Europe and the Japanese Challenge


Book Description

A study of the history of Japanese involvement and investment in Europe from the early part of this century to the present day. The main focus of the analysis centres on the auto industry consumer electronics and banking, whilst the different reactions to Japanese investment in Europe and the United States is also considered.




European Power and The Japanese Challenge


Book Description

Analyzing relations amidst the European Community's growing unity and Japan's ever more dynamic economy, this book compares the processes, means, ends, successes and failures of European and Japanese industrial, trade and foreign policies. Nester has also written "Japan and the Third World".




The Japanese Discovery of Europe, 1720-1830


Book Description

This is an account of the growth and uses of Western learning in Japan from 1720 to 1830. These are the dates of the beginning of official interest in Western learning and of the expulsion of Siebold from the country, the first stage of a crisis that could be resolved only by the opening of the country of the West. The century and more included by the two dates was a most important period in Japanese history, when intellectuals, rebelling at the isolation of their country, desperately sought knowledge from abroad. The amazing energy and enthusiasm of men like Honda Toshiaki made possible the spectacular changes in Japan, which are all too often credited to the arrival of Commodore Perry. The author chose Honda Toshiaki (1744-1821) as his central figure. A page from any one of Honda's writings suffices to show that with him one has entered a new age, that of modern Japan. One finds in his books a new spirit, restless, curious and receptive. There is in him the wonder at new discoveries, the delight in widening horizons. Honda took a kind of pleasure even in revealing that Japan, after all, was only a small island in a large world. To the Japanese who had thought of Chinese civilization as being immemorial antiquity, he declared that Egypt's was thousands of years older and far superior. The world, he discovered, was full of wonderful things, and he insisted that Japan take advantage of them. Honda looked at Japan as he thought a Westerner might, and saw things that had to be changed, terrible drains on the country's moral and physical strength. Within him sprang the conviction that Japan must become one of the great nations of the world.




Japan Encounters the Barbarian


Book Description

For over a hundred years the Japanese have looked to the West for ideas, institutions and technology that would help them achieve their goal of 'national wealth and strength'. In this book a distinguished historian of Japan discusses Japan's 'cultural borrowing' from America and Europe. W. G. Beasley focuses on the mid-nineteenth century, when Japan's rulers dispatched diplomatic missions to the West to discover what Japan needed to learn, sent students abroad to assimilate information and invited foreign experts to Japan to help put the knowledge to practical use. Beasley examines the origins of the decision to initiate direct study of the West at a time when western countries counted as 'barbarian' by Confucian standards. Drawing on many colourful letters, diaries, memoirs and reports, he describes the missions sent overseas in 1860 and 1862, in 1865-1867 and in the years after 1868, in particular the prestigious embassy led by Iwakura in 1871-1873. The book also tells the story of the several hundred students who went overseas in this period. It concludes by assessing the impact of the encounters on the subsequent development of Japan, first by examining the later careers of the travellers and the influence they exercised (they included no fewer than six prime ministers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries), and then by considering the nature of the ideas they brought home.




Dynamics Of Regional Innovation, The: Policy Challenges In Europe And Japan


Book Description

All over the world, open innovation is emerging and requires much more interactions between different actors with different organizational cultures: large firms and SMEs (i.e. industry), universities and research institutions (i.e. academia), as well as national and regional authorities for building the legal or incentive framework of innovation (i.e government). Certainly, flows of knowledge between these three spheres, which are also known as the triple helix, have always existed; but what appears to be new in an open innovation environment is the overlapping of their missions. In many areas such multi-actor interactions with overlapping roles did not emerge spontaneously, as was the case with the United States.Based on robust cases studied by researchers and practical experiences of personnel involved in innovation at public or private institutions, this book successively discusses the policy framework in Europe and Japan, the new role for universities due to intellectual property reform or technology transfer promotion, the new challenges for firms in terms of licensing, patents, corporate venturing, including entrepreneurship, incubation, venture capital or cross-industry knowledge sharing.All issues addressed in this book are clearly those toward regional innovation policies and practices that are open in nature. It contains descriptions and analysis of the various approaches taken by industrial, governmental, and academic players in various regions of Japan (Tohoku, Tokyo) and Europe (France, Belgium). The mix of theoretical and empirical material collected in this book was first presented at an international symposium in Tokyo.The dynamics of regional innovation is an on-going issue, and we are still standing at the threshold of this field of research. It is exactly why such a book is needed now.




Japan Challenges America


Book Description

With the US-Japan alliance in jeopardy, former diplomat Harrison Holland argues that both sides must take bold steps to avert a catastrophe that could destabilize economic, political and security conditions in Asia. Taking advantage of his insider's perceptions, the author illuminates those aspects of life in Japan that influence behaviour, shape policy and affect public opinion in an inwardly directed society. Holland evaluates the obstacles to better economic relations; the security dilemmas facing Japan; and the rigid Japanese political structure, which has been slow to adapt to the surge of modern technology, the demands of rapid international change, and the internal and external calls for a more responsible Japanese role in world affairs. Can the alliance survive the present turmoil? Despite the daunting obstacles, the author concludes that solutions must and will be found.




Europe, Japan and America in the 1990s


Book Description

Competition and cooperation between Japan, Europe and USA is the key issue of this book - both at government and business levels. Both short-term and long-termin competitive cooperation between Western and Japanese firms and institutions can be fruitful. Cooperation however, provides no easy solutions to problems which Western economies have been unable to solve on their own. Governments as well as companies are often unprepared for cooperation with Japan within the framework of larger-scale projects. On theother hand, Japan itself still lacks the leadership capacities to match its present economic and technological dominance. Thus the Japanese strategyfor a Number Two role in cooperation with the USA and the EC is described. The discussion focuses on the implications of US/Japanese relations for Europe. It further highlights future relations between the US and Japan in the field of technology, and also deals with the EC/Japan context.




New Challenges for European Resource Management


Book Description

This book breaks new ground in human resource management through focusing on specific themes written by a range of European experts drawing on a common survey. As such it is a major progression from previous texts that lack a coherent, cross-national database. Representing a truly collaborative European project, it includes themes such as flexibility, training and development, industrial relations, regional aspects and the problems of organising and undertaking comparative human resource management research.




Japan: A European Perspective


Book Description




British Intelligence and the Japanese Challenge in Asia, 1914–1941


Book Description

This is the first full-length study of the role played by British Intelligence in influencing policy towards Japan from the decline of the Alliance to the outbreak of the Pacific War. Using many previously classified records it describes how the image of Japan generated by Intelligence during this period led Britain to underestimate Japanese military capabilities in 1941. The book shows how this image was derived from a lack of adequate intelligence resources and racially driven assumptions about Japanese national characteristics.