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This study examines localisation endeavours in contemporary Taiwan to explore the history of the Taiwanese localisation movement as a way of reimagining meanings of Taiwaneseness constructed under different historical circumstances. It focuses on the xiāngtǔ (nativist) literature movement in colonial Taiwan in the early 1930s that was initiated by Taiwanese intellectuals to create real Taiwanese literature on Taiwan and for the Taiwanese masses. Besides being a social education initiative to improve Taiwanese mass literacy, the xiāngtǔ literature movement was a localisation effort to reform Taiwanese language and preserve Taiwanese culture under Japanese occupation. The reform discourse made a turn towards specifically Taiwanese linguistic and cultural traditions, instead of pursuing modern Japanese and Chinese language and culture, which were the then available cultural impulses in colonial Taiwan. Local Taiwanese language and folk culture were essential curricular materials in the social education agenda that created particular meanings of Taiwaneseness for colonial Taiwan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Japanese manufacturers tend to export their HRM practices when they set up plants abroad. However, Japanese subsidiaries around the world do not adopt fully to the Japanese HRM practices. Due to the differences, we adopt a case study that addresses on the HRM practices of a Japanese subsidiary in Malaysia. This research serves as a valuable lesson for other Japanese investors when formulating their HRM strategies abroad. The findings suggest that new Japanese investors need not attempt to be more Japanese than the local Japanese firms in Japan in view that most subsidiaries are already localising their HRM practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The processes and structures in the retail sector in Japan frequently are characterised as very traditional. Since the decade of slow growth in the 1990s a small group of medium-sized retail firms have adopted strategies that have allowed growth in sales and profit. These medium-sized firms, that are present in several sub-sectors of retailing, are becoming, through strategies focused on localisation and ‘newness’, the role models and catalysts for a more general change that is spreading through Japanese retailing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]