The Best of the Bureau/The_Best_of_the_Bureau_Bureau_Development_Inc._1992.iso/dp/0035/00359.txt

Text File | 1992-08-07 | 20KB | 363 lines

$Unique_ID{bob00359}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Japan
The Negotiators}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Nathaniel B. Thayer and Stephen E. Weiss}
$Affiliation{Center for the Study of Foreign Affairs}
$Subject{japanese
negotiators
american
negotiating
often
negotiator
government
negotiations
bargaining
issue
see
tables
}
$Date{1987}
$Log{See Table 1*0035901.tab
}
Title:       Japan
Book:        National Negotiating Styles
Author:      Nathaniel B. Thayer and Stephen E. Weiss
Affiliation: Center for the Study of Foreign Affairs
Date:        1987

The Negotiators

Selection, Expertise, and Support

     The highest calling for a Japanese youth still is to become a government
official. In a recent year, 488 of the 1,102 successful applicants to Japanese
officialdom came from Tokyo University, a school accorded great prestige in
part because of the difficulty of its entrance examination. Another 211 came
from Kyoto University, also top-ranked, also difficult to enter. Two-thirds
of the applicants (both universities) came from the law department; one-third
came from the economics department. These figures would not be unusual for any
post-war year. The Japanese bureaucracy is kept small. Bureaucrats are chosen
for their educational attainment in a prescribed course of study. They have
extraordinary elan and a sense of solidarity that should not be obscured by
the dust kicked up in fights between the ministries.

     Each young official will rise through the tiers of his ministry at about
the same speed as his colleagues rise through the tiers in their ministries.
Nemawashi, then, turns out to be a meeting between classmates.

     At age 55 or 56, each official will resign from his ministry (the
Japanese expression is "leave heaven") to pursue a second career. Some run for
elective office; others become an adviser to a major corporation. That
prospect cements ties between bureaucrats businessmen, and politicians.

     Generally rather large by U.S. standards, a Japanese negotiating team is
composed largely of middle-level officials appointed because of their
technical and substantive expertise. Often, these individuals are division
heads in their mid-forties. The official chief negotiator is usually a senior
man with sufficient status to serve as a symbolic representative of the
domestic consensus. He may know and say little about the subject matter,
though, and defer to the specialists on the team.

     In spite of their technical or substantive expertise, Japanese government
representatives often lack tactical negotiating skills. Some American
businessmen contend that Japanese in large multinational companies negotiate
ably in the Western tradition. But negotiating skills in a real setting are
generally difficult to assess systematically.

     Support for government negotiators is broad and deep. The team itself
may have 15 to 20 members, who are supported by 15 to 20 staff. Their advance
preparation is the envy of other governments.

     The work of other domestic groups should not be over-looked.

Range of Authority

     In the recent aviation negotiations, Japan Air Lines exerted pressure for
the government to hold to its position. Similarly, Toyota pressured and
limited the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) during initial
bilateral talks on auto export restraints, as Nippon Telegraph and Telephone
did with the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications during initial talks on
government procurement policies. Even the prime minister's authority seems
limited. Prime Minister Nakasone signaled as much in telecommunication
negotiations in March 1986, when he responded to U.S. requests with the
promise to use "my best possible efforts." Unlike President Nixon with Prime
Minister Sato, President Reagan decided not to press Prime Minister Nakasone
any further for the time being.

Individual Styles

     Many foreign observers have underscored the similarities in the actions
of individual Japanese negotiators. A strong team presence and negotiating
position and the cultural imperative of consensus-building, among other
factors, make for homogeneity. But there are differences worth noting.

     It has already been mentioned that representatives of different
ministries often exhibit different negotiating styles as well as different
interests. Foreign Affairs and MITI officials tend to be rather direct and
straightforward, for example, whereas Health and Welfare officials, who
clearly have less experience with U.S. negotiators, show some difficulty
in communicating with Americans. Some have also observed that negotiating
styles differ by industry and by region. Naturally, one can point to
different personalities and dispositions.

     All in all, what shines through here is the technical expertise of
individual negotiators in groups that have limited authority to bargain.
Differences in individual styles and interests should not be assumed away,
however. In coming years, they are likely to become more pronounced.

Negotiating Strategies and Tactics

     Negotiating style can be treated as a composite of two kinds of
behaviors. One is sheer bargaining-the exchange of proposals and
counterproposals for settling particular issues-that occurs within the broad
process of negotiation. The second is other interactions among negotiators.
The first is negotiating techniques-the magnitude and timing of concessions,
for example-and the second involves developing rapport and trust and general
patterns of communication. Both kinds of behavior deserve attention. U.S. and
Japanese negotiators tend to differ in their relative emphases on the two and
in their conduct in each area. Table 1 shows the basic differences between
U.S. and Japanese negotiating behavior.

The "Probe, Push, Panic" Style

     In a detailed study of Japanese bargaining with the United States and
other governments, Michael Blaker has argued that the Japanese government has
"the simplest sort of {bargaining} strategy-know what you want and push until
you get it." The Japanese game plan, as he sees it, involves three stages:

first, to probe carefully opposing thinking in order to gauge what is
obtainable and to set manageable goals; second, to harness all available
bargaining resources to force through these apparently realizable conditions;
and finally, to continue to press for these demands even when their fortunes
have soured and at the risk of terminating negotiations.

[See Table 1: DIFFERENCES IN NEGOTIATING BEHAVIOR BETWEEN JAPANESE AND UNITED
STATES OFFICIALS]

Or in their barest form: "probe, push, panic."

     While this fairly simple model has been criticized by several scholars,
it does describe many aspects of the Japanese style or pattern of negotiation,
if not their "game plan."

Opening Moves

     The Japanese do not deliberate extensively over their bargaining tactics
or plan what concessions they might make. Blaker observed that once into
international bargaining, Japanese negotiators often find themselves with no
contingency or fallback plans, few officially authorized concessions, and an
absence of clear policies on some questions. Even at the outset, the Japanese
sometimes wait for U.S. negotiators to present a first proposal.

     However, when the Japanese do present a first proposal, it is carefully
drafted and reasonable. It reflects the Japanese predilection for
well-informed, "best" solutions and the solidarity (and obligation) arising
from domestic consensus-building. When the Japanese government negotiators
have made their initial proposal, they are in effect not initiating bargaining
but presenting its results. Internal activities have been arduous and
protracted, and negotiators are held strictly accountable to their
constituents.

Making Concessions

     Americans tend to engage in systematic concession-making, starting with
high initial demands and then making step-by-step concessions to converge on
mutually agreeable terms. Americans always reciprocate when the other side
makes a concess