Didn't you know initiative is forbidden around here???!!! Photo by Stephen Poff on Flickr (click photo to visit his page)

A lot of ink has been spilled in writing about slow or inadequate responses by Japanese governmental and other officials to the earthquake/tsunami/Fukushima nuclear crisis. However, such slow response is built-in to the system. The fact is, personal initiative is not highly valued in Japan. On the contrary, it often gets you into deep doo-doo, so that folks quickly learn it ain’t worth the risk.

This is the downside to the much-vaunted “consultation” ethic of the Japanese: when in doubt (or even if you’re not!) consult with others before taking action.

This news item shows what can happen when someone takes personal initiative. Note that no-one is complaining that what the former head of the District Prosecutor’s Office actually did was wrong, inappropirate or even illegal. No. His “crime” was that he failed to sufficiently consult with others before acting. Why is this so wrong? I’ll give my answer below. Feel free to add your comments. Here’s the news item.

The head of the Fukushima District Public Prosecutors Office has been transferred to a post at the Supreme Public Prosecutors Office effective Monday, the justice ministry said, in an apparent punitive move for releasing 31 crime suspects shortly after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

“His act was not illegal but he failed to sufficiently consult with the local high prosecutors office, the supreme prosecutors office and police,” a justice ministry official said. “Since the investigation on the matter is almost complete, we have decided on a personnel change.”

At the instruction of its chief Akira Nakamura, the Fukushima prosecutors office decided to let the suspects go on the grounds that it was difficult to investigate them in the midst of the unfolding disaster.

via Prosecutor transferred for releasing crime suspects after quake+.

The reason it’s such a crime in Japan to act without properly consulting others (even if what you did was perfectly ok and absolutely appropriate and correct), is that such actions can result in others losing face, a major no-no in this country.

Let me give some examples.

1. In Japanese schools, Western teachers very quickly notice that if they ask any student a question, the student will rarely immediately answer (even if they KNOW the answer). Instead, they’ll turn to their right and their left and consult. It drives Western teachers nuts! But the students know the risk of just answering straight out: “Did you see that show-off? Putting herself first! What a big-head!” Yes, the collective in its wisdom, will stamp on such behaviour pretty darn quick.
2. A teacher in a school has trouble with some particularly talkative and obstreperous students. No matter how many warnings they get, they won’t shut up. Finally, the teacher pulls his last card, and bans them from the class for good. Result? Major panic! Why? The students leave the room and go straight to the office and ask “What’s going on?”  Naturally the good folks in the office don’t know and can’t answer. They look silly. Right or wrong, they blame the teacher. Why didn’t he warn them ahead of time? Or better still, consult with them or with his boss about this: “I’m having trouble with these students, what can I do? Throwing them out of the classroom doesn’t work. Can I ban them altogether? Do I have that authority? Do I have the school’s backing if I do?”
3. A small group of teachers in a school, with the co-operation of the library, finally manage, after a lot of negotiation and planning, to set up a special section where graded readers are kept. The teachers are proud of this and want to take photos and post them on the school website for PR. One of them asks the library about this. The librarian says they can’t decide: the teachers should ask the PR department. No personal initiative allowed here. We all move forward together as a group, see, or not at all.
4. A new teacher has arrived. She is attending her first department meeting (what joy!). A number of items are discussed which the chair wants everyone’ s opinion on. The chair (a man and not a Japanese) asks the new teacher (a woman; ladies first,  you know) for her opinion first. The woman is flustered. She feels a trap of gigantic proportions opening up right before her feet. How can she possibly give an opinion without hearing what others think? That is an invitation to professional suicide! She begs to be excused, on the grounds that she still needs to learn the ropes (otherwise she might hang herself with them!).
5. A teacher of English has some old books he wants to get rid of. While he could just trash them, it occurs to him to temporarily put them on show outside his office, with a sign telling people to just take what they want. He finds an old bookshelf and places it in the corridor. The next day, he gets a message from the boss, not directly but passed on through a colleague, to “get rid of the bookshelf fast”. Why? What’s so wrong about an English teacher offering English books for free to students and colleagues? He balks. The next day, he finds his bookshelf and the books have been taken away. His “crime”? He didn’t consult with anyone before putting the bookshelf in the corridor.

Consultation is not a bad thing, of course, but it slows down the decision-making process, and in emergencies that can be fatal. Another, perhaps unintended consequence of this consultation fetish is a profound self-censorship, where folks end up unable to act on their own initiative because they’ve learned that the price for doing so is too high.

Tags: cultural commentary, initiative, Japan