The Changing Nature of the Japanese Business System and Its Impact on Asia

Japanese management practices represent a distinctive and compelling approach and while much research has focused on their adoption by Western organisations, less attention has been paid to the Japanese influence in Asian contexts. In this Special Issue, we try to redress this, and our aim is twofold: to examine the dimensions of the Japanese management system, and to examine Japanese practice within an Asian environment. This introductory article discusses some of the changes apparent in traditional views of the Japanese model, including the shifts in the governance system, employment arrangements and the management of overseas operations, and highlights the contributions of a set of papers by a cadre of scholars offering a wealth of rich data and theoretical insight into this important and challenging area.