Japan ranks among the first in the world in terms of average life-expectancy, but its combination of high-age with a low birthrate is gradually turning it into a “society of many deaths” (tashi shakai). With the current change in family structures, the need to make arrangements for one’s own passing is felt by an ever growing number of people. Trying to cash in on this demand, the ailing funeral industry has started to urge individuals to take care of their own future grave, funeral, inheritance, elderly care and property clean-up, promoting these activities under the label “shūkatsu” (end of life activity).

Mothers often play an important role when it comes to social movements and political activism, in Japan and elsewhere.

In this conference, we aim at bringing together several of the researchers who study mothers as activists in social movements in Japan, with a particular focus on, but not limited to, activism after 3.11.

Tomoki Sekiguchi is professor of management at the Graduate School of Economics, Osaka University. His research interests centre on individual behaviour in organizations, organizational justice, person-environment fit, hiring decision-making, management fashion, and international and strategic human resource management.

In his presentation he will report on a growing number of Japanese firms that are hiring non-Japanese employees in their domestic workplace in order to promote uchi-naru kokusaika or internal internationalisation of management.

The presentation will be followed by comments from Sierk Horn and Hendrik Meyer-Ohle.

To most Americans, it is perfectly obvious that the two atomic bombs ended World War II. Yet at least four other developments helped persuade Japanese leaders to surrender.

The Soviet Union’s entry into the war against Japan on August 8 may have been more decisive, some historians argue. However, the other three factors are rarely discussed.

On its surface, Japan’s health system appears to be one of the world’s best. The country provides universal access to health care and scores well on most public health metrics. For example, the Japanese have the longest life expectancy and among the lowest infant mortality rates in the world, and they lose significantly fewer potential life years to disease than do the citizens of almost any other country.

However, Japan’s health system – like those in many other countries – is under severe stress. An increasing number of patients are finding it difficult to obtain the right care at the right time and place. The quality of care delivered varies markedly. Many of the cost-control measures the system has implemented have damaged its cost-effectiveness.

The rise of the so-called new religions (shinshūkyō) amidst Japan’s traditional religions Buddhism and Shintō had attracted much commentary already in the Meiji period, ever since they started vying for official recognition in Denominational Shintō. Research has tended to lock early groups like Tenrikyō and Renmonkyō in the narration of a modern Japan, placing them firmly in the pre-modern and superstitious “enchanted garden” of the Weberian modern “disenchanted” world.

In the context of the critique of modernization theory it is necessary to re-examine the formation of the new religions in the Meiji period.

Japan and South Korea are home to numerous multinational firms, particularly in highly globalized manufacturing industries such as automobiles and electronics. Both countries also have distinct business cultures and management systems which arguably lend strong competitiveness to their leading multinationals. However, the business activities of Japanese and Korean firms are increasingly being transferred to overseas locations, resulting in the need to attract, nurture and retain talent from all over the world.

How can firms with strong national roots manage their global human resources competently without giving up their home-grown competitive strengths? How can they effectively integrate managers who neither know the business cultures nor the languages of their firms’ home countries?