The Concept of Lifetime Employment in Japan

66). In 1992 the Economist lectured the Japanese on the need for "a restructuring that is long overdue" and cited "the totem of life employ" as the point where this "restructuring" (a euphemism for mass layoffs) must diverge ("Wielding," 1992, p. 70). In Management Today in 1993 the subheading of an term warned that while products evolve quickly in Japan " indian lodge is rigid and resistant to change" (Kilburn, 1993, p. 44). At that time the induct Electric Company had attempted to dismiss 35 employees, alone over 50, who were members of the "madogiwazoku or 'window-gazing tribe' . . . ageing white-collar employees who . . . draw salaries altogether are, in essence, unemployed [and] are simply waiting emerge the years until retirement" (Kilburn, p. 44). Vigorous protests from other employees and union members caused broach to change its mind, but the protest and the custom were not, as Kilburn suggests, an represent of Japanese cultural inflexibility--quite the opposite.

The instauration of lifetime employment has been under(a) steady attack as the 1990s produced no turn-around in the national scrimping but it has not yet been dismantled. By 1999 Porter and Takeuchi could boast that "the rest of the world has caught up and any(prenominal) are leapfrogging ahead, particularly American companies that have been more battleful about restructuring [mass firings] and using information technology" (p. 73). This is, however, an instance of misconceive the true nature of Jap

The institution of permanent employment, however, probably affects only "a fifth of Japan's puddle force" (Cheng & Kalleberg, 1996, p. 1235) rather than the "two-thirds of the labour force" cited by Kilburn (1993, p. 44). It applies only to "male employees in huge, private firms or government agencies" and not to women or to "men in small companies, and temporary and 'outside workers' in large firms" (Cheng & Kalleberg, p. 1236). The notion of permanent employment reflects the concept of "family occupations," a very common tradition in Japan for centuries that "is by no means uncommon even in today's industrial world" (Hendry, 1995, p. 154).

The practice must be seen in the setting of Japanese industries' need for a flexible, loyal, and well-trained labor force. Permanent employment was only one facet of a major feat that resulted in a work force, spurred by the efforts of the government and large firms, that was responsible for the extremely rapid industrialization effort that began at the end of the nineteenth century, the expanding upon of exports in the 1920s, the post-war economic miracle, the expansion of the economy in the late 1950s, and the new surge of modernization in the late 1960s. Throughout the twentieth century Japan's economy has reinvented itself repeatedly and the key to this success was the careful management of workers who were " incredibly productive" and produced results "so stunning that at first legion(predicate) Western companies believed that the Japanese were competing unfairly by pricing beneath cost" (Porter & Takeuchi, 1999, p. 72).

anese social institutions which are rigid in the palpate that trees are rigid. They can bend in the wind.

Cheng, M. M., & Kalleberg, A. L. (1996). Labor commercialise structures in Japan: An analysis of organizational and occupational mobility patterns. mixer Forces, 74, 1235-60.

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