I enjoy living in Japan, but sometimes feel really disconnected from society, which gets me pretty depressed.
One thing that I’ve found helps is educating myself about my adopted home to put me in a position to better participate socially and economically on Japanese terms.
What were some of the most helpful books you’ve read about the Japanese economy and/or society?
16 comments
Not a book but a phrase:
‘When in Rome, Do as the Romans Do .’
From my very personal opinion, most of the Japanese people I’ve talked to don’t care too much about politics, their own socio-political landscape and such.
I’m generalizing of course, but my partner’s mother didn’t know that foreigners couldn’t vote and never voted in her life. Of course, not everyone is like that, but my understanding after 7 years here is that they are really disconnected and when I tried to strike a conversation about local politics, I was met with wide eyes and a silence.
Maybe because Japan in general is very disconnected from day-to-day politics, with politicians having minimal impact on actual policy (which is largely left to the generally competent bureaucrats of the main gov’t ministries), Japan has so far managed to avoid the group identity politics / tribalism that plagues the US and many countries in Europe. The red/blue state divide in the US is incomprehensible to most Japanese. As one friend noted – ‘Wait, Americans will vote for a president because they do or don’t support *abortion?* What a silly reason to vote for someone’.
Another factor, I suspect, is that Japan is not religious at all – or at least, it isn’t in the Western sense. Religion in Japan almost exclusively refers to customs and traditions, not belief systems, and certainly voting based on religious beliefs is almost unheard of. Political candidates in Japan are not expected to tout their religious credentials to get elected.
Peter Tasker had a couple of very good books on Japan that were both sharp-eyed and fair, although both were written in the late 80s/early 90s.
For politics, I recommend *The State and Politics in Japan* by Ian Neary. It’s a few years old at this point but will give you a good overview of the political systems in Japan.
For culture, *An Introduction to Japanese Society* by Sugimoto and *Understanding Japanese Society* by Hendry are good starting points.
A history book I found very informative was *Embracing Defeat* by John Dower.
Literally none of the suggestions so far are about economics…
As part of my goal setting at work I said I would do some self-study about the Japanese economy and picked up this book:
The Business Reinvention of Japan: How to Make Sense of the New Japan and Why It Matters https://amzn.asia/d/0YVGUDk
Firstly watch the news. Just turn on the TV and you can find out a whole lot about what’s happening / relevant right now and Japanese news does a lot of street interviews, so you can kind of see what the general public thinks. If the Japanese is too difficult I think NHK has English versions on their website. Also, I recommend watching this guy called NAKATA UNIVERSITY on YouTube, with English subtitles. He does educational videos on the Japanese economy and he’s quite popular in Japan right now. A good way to practice listening to spoken Japanese as well👍
Edit: saw that you specifically asked for books but I hope this is still helpful for other sources
I honestly think westerners tend to have pretty awful, half-baked shallow takes on Japan. I’d only trust a book written by a decades-long resident who can actually speak the language.
Perhaps, Sugimoto’s An Introduction to Japanese Society is probably the best entry way into understanding Japanese society, politics, and economy. As other posters said, if you want to know what’s going on, just read the asahi or nikkei keizai. However, I think what you want is a deeper dive into the cultural aspects that make Japan’s politics and economy operate differently. Sugimoto’s book gave me a really good frame to think about how Japanese people think and therefore how Japanese society functions.
Precarious Japan by Anne Allison. Anne Allison is an anthropologist who focuses on Japan. Precarious Japan covers a lot of modern social and economic problems. It can be a bit repetitive and really depressing, but it’s comprehensive.
Not about economics but it is very educational to understand Japanese society.
Japanese Patterns of Behavior by Takie Sugiyama Lebra
Governing Japan – JAA Stockwin,
The Logic of Japanese Politics – Gerald Curtis,
A Modern History of Japan – Andrew Gordon,
Japan as Number One – Ezra Vogel
Ellis and Krauss have good stuff on the LDP and more modern politics.
I recently really enjoyed Machdori’s Is Reform Finished, but it’s an academic book.
MITI and the Japanese Economic Miracle is good but was written in 1982.
It’s also 1980s but there’s a fun comic called Japan Inc. too. For more modern stuff in Japanese economy I don’t have many recommendations I’m afraid
My husband read and really liked [Pure Invention: How Japan’s Pop Culture Conquered the World](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58393493-pure-invention).
Mostly commenting to be able to find this thread again and read through the answers – that’s a wonderful question.
Are there any recommendations for book in Japanese, by Japanese authors?
My favorite book on the topic mentioned must be *”What Is Japan? Contradictions and Transformations”* by Taichi Sakaiya, translated by Steven Karpa. First English language edition published in 1993 by Kodansha America, Inc. ISBN 1-56836-087-8 (Originally published in 1991 in Japanese by Kodansha Ltd. as 日本とは何か.) [Goodreads link >](https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/2062252) Happy reading! 🙂
“Embracing Defeat” by Dower is a must read for grasping Japanese culture.