Keywords

1 What Gave Rise to Genba-Shugi?

In Japan's international development aid, the concept of genba-shugi (the hands-on approach) is widely used. At times, the recommendations of researchers and high-level bureaucrats can even be criticized as absurd opinions that have no understanding of what is happening at the genba—on the ground, in the field, or at the locality. This is reflected in everyday expressions, such as “genba hyakkai”, we should visit the genba as often as possible, or “everything starts from the genba”.

However, both constituent words of genba-shugi, “genba” and “shugi”, are polysemous. Their meaning depends on the context in which they are used. The purpose of this chapter is to elucidate the various contributions to genba-shugi as a concept. Before entering the main discussion, I will begin by reviewing these terms.

In business management, an explanation of the word genba has been attempted in English. For example, the Cambridge Business Dictionary (2022) explains the genba as follows1: “In Japanese business theory, the place where things happen in manufacturing, used to say that people whose job is to manufacture products are in a good place to make improvements in the manufacturing process.” Rather than the place itself, it implies a space “where events happen, experiences are gained, knowledge is generated and shared, the intrinsic becomes explicit, and intangible becomes tangible” (Macpherson 2013, p. 16). Macpherson (2013), who studies Japanese manufacturing sites, points out genba is not limited to “just a physical place,” as portrayed in much of the “anglosphere literature.”

The term may be used in ways not explained by any of these. For example, the expression “genba no koe” (literally “the voice of the genba”) refers not only to the opinions and comments expressed by people in the genba but also feelings and emotions that cannot be conveyed through text. Genba is much more than just a place: it also encompasses the people in the place, their movements and interactions, and even physical sensations too subtle for words. Adding the suffix “shugi” (roughly equivalent to “-ism” in English) to this term makes its meaning even harder to grasp. This is because shugi denotes more than the policies or attitudes of individuals; it encompasses the principles and fundamental rules espoused by groups and organizations. Thus, in addition to defying easy translation into English, the term “genba-shugi” is a difficult concept to explain accurately even in Japanese.

Almost none of the previous research on genba-shugi provides a rigorous examination of the exact meaning of the term. Rather, it tends to provide hints at the meaning through individual case studies. The business history researcher Yamashita (2010), for example, describes existing research as “dependent on specific case studies and limited data, using genba-shugi as a concept to explore their various characteristics” (Yamashita 2010, p. 86). The tendency of the term genba-shugi to obfuscate the point being made and the resultant difficulty of using it for rigorous analysis have caused it to fall out of use among researchers. At the same time, however, it has been adopted by businesspeople and politicians as a convenient concept that “enables the user to express a variety of elements collectively” (Yamashita 2010, p. 87).2

The origin of these discussions on genba-shugi can be traced back to the time when Japanese companies were expanding their production bases around the world amid a trend toward globalization. When Japanese companies began to transfer their techniques and knowledge, they became aware of differences in attitudes between Japanese technical staff and local engineers at overseas production bases. These differences came to be explained through the use of the term genba-shugi. Today, the term is used by engineers and students of business management as well as by politicians and business administrators, especially those at the top of organizations, with the meaning left conveniently ambiguous.3

Questioning the various contributions to genba-shugi as a concept, I will specifically focus on three contexts. Section 2 discusses genba-shugi in the context of Japanese engineers and business management, where the term has been discussed most vigorously. Section 3 discusses genba-shugi as a specific characteristic of Japan’s development assistance, particularly technical cooperation. And Sect. 4 discusses genba-shugi as used by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the organization responsible for implementing development assistance provided by the Japanese government. This last is studied because the examples presented in Sects. 2 and 3 no longer adequately explain the term, given its recent emergence in the context of politics, public administration, and organizations, as described above. Comparing the various contexts in which the term genba-shugi has been used will reveal their shared emphasis on the superiority and initiative of the user.

2 The Discovery of “Japanese-Style” Engineers and Companies in Manufacturing

The emergence of genba-shugi—particularly as it relates to engineers and technical staff—was related to the discovery of different local cultures of production and labor as Japanese companies expanded their production bases overseas from the second half of the 1970s through the 1980s. Until that time, overseas expansion by Japanese companies had consisted of the establishment of foreign sales bases aimed at enhancing sales networks. Subsequently, the dramatic rise in exports by Japanese companies from the era of rapid economic growth until the time of the oil crisis made it necessary to resolve trade frictions with countries in Southeast Asia and Europe, and with the United States (Ueno 1986, pp. 242–245). At around the same time, Japanese companies, facing the challenge of rising export product prices due to an appreciating yen, responded by moving production bases overseas (Ueno 1986, pp. 242–245; Cabinet Office 2012).

These companies attempted to introduce Japanese-style factory systems at these overseas production bases in Southeast Asia, Europe, and the United States by transferring technology to local employees (Ueno 1986, pp. 245–247). The Japanese-style factory systems refer to systems where engineers enter the production site to improve manufacturing processes and quality control through dialogue with on-site employees. The reluctance of locally hired engineers to personally engage with people and processes on the factory floor (seisan genba) became a subject of attention for Japanese researchers in fields such as business management and economic history (Yoneyama 1985; Dore 1987; Imano 1990). These differing attitudes provided ideal research material for academic fields concerned with the different developmental routes taken by Japan compared to those in Europe and the United States. A growing body of literature identified this engagement with the genba as a key success factor in Japanese-style business management.

Genba-shugi was already becoming widely accepted as a special feature of Japanese companies during the second half of the 1980s. For example, the Japan Economic Research Institute (1987) summarized its vision for the new industrial era as follows:

Ultimately, the distinctive features of Japanese business management, compared to that of foreign countries such as those in Europe and the United States, can be reduced to two points. The first point is “egalitarianism” or “humanism.” (...) The second point is “genba-shugi.” In contrast to American managers out of business school, who, it is said, only respect figures and are uninterested in the factory floor, Japanese managers have the utmost respect for the factory floor, beginning everything there (Japan Economic Research Institute 1987, p. 19).

In a paper written during this period and recognized as a representative example of research on engineers’ genba-shugi, Morikawa (1988)4 referred to his own observations of factories in the United States and the comparative research into Japanese and British factories by Dore (1987), arguing as follows:

For Japanese engineers, the factory floor (seisan genba) is the most important workplace. The genba is an object of respect, from the time when engineers receive their training at the genba, through their unceasing work together with the factory workers. They are governed by a system of value norms under which those who devote themselves only to deskwork such as research, design, and the composition and amendment of operational manuals are, at least, not fit to be called engineers. In this sense, “genba-shugi” is an aspect unique to Japanese industry, and may even be seen as one factor underlying its technical prowess (Morikawa 1988, p. 29).

Both the Japan Economic Research Institute and Morikawa contrast Japanese engineers and business management with those of Europe and the United States, juxtaposing the physical experience gained from actually using one’s eyes and hands on the factory floor with theoretical knowledge acquired from figures, logic, and research.

Considering the historical background of these arguments, they were not limited to a simple comparison. Rather, they were presented in the context of trying to demonstrate the superiority of Japanese-style business management over that of Europe and the United States. The arguments of both the Japan Economic Research Institute (1987) and Morikawa (1988) emerged in an era when the Japanese economy had recovered—most swiftly of all the developed countries—from the oil crisis, and Japanese-style business management had become a major focus of international attention. Many people in Japan were becoming increasingly self-confident about the “Japanese-style” approach. Hirano (2011), analyzing the historical formation of Japanese-style business management, notes the overwhelmingly positive attitude of researchers toward Japan’s corporate management during the second half of the 1970s through the 1980s (Hirano 2011, p. 138). At the same time, almost all researchers broke with previous assumptions of the Japanese-style approach as consisting of “systems and customs aimed at avoiding competition.” Rather, they came to assess it as “no less competitive and efficient than those of Europe or the United States” (ibid.).

Previously, it had been thought that the internal rotation of personnel to allow them to experience various divisions and roles, a feature of Japanese companies, was inefficient, as it failed to enhance the specialization of employees. In contrast, Koike (1997), comparing factories in Japan and the United States, discovered that when problems occurred at factory production lines in Japan, managers and employees who had experience in various internal roles could meet to discuss solutions, thereby facilitating the swift discovery of ways to solve problems, including those that resulted from a combination of factors. In contrast, factory production lines in the United States had few employees with experience in multiple roles. When problems arose, there would be no discussion like those in Japan, and it would therefore take more time to discover the cause and get the line running again. Koike also found significant differences in personnel development, with the more talented employees in Japan rotated more quickly between different divisions and roles, allowing them to rise faster in the organization, while even talented employees find it difficult to achieve promotion in U.S. factories, where greater specialization limits the number of posts available (Koike 1997, 2005). Koike’s and similar research by others suggested that Japanese-style business management was more efficient and competitive than that of Europe and the United States.

Japanese engineers’ genba-shugi was thus used to explain differences between business practices in Japan and other countries, particularly European countries and the United States. In this context, genba-shugi became used with a sense of superiority, implying that the greater emphasis placed on the factory floor (seisan genba) by Japanese engineers and companies, compared to their counterparts in Europe and the United States, led to more efficient Japanese-style business management.

3 The Emphasis on Japanese Uniqueness

In this section, I will discuss genba-shugi in the context of Japan’s technical cooperation. Official development assistance (ODA) by the Japanese government began in 1954 with its participation in the Colombo Plan for Cooperative Economic and Social Development in Asia and the Pacific. Japan commenced technical cooperation, welcoming trainees and dispatching specialists, the following year.

The focus of Japan’s technical cooperation up until the 2000s was “people”: hito-zukuri (human-resource development), which is discussed in this chapter. In the Diplomatic Bluebooks published by Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), phrases such as “implemented through human contacts (…) to deepen mutual understanding” and fostering those “who will shoulder the task of future nation-building (kuni-zukuri)” appear frequently (MOFA 1976, 1988, 1993). JICA also set forth the same policies as MOFA—human resources development (hito-zukuri), cooperation through human contact, and cultivating people for the task of nation-building (kuni-zukuri)—in an almost identical way (JICA 1995, p. i).5 Likewise, in papers published in academic journals, the concept of human resources development (hito-zukuri) was emphasized more than genba (Saito 1992; Hayase 1989).

From the 2000s onward, however, arguments were again made linking genba-shugi to the traditional characteristics of Japan’s technical cooperation. Discussing a revision of the Act of the Incorporated Administrative Agency-Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA Act), MOFA, which had previously used terms such as human resources development (hito-zukuri) and nation-building (kuni-zukuri), reviewed the previous three decades of technical cooperation projects by JICA as follows6:

We think that this technical cooperation represents a classic example of so-called “face-to-face” genba-based assistance. Basically speaking, the image of Japanese experts—technical experts—working up a sweat on hand and brow in the genba convincingly conveys the Japanese approach to work: the sense of virtue in all forms of labor and the hardworking attitude of the Japanese people. We regard this as the reason for our outstanding reception in India, for example.7

In this statement, the Minister of Foreign Affairs links genba-shugi in technical cooperation with the attitudes of the Japanese people, evaluating both highly.

At around the same time, academic research citing genba-shugi as a traditional feature of Japan’s technical cooperation began to appear. For example, Matsuoka (2008) describes the “great Japanese tradition” of genba-shugi as indispensable for a newly proposed approach to “capacity development” that had emerged during the 1990s (Matsuoka 2008, pp. 235–236). Other researchers similarly characterized genba-shugi. Nakahara (2009) identified genba-shugi as a characteristic of the development of Japanese systems of industrial education and occupational training, and Japan’s approach to international cooperation. Uotani (2012), in a case study on Ghana, portrayed genba-shugi as a special feature of Japanese-style technical cooperation.

These studies present genba-shugi as a traditional feature of technical cooperation by Japan, but provide no empirical verification of this claim. Each researcher assumes as if obvious the idea that genba-shugi is a feature of Japanese technical cooperation. Moreover, the meaning of the term “genba-shugi” is different in each study, and there is no common conception of the meaning of genba-shugi in the context of technical cooperation. Matsuoka uses the term to refer to the utilization of information from the genba in planning (Matsuoka 2008). According to Nakahara, it refers to an emphasis on on-site training in the context of industrial education and occupational training, and an emphasis on “people” over systems in Japanese policy in the context of international cooperation (Nakahara 2009). Meanwhile, Uotani uses the term to refer to the physical presence of experts on-site (at the genba) (Uotani 2012). In each case, however, genba-shugi is characterized as a feature of Japanese technical cooperation, in contrast to development assistance by European countries and the United States, which prioritizes concepts and ideals.

During the 2000s, while this idea of genba-shugi in technical cooperation was being expounded in Japan, aid donors in European countries and the United States were endeavoring to change their approach to technical cooperation. This represented a “significant turning point” for Japanese technical cooperation (Miyoshi 2008, p. 133) because Japan alone risked being left behind amid the emergence of a new worldwide trend in technical cooperation resulting from changes among European and U.S. aid donors and the previously mentioned appearance of the concept of “capacity development.” This trend in technical cooperation arose from the criticism of the project-based style of technical cooperation, favored by Japan and observed from the 1990s through the 2000s. Berg and UNDP (1993), a leading example of this type of criticism, cite the example of technical cooperation in Africa in the 1980s, pointing out that the technology that was supposed to have been transferred was not actually used sustainably in the recipient countries. The transfer of technologies that could be overseen only by developed countries and the lack of an appropriate implementation environment for the use of transferred technologies were cited as the main causes of this failure. The focus of criticisms such as those presented by Berg and UNDP was the attempt at “capacity building” through the transfer of technology and knowledge from developed countries in total disregard for developing countries’ existing ownership and other structures and systems (Matsuoka 2008; Miwa 2008). “Capacity development” was suggested by Fukuda-Parr et al. (2002) as a new assistance concept acknowledging the impact on systems and societies in developing countries, in response to the issues that had emerged in conventional technical cooperation. Meanwhile, Japan, which perceived its technical cooperation in Asia as a “success,” rejected its inclusion among the developed nations criticized by Berg and UNDP, Fukuda-parr et al., and others for disregarding existing structures and systems in developing countries (Matsuoka 2008, p. 227). For example, JICA et al. (2003), in a 300-page-long report, The Effectiveness and Challenges of Japanese-style International Cooperation, uses specific examples to argue that this criticism does not apply to Japan.8

From the discussion above, it is clear that, in the context of technical cooperation, the concept of genba-shugi has been invoked to argue that Japan’s technical cooperation and those who implement it are closer to the situation on the ground (genba) than those of European and U.S. aid donors, thereby emphasizing Japan's unique development assistance, which, it is argued, has been no less effective than that of Europe and the United States in achieving development.

4 JICA’s Pursuit of Autonomy

Unlike the concepts of genba-shugi discussed in relation to engineers and technical cooperation, which implied comparison with outsiders, JICA’s discourse on genba-shugi emerged in a domestic Japanese context.

JICA’s status changed from that of a special public institution to an independent administrative institution in October 2003. Unlike a special public institution, which is subject to detailed restrictions in terms of budgets and personnel by central ministries, as an independent administrative institution, JICA was largely free to allocate its own budgets and projects, and was accountable mainly for its medium-term targets and their evaluations. With this change, Sadako Ogata (1927–2019) became the first President of JICA from outside the government. Ogata attempted to reform the organization of JICA, based on three principles: (1) genba-shugi, (2) guaranteeing human safety, and (3) effectiveness, efficiency, and speed. In this context, genba-shugi was translated into English as the “field-oriented approach,” and referred to the delegation of personnel and authority from its Tokyo headquarters to local offices (JICA 2004, 2005).9 The reason why JICA adopted this policy of genba-shugi can be observed in the events leading up to its establishment. This following text overviews the events leading up to the election of Ogata as the first President of JICA and the path for its reform.

JICA was established in 1974 from the merging of several special public institutions under the auspices of MOFA, primarily the Overseas Technical Cooperation Agency (OTCA) and the Japan Emigration Service (JEMIS). Behind the decision to establish JICA lay tensions between the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF)—both of which proposed the establishment of their own organizations to implement technical cooperation—on one hand, and MOFA and the Ministry of Finance—which hoped for integration—on the other. These tensions escalated into a political battle involving politicians and the financial world, which was eventually settled through the integration of functions into JICA (Araki 1984; Numata 1994; Hashimoto 1999; Sato 2021). Through a process of political compromise, the JICA Act was passed which, while making MOFA primarily responsible for JICA, also required the authorization of the Minister of International Trade and Industry for projects overseen by MITI and the authorization of the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries for projects overseen by MAFF. The government bureaucracy thereafter established systems to supervise and direct JICA’s operations based on this general supervisory power. For example, not only was there an insufficient number of senior vice-president posts at JICA to incorporate the management staff from OTCA and JEMIS, but there were also few posts at the level of vice president or section head. All senior vice president posts and that of the president were filled by retired public officials, and JICA’s operating sections were organized to correspond to the government bureaucracy. All section heads were dispatched from departments of the central government (Sugita 1999; Takashima and Miyoshi 2000).

Against this background, JICA was subject to aspects of bureaucratic stovepiping, with much of its development assistance carried out on a sector-by-sector basis. Essentially, the supply-side of development assistance—the convenience of the central government bureaucracy—was prioritized over demand-side information from the local areas where the development assistance was to be implemented. JICA’s staff was aware of this issue, emphasizing an approach based on the recipient country and region from the time of JICA’s establishment, and pushing ahead with organizational reforms while simultaneously giving consideration to the central bureaucracy (JICA 2019). JICA staff attempted to reform the organization—originally a miscellany of different sections answering to different bureaucracies—into an organization that could formulate assistance plans for each country and region, and implement assistance based on these plans.10 From the second half of the 1980s, they had also embarked on organizational reform aimed at strengthening local offices in order to identify the needs of local areas (Tajima 1986; Nakamura 1991; Yanagiya 1991).

The strengthening of local offices continued to be an issue through the 1990s. The reform of JICA was supported by international pressure to decentralize assistance organizations by strengthening local personnel and delegating authority to local offices. The OECD (1985) insisted that greater localization of assistance organizations led to more effective and efficient assistance. Some countries, such as Canada, even undertook parliamentary initiatives to reform assistance organizations (OECD 1985; The Standing Committee on External Affairs and International Trade 1987). Cooperation between aid donors had become commonplace from the second half of the 1990s (Miyoshi 2001), and the increasing importance of local negotiations between donors provided an additional reason for JICA to reinforce its local offices. However, these efforts to strengthen local offices met with obstacles, due to the internal issues within JICA described below.

While Japan’s ODA budget increased five-fold from 1978 to 1997, the number of JICA staff grew by only approximately 20%.11 Moreover, JICA was unable to transfer staff arbitrarily, as it was still closely controlled by the government bureaucracy. Each bureaucratic unit in central ministries, corresponding to each of JICA’s various operating departments, had the authority to determine JICA’s budget. JICA’s operating departments were therefore required to discuss and negotiate with the central government bureaucracy on issues such as the number of personnel in each section, the number of specialists assigned to each project, the cost of purchasing materials, and even travel expenses incurred by JICA staff. These constraints meant that local offices were unable to take any action without first contacting and confirming with JICA headquarters in Tokyo, making it difficult to respond swiftly and flexibly to emerging issues.12

The announcement to convert JICA to an independent administrative institution was published in 2001, two years before it came into effect. Simultaneously, after decades of steadily increasing ODA budgets, it was announced that Japan’s ODA budget would be substantially reduced with the stated goal of improving fiscal health,13 and even greater efficiency was demanded from the development aid. In response to this political situation, some JICA staff, together with labor unions, conducted questionnaire surveys and other activities to develop a vision for JICA’s ideal form and the ideal leader for the organization as an independent administrative institution. According to them, the local needs identified from these initiatives were incorporated into their ultimate vision for development assistance.14 Meanwhile, Ogata, who had been an overwhelmingly popular choice for the ideal leader among survey respondents, went on to become the President of JICA, leading the organizational reforms described above.

The incorporation of genba-shugi into JICA’s organizational reforms originated not only from JICA’s internal staff. Tajima (1986), Yanagiya (1991), and Nakamura (1991) illustrate that MOFA managerial personnel also supported placing genba-shugi as a central pillar of JICA’s ODA. When these texts were written, the authors were, respectively, General Manager of JICA’s General Affairs Department, President of JICA, and Senior Vice-President of JICA. However, all were originally appointed from MOFA. MOFA had local diplomatic missions in developing countries. Boosting the importance of localization in ODA by advocating genba-shugi effectively facilitated an attempt to wrest control from other branches of the central government bureaucracy. The greater the importance placed on the local context, the more MOFA’s embassies would become the core of Japan’s ODA through their local networks. When ODA budgets shrank during the 2000s, MOFA had no choice but to aim for “efficient” ODA operations through “MOFA leadership,” to continue to achieve the same diplomatic effect as before. For this reason, genba-shugi was a crucial concept for MOFA, enabling it to ensure that it kept the initiative and maintained leadership.

From the discussion above, it is clear that the genba-shugi that formed one of the three pillars of JICA’s organizational reform was a policy aimed at the decentralization of development assistance by transferring authority, personnel, and budgets from the Tokyo headquarters (the supply side) to local offices (the demand side). At the same time, however, it was also intended to support the leadership and initiative of JICA and MOFA themselves. In other words, genba-shugi was used to argue for MOFA and against other branches of the central government bureaucracy, for JICA to better control development aid policies and their implementation on the basis that it better understood local conditions.

5 Conclusion

In this chapter, I have described the events and circumstances that gave rise to the use of the concept of genba-shugi in three different contexts: business management, technical cooperation, and JICA’s organizational reforms. The concept of genba-shugi examined in Sects. 2 and 3 was used to advocate the superiority and uniqueness of Japanese-style business management in terms of effectiveness and efficiency. These were attributed to close interaction with the genba by Japanese companies, engineers, and experts, compared to those of other countries. In Sect. 4, I described the background against which JICA’s and MOFA’s career staff used the expression genba-shugi to argue for their own leadership and initiative, and against control by other branches of the central government bureaucracy. JICA and MOFA possessed their own networks of local offices and embassies, leveraging the features of genba-shugi to argue for more effective and efficient assistance based on those networks. Despite these different contexts for the use of genba-shugi, they share an attempt by people and organizations close to the genba to assert their own value.

There were also common characteristics defined in contrast to genba-shugi. The European and U.S. engineers, business management, and development aid, as well as Japan’s centralized bureaucracy, each cited as the antithesis of genba-shugi in the arguments examined in this paper, were seen to approach the genba based on abstract “theory.” Here, abstract theory refers to logic based on ideals, and the pursuit of efficiency through the centralized organizational government. These have been rationalized based on existing authorities, such as abstract “models” from developed countries in Europe and the United States, or the interests of the central government bureaucracy. Such abstract theory disregards the context of the genba. The “rationality” of genba-shugi, by contrast, seeks to achieve justification by other means. Genba-shugi appeals to people’s “intuition” by implying strong links to the genba, as seen in the contexts of manufacturing technology and development aid examined in this chapter. This intuition is informed by experiences common to us all: “there are some things you just have to be there to understand;” “you’ll never find the solution buried in your own thoughts.” The rationality of genba-shugi draws on these experiences for its justification.

In today's social science, where natural science methods are being actively introduced, using causal relationships between variables to create sophisticated replicable models of social phenomena is solidifying its position as the mainstream paradigm. International development is no exception. However, theories in social science cannot be as valid as those in natural science. As in the cases of self-denying prophecies or self-fulfilling prophecies, a theory about a social phenomenon, once disseminated in society, may distort social phenomena. Also, behavior, which is considered irrational in the majority of society, may be considered rational in some locality. We need to deal with theories and models carefully in the context of the phenomena at hand. Under these circumstances, genba-shugi focuses our attention on intuition that originates from physical and social experience.

Notes

  1. 1.

    The word is romanized as “gemba” in the Cambridge Business Dictionary.

  2. 2.

    According to Yamashita (2010), a search of journal articles held by Japan’s National Diet Library revealed that the use of the term in articles and academic papers increased from the second half of the 1990s, and thereafter spread to fields such as education, politics, and mass media from the 2000s onward in particular. From 2005, he indicates a characteristic increase in the number of articles discussing genba-shugi as an organizational problem-solving approach.

  3. 3.

    Based on the database of the Japanese Diet proceedings, the number of times genba-shugi was used rapidly increases from the 2000s onwards (seven times from 1985–1989, 31 times from 1990–1999, 245 times from 2000–2009, 429 times from 2010–2019). The same trend can be observed in Yomiuri Shinbun newspaper articles. The term appeared in 31 articles in 2020; in 29 of these, it was used in the context of politics or public administration (the attitudes and ideals of politicians or organizational direction).

  4. 4.

    This research by Morikawa (1988) sparked the popularization of the term “genba-shugi” (Odaka 2017; Ichihara 2015; Woo 2016).

  5. 5.

    Statements to the Diet by JICA management up to the year 1995, including statements by Keisuke Arita, then-President to the Committee on the Budget, March 30, 1985 and March 29, 1986; the statements by Taizo Nakamura, then-Senior Vice President to the Subcommittee on International Economy and Society, Committee on Foreign Affairs and Comprehensive Security, House of Councilors, May 18, 1987; etc.

  6. 6.

    Revisions concerning the yen-denominated loans department at the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) and integration with JICA.

  7. 7.

    Statement by (then) Minister of Foreign Affairs Aso at the Diet. Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense, House of Councillors, 165th Plenary Session of the Diet, November 7, 2006.

  8. 8.

    It has been argued that JICA (2003) was compiled “for the purpose of presenting JICA's rebuttal” of the assertions presented in Fukuda-parr et al. (Miyoshi 2008, p. 135).

  9. 9.

    Specifically, it referred to the transfer of around 20% of JICA staff (200 people) to local offices and the introduction of an overseas project management system under which local offices were made responsible for the formulation, implementation, and evaluation of projects (JICA 2004, 2005).

  10. 10.

    A regional section was established under the Operations Strategy Department in 1981. The number of regional sections subsequently grew to three. Four regional departments were created in 1999. New sections were also established from the second half of the 1980s onward to address issues such as new development challenges, environmental issues, Women in Development, and peace-building (Takashima and Miyoshi 2000, pp. 132–133).

  11. 11.

    The ODA budgets and numbers of JICA staff were calculated by the author based on MOFA (2021) and JICA (1978 and 1997), respectively.

  12. 12.

    From an interview with a former JICA staff member. At the time, authorization was obtained by fax, requiring even more time than in the present day.

  13. 13.

    The general budget declined from its peak (in yen, here indexed at 100) in 1997 to 89.6 in 2000, 73.4 in 2003, and 65.0 in 2006. The budget was reduced by approximately one third over the space of a decade (calculated by the author in reference to MOFA 2021).

  14. 14.

    From an interview with a former JICA staff member.