The Reconstruction of the Japanese Business Ethics

日本商业伦理的主要起源可以追溯到封建德川时代的武士道。武士道思想对商人的心态和行为产生了深远的影响。人们认为。商人应该像武士一样。例如，员工对店主的忠诚被认为是最重要的。雇主是家长，雇员的人权经常被忽视。另一方面，家长式的管理方式将员工视为准家庭成员，并保证他们长期就业。我们应该学习家长式管理的优点，以便在全球市场上具有竞争力。我们制作了一份问卷来调查目前企业的道德风气。我们得到了79个回报。重要的发现是，大约80%的受访者支持举报。他们回答说，如果在办公室发现违法行为，将告发雇用他们的公司。与美国的情况相比，女性员工的待遇并没有什么进步。根据这项调查，我们可以有把握地得出结论，日本的商业道德有所改善，但企业家们多少轻视人权，所谓的“金钱就是一切”的态度在日本盛行。因此，我们可能必须学习江户时代的道德，在那里，雇员被视为一种重要的资产。Omi商家的营销策略在今天仍然可以被看作是一个很好的商业模式。他们把卖家、买家和社区视为重要的利益相关者。他们在企业社会责任方面走在了前列。

The main origin of business ethics in Japan can be found in the Bushido of the Feudalistic Tokugawa Era. The Bushido ideology exerted profound influence on the mentality and behavior of the merchant. It was considered that. Merchants should act like the Samurai. For example, employees' loyalty to the owner of the shop was considered as having highest priority. The employers were patriarch and the human rights of employees were often ignored. On the other hand paternalistic way of management treated employees as quasi-family members and guaranteed them long term employment. We should learn the merit of the paternalistic management to be competitive on the global market. We made a questionnaire to survey as to the present ethical climate of corporations. We got 79 returns. The important finding is that about 80% of respondents support the whistle blowing. They answered that if they found the illegal act in the office, they would whistle blow the corporations which employ them.The treatment of women employees has not shown progressed as compared with the case of U.S.A. Based on this survey we can safely conclude that the business ethics in Japan has been improved, but business persons somewhat make light of the human right and that so-called "money is all" attitude prevails in Japan. Hence we must perhaps learn from the ethics of the Edo period where employees were regarded as an important asset. The marketing strategy of Omi merchants can still be regarded as a good model to business persons today. They took care of the sellers, buyers and the community as important stakeholders. They ware the forerunners in regards as corporate social responsibility.