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This paper reports on the transfer of Japanese supervisory practices to their Great Britain-based Japanese transplants and to the Great Britain-based emulators. To this end the paper is divided into three further sections. The first section briefly reviewing the state-of-the-debate on Japanization: was it a 'straw man' debate, is it yesterday's news or does it still retain some saliency? The second section will provide a context for the study of supervisory systems and the third will provide the results of a recent empirical study, before conclusions are drawn.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore how active learning may help address the legitimacy and practicability issues inherent in introducing education for sustainability into business-related degree programs. Design/methodology/approach – The focus of this study is the experience of the authors in the development and implementation of education for sustainability within their business-related higher education programs. To address the inherent challenges of the task, they apply the principles of active learning, with substantial use of problem-based learning, in the classroom and engage in a process of staff development in their personal time. The method used is a simplified version of action research where the authors worked together over two years and then reflected on the experience through interviews and extensive discussions with each other, with their respective teaching teams, and with sustainability educators from outside of their programs. Findings – The findings suggest that active learning approaches move learners away from dependence on (possibly illegitimate and unprepared) educators and towards a personal responsibility approach. This also means accepting that learners are free to understand sustainability in a "global" sense or instead choose only its "business as usual" applications. Originality/value – The paper provides a useful insight into the practical value of active learning for educators grappling with the dilemma of delivering globally responsible business and/or management-related education programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to show how, by looking within one group of nonprofits, perceptions of ethical climate. may differ in the nonprofit sector, both within and between separate country contexts. Design/methodology/approach - Executive directors in two groups of social services nonprofits in the UK and Japan were surveyed, and several subsequently interviewed, in accordance with the Ethical Climate Scale developed by Agarwal and Molloy. Findings - The paper finds that perceptions of the ethical climate types relating to "independence" and "law and codes" were polarized, with executive directors in the UK being more likely to base moral decisions on the evaluation of rights, values or principles than on public opinion. In Japan, however, such decisions were predominantly focused on how they would impact on others, both within and outside the organization, in the context of personal responsibility to society and the maintenance of social order. Practical implications - Social service nonprofits nowadays occupy a major role in the delivery of services which the state used to provide alone. It has therefore become essential for governments to be able to assess the internal culture of nonprofits in order to determine their trustworthiness and reliability, and the best yardstick for this is ethical climate. This research will help state and local government policy makers toward a better understanding of their contractors. Originality/value - The originality of this study lies primarily in the fact that it was the first time that this type of research had compared similar nonprofit organizations in different countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the attractions of exposing the ideological dimensions of the thesis of Japanization of British manufacturing are set aside in favor of more basic objectives. The paper divides into four parts. The first shows how the preoccupation with Japanese methods has distorted the understanding of developments in the British manufacturing industry. Too much effort has been directed at understanding the operation of a small number of Japanese transplants; at the same time, the idea that there is a distinctively British pattern of organization has been played down. In the second section we use the concepts introduced originally by one of the authors to demonstrate the limited impact of both 'direct' and 'mediated' Japanization. The third section of the paper sets out the nature of the British manufacturing organization, bringing out its distinctive structural flexibility. The way in which it achieves this, the development of a form we have called the 'new flexible firm,' is explained in the paper's fourth section. Here we set out the combination of production technology, labor utilization and management control that characterizes much of British manufacturing.

Purpose -- To provide an overview of the Japanese publishing industry and to compare it with the publishing industry in the United Kingdom to see whether similarities and differences are industry- or culture-specific. Design/methodology/approach -- The paper provides detailed descrip-tions of the activities of the three main players in the Japanese publishing industry (publishers/editors; distributors; and booksellers). This tripar-tite structure of the industry encourages divide-and-rule mechanisms also found in the Japanese advertising industry. At the same time, a comparison with the UK publishing industry reveals certain structural differences between it and the Japanese publishing industry. Findings -- Three developments that have affected trade relations in the UK publishing industry (retail chains, literary agents, and mergers and acquisitions) do not have such great impact in Japan. In Japan, whole-sale distributors are extremely powerful -- something not noted, but possibly overlooked, by Thompson for the UK publishing industry. Comparative material between Japan and the United Kingdom, as well as across industries within Japan, suggest certain cultural influences prevail in the organization of Japanese publishing. Research limitations/implications -- The Japanese publishing industry appears to operate under certain cultural constraints that inhibit cross-cultural comparison, while enabling cross-industry comparison within Japan. Why this is so needs further research. Can the parallels between advertising and publishing industries be extended to other forms of cultural production in Japan? In particular, the way in which money is circulated within an industry has an influential effect upon its structure. Practical implications -- A useful source of information for practitioners and academics interested in the functioning of a non-Western publishing industry. The paper also provides food for thought for those interested in trying to better the organization of publishing in Japan and/or the United Kingdom. Originality/value -- A hitherto undocumented comparative study in English of the Japanese publishing industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents evidence on the management of the labour process (and responses to it) at Rover and Peugeot-Talbot. The analysis of this material is intended to contribute to the wider debate on the claimed Japanization of British industry (Bratton, 1992; Oliver and Wilkinson, 1992) in three main ways. First, it will analyse existing studies of Japanization in terms of two major theoretical models — labelled the "diffusion" and the "bolt-on" model — together with their associated underpinning assumptions. Second, it will compare these models with the recent empirical evidence gleaned from Rover and Peugeot-Talbot. Third, it will outline an "adaptation model" of change based on this evidence. This model highlights the creative role played by both management and unions in responding to lean production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the human resource and shopfloor work organization aspects of the Japanese model of manufacturing in both Japan and Great Britain. The basic human resource elements of the model include: shared destiny relations between employee and employing organization; team-based work organization on the shopfloor, including labor flexibility and multi-skilling; opportunities for shopfloor workers to improve the production process, via suggestion schemes and problem solving groups; and much greater responsibility for front line operators for a range of activities on the shopfloor, including quality monitoring and improvement, maintenance and personnel issues such as the selection of new members for work groups.

Debate over the transfer and adoption of industrial models prompted by the globalization of Japanese manufacturers continues to draw attention. Most discussion has concerned issues of work and employment relations, where the new multinationals have interacted most directly with host societies. Theoretical issues are addressed in a case study of operations, organization and employment relations at the Honda factory at Swindon in southern England, Honda of the UK Manufacturing. The analytical approach adopted in this paper is based on the following proposition. The relationship between Honda's global corporate strategy and the local operating environments of its factories is mediated by a nexus consisting of the production system, the organization of work, hiring and training processes, organizational processes and philosophies, and employment relations frameworks.

The aim of this paper is to delineate and assess three key approaches to the implications of Japanese involvement in Great Britain and to suggest an alternative to the so-called 'Japanization' school in its various incarnations. Far from seeking to provide anything approaching a definitive account of the full range of participants involved in the discussion over the nature of Japanese inward investment in Great Britain, let alone the character of the debate at an international level, my main priority is to attempt to draw out some basic themes by assessing the continuities and discontinuities in the various positions delineated. These are broadly conceived, far from definitive and of course open to elaboration and debate. The range of material drawn is thus deliberately limited so as to focus primarily on the key participants, if progenitors, mostly in Great Britain.

The article reports that the term "Japanisation" was first used to describe a host of changes introduced into some sectors of Western industry during the mid-1980s. Research into mediated Japanisation has focused around indigenous Great Britain and the U.S. firms (as well as Japanese inward investors) which have attempted to copy Japanese manufacturing and personnel management processes. The mediated Japanisation of management accounting in the Britain is comparatively less studied. However, from the late 1980s a research agenda has emerged, with extensive English literature on Japanese management accounting practices. Although generally similar, Japanese management accounting differs from Western management accounting in at least one significant area: pre-production cost management with the closely associated target costing. Whilst pre-production costing techniques are relevant in the Britain, the different Britain corporate internal and external environment may impede their transfer and adoption.

The author examines the critical issues facing the British steel industry as its technological basis is transformed. He identifies the need to plan on an international basis if Britain is to meet the Japanese challenge. [This paper was first read at Bradford University's Conference on The Marketing of Advanced Technology, May 1971.] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the impact of demographic ageing on rural areas in Great Britain, the U.S. and Japan. As stated, the population in England is growing faster in rural areas than across the nation as a whole and demographic ageing is more pronounced in rural areas as a result of age-specific migrating flows. In the U.S., several states have pursued explicit retiree attraction policies since the 1990s, as a means of promoting economic development. In Japan, the context is different to Great Britain, with rural areas long experiencing depopulation and thus, the opportunity exists for rural areas to be at the forefront of developing innovative approaches to draw out the benefit of the demographic ageing process.

Presents the guest editor's comments and introduction to the special issue of "Employee Relations" in 1998. Decision that the term 'Post Japanization' really did seem to suit the content of what was coming in; Hope that the title presents and frames the labors and careful scrutiny of the researchers and writers published; Meaning of Post Japanization on the British and global stage.

Interest in the 'Japanization' debate of British manufacturing has focused on the effect that these new manufacturing initiatives will have on the design of jobs. One of the key questions in the 'Japanization' debate has been to what extent will the introduction of new production practices, such as just-in-time, lead to work intensification and de-skilling, or alternatively provide opportunities for skill development. This article, rather than focusing on these wider issues, provides a descriptive account of the impact of new production methods on a major automotive component supplier and the consequences for the internal dependency relationship. The case study examples illustrate the nature of the internal dependency relationship under the new production methods and attempts to assess how this internal dependency relationship interacts with increasing levels of devolved responsibility; problem solving and continuous improvement at source, and the use of increased information at shop floor level. Implications for future management of these dependencies are examined.

The article reports on research which is part of a larger project on Japanese-owned manufacturing companies in the West Midlands, for which case-studies have been conducted at ten sites owned by six companies. At each of the case-study research sites employees were interviewed from a full range of functions and backgrounds and this was supplemented with appropriate documentary and observational material. A total of 184 workplace informants were interviewed, which meant a minimum of 7% in the larger establishments and higher percentages in the smaller workplaces. In addition we have also monitored the financial press, collected further documentation and interviewed a range of key informants from outside the workplace, particularly people from local state agencies, trade union officials and others in Telford, England, the locality where many of our case-study plants are situated. For the purposes of this article, focus was on the four Telford cases drawing data primarily from Copy Co. and Carpart Co., but with some references to the other two cases.

This article examines the use of subcontracting as a manufacturing strategy while focusing particularly on the associated operational issues. Within a vertically integrated supply chain a single enterprise retains ownership and/or control over the others. This can be achieved by merger, or other form of formal corporate alliance with enterprises elsewhere in the chain, and does not normally make use of subcontract arrangements with independent organizations. By contrast, within a vertically disintegrated supply chain, production can be subcontracted down through a series of levels from the original principal to several independent enterprises. The subcontracting of manufacturing activity is an integral part of manufacturing strategy within this model of the supply chain. Between these two extremes a continuum of intermediate approaches exists. It has been reported that the use of vertically disintegrated production is more widespread in Japan than it is in Great Britain, and that its use is a contributory factor in the continuing success of Japanese industry.

Japan is perceived in most advanced countries as the world leader in the introduction and exploitation of new management practices, particularly in the area of manufacturing. In an attempt to match Japan's economic progress other countries are seeking to introduce many of the systems which are believed to be the basis of Japanese success. In this article, certain aspects of a UK manufacturing company which had adopted a number of practices following studies undertaken in Japan, is compared with a Japanese owned company located in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Japanese style of production management in Great Britain. The main method used for studying Japanese management in Britain is by obtaining workers' perceptions. Information has been obtained both by means of personal interviews and be self-completion questionnaires, from one medium-sized Japanese factory and from two smaller factories. At the supervisory level, a distinction generally regarded as important is between close and general control over work. Close supervision involves maintaining continuous contact with the production line, so that the individual worker's performance is visible to the supervisor most of the time, while general supervision involves greater emphasis on planning and other activities off the shop-floor. Supervisors in the Japanese-owned factories seemed to be required to work in both of these modes. Great attention was paid to the planning and organization of work, yet there was also great emphasis on close involvement with the production line or section.

The article considers the issues arising from the Japanisation process by examining two sets of events at Ford UK in 1988; the national strike and the row and subsequent withdrawal by Ford over the planned electronics plant at Dundee. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic links between north-east England and Japan go back to the turn of the century, when Japan's first modern battle fleet was built by Armstrongs on Tyneside: no small irony, then, that British Shipbuilders (headquarters in Tyneside) should turn to the Japanese in the 1980s to re-learn how to build ships! Japanese direct manufacturing investment in Britain began in the early 1970s. One of the pioneer entrants, the bearing manufacturers NSK, started operations at Peterlee in mid-Durham in 1976. But the turning point for the north-east was, of course, Nissan's decision in 1984 to locate its British manufacturing operation at Washington New Town, near Sunderland. The number of Japanese companies in the north-east has since grown steadily. By the end of 1988, 20 Japanese companies were operating in the area between Teesside and the Tweed, involving 14 manufacturing plants. North-east England has the largest concentration of Japanese engineering plants in Europe, and a rapidly growing presence in electronics assembly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the development of a new qualification curriculum in business Japanese by the Royal Society of Arts Examination Board in Great Britain. The curriculum is established in response to the growing influence of Japanese companies and management practices in the country. It is composed of seven oral modules, containing the most frequent situations encountered by business people collaborating with companies in Japan. The modules provide information on how to deal with company visitors, how to entertain clients, and how to make business telephone calls.