German Institute for Japanese Studies, Tokyo (DIJ) Podcast

Between 2002 and 2008, Japan's economy saw constant expansion, a record among the world's advanced economies and Japan's longest period of economic growth since World War II. This remarkable achievement was driven by a transformation of Japanese laws and business practices that have forced companies to refocus, away from the previous high diversification to a concentration on their core business. The sea-change in the incentives and constraints faced by Japanese managers has brought a strategic inflection point, and the emerging practices and attitudes have created a New Japan "Choose and focus" strategies, whereby corporations spin off unrelated businesses to concentrate on the core, have completely altered the strategic logic of Japan's industrial architecture, such as business groups, the main bank, corporate governance, and lifetime employment."Choose and focus" strategies have also created new market opportunities for start-up enterprises and foreign investors, as well as a wave of mergers, acquisitions, and hostile takeovers that have shaken Japanese companies out of complacency. Unlike the advances made by Japanese firms in the 1970s and 1980s, the current transformation is taking root in component and materials industries rather than in consumer products. Because of this and the overshadowing story of China's ascent, the Japanese corporate revolution has gone largely unnoticed among Western observers. Ulrike Schaede is Professor of Japanese Business at the University of California, San Diego. She is the author of Cooperative Capitalism: Self-Regulation, Trade Associations, and the Antimonopoly Law in Japan and coeditor of Japan's Managed Globalization: Adapting to the 21st Century. Her new book, Choose and Focus: Japanese Business Strategies for the 21st Century will be published by Cornell University Press in July 2008.

Policy for old people has been unusually contentious recently. The pension records debacle is one of the most-covered issues for a year or so, and fundamental pension reform remains high on the policy agenda (with the LDP and the DPJ taking quite different positions). A substantial reform of Long-Term Care Insurance (Kaigo Hoken) was implemented in 2006 without too much fuss, but introduction of a new system for medical care of the old-old in April brought sharp protests. Is all this a blip, or will old-age policy be a contentious arena in national politics and the grassroots? John Creighton Campbell is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Michigan and Visiting Professor in Health Policy and Administration at the Keio University Medical School. He is the author of Contemporary Japanese Budget Politics, How Policies Change: The Japanese Government and the Aging Society, and (with Naoki Ikegami), The Art of Balance in Health Policy: Maintaining Japan's Low-Cost, Egalitarian System (all also available in Japanese).

Policy for old people has been unusually contentious recently. The pension records debacle is one of the most-covered issues for a year or so, and fundamental pension reform remains high on the policy agenda (with the LDP and the DPJ taking quite different positions). A substantial reform of Long-Term Care Insurance (Kaigo Hoken) was implemented in 2006 without too much fuss, but introduction of a new system for medical care of the old-old in April brought sharp protests. Is all this a blip, or will old-age policy be a contentious arena in national politics and the grassroots? John Creighton Campbell is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Michigan and Visiting Professor in Health Policy and Administration at the Keio University Medical School. He is the author of Contemporary Japanese Budget Politics, How Policies Change: The Japanese Government and the Aging Society, and (with Naoki Ikegami), The Art of Balance in Health Policy: Maintaining Japan's Low-Cost, Egalitarian System (all also available in Japanese).

Japan and Germany are regional pivots in the American imperium. For half a century their special position has strengthened an American imperium, which exercises its power both through traditional territorial and novel non-territorial forms of power. Was the Bush administration and its preference for unilateral forms of exercising power an aberration from a system of rule that relied on regional pivots or has it initiated a new American diplomacy to which Japan and Germany will have to adjust?

Peter J. Katzenstein is the Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Professor of International Studies at Cornell University. His research and teaching lie at the intersection of the fields of international relations and comparative politics. He is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of over 30 books and over 100 scholarly articles and book chapters addressing a broad range of economic, security and cultural issues in world politics. His most recent work has focused on Japanese security policy, regional politics, anti-Americanism, religion, and America as a civilizational imperium. Recipient of numerous awards and prizes, Katzenstein was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1988 and is currently the president-elect of the American Political Science Association. Since joining the Cornell Government Department in 1973 Katzenstein has chaired or been a member of more than one hundred dissertation committees. He received Cornell's College of Arts and Science Stephen and Margery Russell Distinguished Teaching Award in 1993, and, in recognition of sustained and distinguished undergraduate teaching, was made one of Cornell University's Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellows in 2004.

Japan and Germany are regional pivots in the American imperium. For half a century their special position has strengthened an American imperium, which exercises its power both through traditional territorial and novel non-territorial forms of power. Was the Bush administration and its preference for unilateral forms of exercising power an aberration from a system of rule that relied on regional pivots or has it initiated a new American diplomacy to which Japan and Germany will have to adjust?

Peter J. Katzenstein is the Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Professor of International Studies at Cornell University. His research and teaching lie at the intersection of the fields of international relations and comparative politics. He is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of over 30 books and over 100 scholarly articles and book chapters addressing a broad range of economic, security and cultural issues in world politics. His most recent work has focused on Japanese security policy, regional politics, anti-Americanism, religion, and America as a civilizational imperium. Recipient of numerous awards and prizes, Katzenstein was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1988 and is currently the president-elect of the American Political Science Association. Since joining the Cornell Government Department in 1973 Katzenstein has chaired or been a member of more than one hundred dissertation committees. He received Cornell's College of Arts and Science Stephen and Margery Russell Distinguished Teaching Award in 1993, and, in recognition of sustained and distinguished undergraduate teaching, was made one of Cornell University's Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellows in 2004.

Japanese attitudes toward death and dying have gone through profound changes during the 20th century. I shall describe the recent changes from my own experience by introducing the activities of the "Japanese Association for Death Education and Grief Counseling".

The three basic goals of the Association are: 1. providing death education (for hospital and hospice staff, the general public, and for junior and senior high schools); 2. Improving terminal care in hospitals and developing hospice programs; 3. Establishing mutual support groups for bereaved people.

We have to be aware that different cultures have, indeed, different attitudes toward death and dying, as well as toward bereavement and grief. Japanese perspectives on death and dying are not a static phenomenon but are rather in a dynamic evolving process. In order to understand a country’s perspectives on death and dying, we have to look at the cultural background and the underlying value structures of the culture.

Japanese attitudes toward death and dying have gone through profound changes during the 20th century. I shall describe the recent changes from my own experience by introducing the activities of the "Japanese Association for Death Education and Grief Counseling".

The three basic goals of the Association are: 1. providing death education (for hospital and hospice staff, the general public, and for junior and senior high schools); 2. Improving terminal care in hospitals and developing hospice programs; 3. Establishing mutual support groups for bereaved people.

We have to be aware that different cultures have, indeed, different attitudes toward death and dying, as well as toward bereavement and grief. Japanese perspectives on death and dying are not a static phenomenon but are rather in a dynamic evolving process. In order to understand a country's perspectives on death and dying, we have to look at the cultural background and the underlying value structures of the culture.

In this presentation, I deal with the ongoing discussion on introducing English in Japanese elementary schools. Although the Foreign Language Subcommittee of the Central Committee on Education has proposed introducing English at the elementary level, there is still much opposition to this proposal. The reasons for opposing the plan range from nationalistic claims as to what it means to be Japanese and the priority of the Japanese language to more practical problems of feasibility considering the lack of human and material resources to successfully implement English in elementary schools.

I will present survey results in an effort to clarify the areas where the problems actually reside. I will argue that problems always arise when new ideas are being considered. What is necessary is the cooperation of all concerned in resolving these problems, if the need for reform is truly felt.

Kensaku Yoshida is Dean of the Faculty of Foreign Studies, Sophia University, and Director of the Sophia Linguistics Institute for International Communication. He has worked on a number of committees for the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), including the Curriculum Reform Committee, the Panel to Promote Revisions in English Language Teaching, the Super English Language High School Assessment Committee, the Task Force to Educate Japanese with English Abilities, and the Foreign Language Subcommittee of the Central Committee on Education.

In this presentation, I deal with the ongoing discussion on introducing English in Japanese elementary schools. Although the Foreign Language Subcommittee of the Central Committee on Education has proposed introducing English at the elementary level, there is still much opposition to this proposal. The reasons for opposing the plan range from nationalistic claims as to what it means to be Japanese and the priority of the Japanese language to more practical problems of feasibility considering the lack of human and material resources to successfully implement English in elementary schools.I will present survey results in an effort to clarify the areas where the problems actually reside. I will argue that problems always arise when new ideas are being considered. What is necessary is the cooperation of all concerned in resolving these problems, if the need for reform is truly felt.Kensaku Yoshida is Dean of the Faculty of Foreign Studies, Sophia University, and Director of the Sophia Linguistics Institute for International Communication. He has worked on a number of committees for the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), including the Curriculum Reform Committee, the Panel to Promote Revisions in English Language Teaching, the Super English Language High School Assessment Committee, the Task Force to Educate Japanese with English Abilities, and the Foreign Language Subcommittee of the Central Committee on Education.

Major research on Japanese civil society characterizes it as chronically weak and penetrated by the state, based on national level measures and comparisons with the contemporary United States. However a vast array of civil society organizations cannot be captured with this approach and remains invisible. Many of these organizations trace their roots to the social movements of the 1960s. I contend that civic participation in these conflicts shaped an alternative civil society in Japan, with characteristic organizational features and institutional practices that persist today. They are quite visible if you know where to look and can recognize their signatures.Dr. Patricia G. Steinhoff is professor of Sociology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Currently she is a visiting professor at the Institute for Social Science, University of TokyoHer research focuses on social movements and Japan. Recent publications include: Bestor, Theodore, Patricia G. Steinhoff, and Victoria Lyon-Bestor, eds., Doing Fieldwork in Japan.  Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2003; Steinhoff, Patricia G., "Kidnapped Japanese in North Korea: The New Left Connection" Journal of Japanese Studies Winter, 2004; and Steinhoff, Patricia G., "Radical Outcasts versus Three Kinds of Police: Constructing Limits in Japanese Anti-Emperor Protest" Qualitative Sociology , fall, 2006.