ABSTRACT
Japan is deceptively like any other market in the industrialised world, and it is all too easy to be impressed by the similarities and to minimise, or even disregard, the differences. Living and working in Japan usually requires a higher degree of adaptation and re-adjustment for the foreigner than in other developed countries, basically as a direct result of the apparent dual personality of the Japanese. Whilst the foreigner is welcomed and generally accepted, there are continual reminders that he is alien to Japanese society on the other. The Japanese generally view themselves as a homogeneous race, which is by no means correct, and they like to think they are different from others. By all means pander to these whims, since there is little to be gained by asserting that the Japanese are essentially the same as businessmen and consumers around the world, yet in the paradoxical society the similarities tend to be immediately more obvious.
