The Nature of the Japanese State: Rationality and Rituality (Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies) - Hardcover

McVeigh, Brian J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415171067 ISBN 13: 9780415171069

Publisher: Routledge, 1998

Synopsis

Brian J. McVeigh uses a unique anthropological approach to step outside flawed stereotypes of Japanese society and really engage in the current debate over the role of bureaucracy in Japanese politics.
To many in the West, Japan appears as a paradox: a rational, high-tech economic superpower and yet at the same time a deeply ritualistic and ceremonial society. This adventurous new study demonstrates how these nominally conflicting impressions of Japan can be reconciled and a greater understanding of the state achieved.

About this title

Review:

"It is ambitious in the scale of its topic, informative in its generally meticulously researched content, challenging in its thought-provoking arguments and calls for a new focus within anthropology, and at times provocative in its rejection of cosy widespread assumptions and its sharp criticism of observations deemed to be inaccurate...this is a book that leaves no room for complacency."
-"Asian Studies Review

Synopsis:

To many in the West Japan appears as a paradox: a rational, high-tech economic superpower and yet at the same time a deeply ritualistic and ceremonial society. In this adventurous new study, Brian J. McVeigh demonstrates how these nominally conflicting impressions of Japan can be reconciled and a greater understanding of the state achieved. By use of an anthropological approach the author shows that in Japan both rationality and rituality constitute a bureaucratic ethos, and that much of the intellectual discourse used to understand Japan is flawed.

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0415171067
• ISBN 13: 9780415171069
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288