Anglo-American Institutions

WEDNESDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2006 (this page is maintained for the historic record only)
"The Impact of Anglo-American Economic Institutions on Japanese Business Culture: Regulation and Tokyo as a Financial Centre"

Organised by: Asia-Pacific Technology Network and Asian Programme (Chatham House)
Supported by: Daiwa Anglo-Japan Foundation
Location: Chatham House, 10 St James' Square, London, SW1Y 4LE
Nearest Tube Station: Piccadilly Circus or Green Park
Time: 3 - 6 pm
To register: please click here

Chair:
Dr Gareth Price, Head, Asia Programme, Chatham House

Speakers
Dr Andrew Walter, Department of International Relations, London School of Economics "Japan and International Regulatory Standards"

Louis Turner, Chief Executive, Asia-Pacific Technology Network "Tokyo as a financial centre: why has it under-performed?"

Arif Zaman, Adviser, South Asia, Commonwealth Business Council, Visiting Tutor, Centre for Board Effectiveness, Henley Management College "Convergence in the Corporate Governance and CSR debates"

This is a Research Seminar - that is a seminar which will be used in the preparation of a final report to be written over December 2006.

In the early 1990s, there was a lively debate in which it was argued that a relatively communitarian Asian model of capitalism was better suited to the region than the more individualistic and profit-driven AAnglo-American@ model. Japan=s post-Bubble deflationary decade, along with the damage done elsewhere in Asia by the 1997 Asian Crisis, meant that the claims for some superior Asian model looked less convincing. As Japan recovers, the impact of the Asian Crisis dies away, and the Chinese and Indian giants are growing impressively, it is time to come back to this debate.

The debate about competing capitalisms rests on vast over-generalisations about the prevalence of coherent capitalist cultures. With this caveat in mind, there is still a perception that Asian business cultures have been increasingly penetrated by economic institutions from the equity-driven cultures of the USA, UK and, to a lesser extent, the rest of Europe. To what extent is this perception true? To the extent that it is, how much influence have these institutions had – if any?

This project will look at a set of institutions or patterns of behaviour which seem emblematic of the AAnglo-American@ model and will test the extent to which they seem to have become increasingly accepted within the key business cultures found in Asia.

The goal is for Louis Turner to write a Chatham House research paper in December 2006, drawing on the proceedings from three Research Seminars of which this is the first. The sequence of topics is still being considered, but could well be as follows: