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Benjamin Peters
12th November 2002, 01:32
Recently I have been made aware of the concepts of Tatemae/Honme by a valued member of this discussion board (thanks to Joe Svinth).

Specifically relating to Honme-
I was wondering, besides literature I can purchase, is there any info and URLs to sites that will lead me to ethical 'decision-making-models' which are based on Japanese culture?? I am interested in how differently the Japanese think when it comes to ethics; how they get to the end result and how different these results (actions) are to more western thoughts and actions.

I realize there are heaps of western ethical models for decision making, but like I said, I'm interested in a Japanese version...if one exists.

P Goldsbury
12th November 2002, 14:44
Originally posted by Benjamin Peters
Recently I have been made aware of the concepts of Tatemae/Honme by a valued member of this discussion board (thanks to Joe Svinth).

Specifically relating to Honme-
I was wondering, besides literature I can purchase, is there any info and URLs to sites that will lead me to ethical 'decision-making-models' which are based on Japanese culture?? I am interested in how differently the Japanese think when it comes to ethics; how they get to the end result and how different these results (actions) are to more western thoughts and actions.

I realize there are heaps of western ethical models for decision making, but like I said, I'm interested in a Japanese version...if one exists.

If you are primarily interested in how the Japanese regard ethics, one place to start might be the books of Takeo Doi. In his second book to be translated into English, he discusses this pair of concepts. However, the book is mainly about another pair of concepts, Omote and Ura, which is actually the Japanese title of the book. The English title is "The Anatomy of Self: The Individual Versus Society" and the publisher is Kodansha International (1985).

If you are interested in how the Japanese make decisions, there is a vast amount of literature available -- in Japanese. A (Japanese) Google search under the kanji equivalents of 'koushou' / 'koushou-gaku', roughly translated as 'coming to a decision by means of negotiation', revealed several pages of material. A key Japanese scholar here is Tadashi(?) Fujita (“¡“c’‰), who has written a number of books on how the Japanese make decisions. But I do not think they have been translated. There are a number of manuals in English on how to negotiate with the Japanese, but these are of little value in relation to ethical issues. Actually, since 'honne' is pretty private, I doubt whether there are any books in English, written by Japanese authors, on 'honne' alone.

But I have been wrong before...

Yours sincerely,
______________
P A Goldsbury,
Graduate School of Social Sciences,
Hiroshima University