the offices in a bureaucratic chain of command; this procedure somehow produces a decision without anyone's taking clear responsibility. Such practices exist, but the attention given them by social scientists is probably excessive, underestimating the role of creative leadership in Japanese institutions, and disregarding the extent to which ringi sei may be limited to the most ordinary sorts of issues. Qualitatively, ringi sei may not differ much from clearance procedures in America; only weaker leaders may rely for important decisions on documents prepared by subordinates. "Japan, Incorporated." Relations between government and business tend to be closer in Japan than in the United States. However, to say that Japanese government and business together behave like a single corversity: George DeVos. University of California. Berkeley; Peter Drucker. Claremont Graduate School; Richard Dyck. Japan Research Institute. Tokyo: Ivan Hall. Harvard-Yenching Institute. Tokyo; Morton Halperin. Brookings Institution ; Yoshinori Ide. University of Tokyo; Ch6sei Ito. Sophia University; Nobuo Kanayama. Japan Research Institute; Solomon B_ Levine. University of Wisconsin; Hideichiro Nakamura. Senshii University; KalUo Noda. Japan Research Institute and Rikkyo University; Yoshihisa Ojimi. former Vice-Minister. Ministry of Interna路 tional Trade and Industry; Herbert Passin. Columbia University: Hugh T . Patrick. Yale University: Edwin O. Reischauer. Harvard University; Thomas Rohlen. University of California. Santa Cruz; Taishiro Shirai, Hosei University; Yukio Suzuki. Nihon Keizai Shin bun (Japan Economic Journal): Nathaniel B. Thayer. Hunter College. City University of New York; Kenichi Tominaga. University of Toyko; Joji Watanuki, Sophia University; M. Y. Yoshino. Harvard University. The conference was supported mainly with funds made available to the Joint Committee by the Ford Foundation. In addition. the Japan Research Institute provided for the costs of simultaneous interpreters. The papers prepared for the conference are being edited for publication in a volume by the University of California Press. MARCH
1975
poration-a notion which has taken on pernicious overtones amid American businessmen's displeasure over Japanese competition-vastly distorts the structure and overstates the strength of this relationship. It is true that government in general does take a more active role in supporting programs in the interests of Japanese business as a whole. But empirical evidence concerning the frequency of cabinet-level contacts with businessmen, the extent to which Diet members represent business interests, the willingness of firms to follow governmental guidance, and the extent to which government involves itself in business decisions simply does not begin to sustain the "Japan, Incorporated" proposition. Indeed, there is considerable doubt whether the zaikai ("business circles," influential big businessmen) makes up a coherent enough entity to represent adequately Japanese business interests before government. Seniority system. For some Western analysts the seniority system-the advance of salary and position with age-has been almost synonymous with the Japanese system of employment. A closer look, however, reveals that the system covers only a minority of workersmainly "regular," long-term male workers in large companies; women, workers in agriculture and sma)) enterprises, and many others are excluded. Even within the system, regular advancement in titles and pay does not necessarily bring parallel increases in responsibility. Although superiors are rarely younger than their subordinates, the actual distribution of power and responsibility will often depend more on individual capability than on seniority. School cliques. It is true that a high proportion of officials at the upper levels of bureaucracy are graduates of the University of Tokyo, and more generally that in the selection of new personnel for a company or other organization, the university attended by the candidate is important. However, among those admitted to an organization, clique formation is more likely to depend on immediate work relationships than on old school ties. A more senior employee often assembles a group of younger men and supports them over a period of time, but he chooses them on the basis of ability and reputation within the organization, not their earlier associations. Toward growth, not profit. Some management specialists have argued that Japanese business is concerned solely with expansion and is not basically oriented toward profits. Several qualifications have to be added. First, reinvestment in new equipment to permit a high rate of growth had been a particular characteristic of the earlier postwar era in Japan, when considerable modernization was required in order to bring the physical plant up to world levels and to gain economies of scale. Now 5