THE GOVERNMENT OF MODERN JAPAN: THE JAPANESE BUREAUCRACY Japan's "Horatio Alger Myth" |
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Gerald L. Curtis :: In Japan it has been believed, at least in the past, that anybody can become a senior bureaucrat in Japan. That is that one need not be rich, one need not be from a good family in an urban part of the country, that a poor farm boy, if he worked hard and passed the exam to the University of Tokyo and went on and passed the civil service exam, could rise to be the vice-minister of the Ministry of Finance, and perhaps then enter the Diet and become prime minister of the country. So, in the United States we have a Horatio Alger myth that anybody from no matter how modest a background through hard work can become a successful businessman, can make something wonderful out of his life. In Japan, the Horatio Alger myth tends to be the myth of the farm boy who becomes a bureaucrat. Now in the United States we don’t think of becoming a bureaucrat as a way to become a great success, but in Japan, that is considered to be a very prestigious career. |
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