ABSTRACT

I gathered the information for this study from a case study of a Japanese-owned company in the Southwest, from July through October of 1992, and from my research trip to the Midwest and California during the Summer of 1993. In addition to one case study company, I studied nine (9) Japanese-owned and four (4) non-Japanese companies. The primary source of data is a series of semi-formal interviews with managers and workers. Most of the interviews were tape-recorded and later transcribed. I conducted 72 interviews and collected about 150 hours of taped interviews. In addition, I did participant observation whenever possible. My fieldnotes on what I observed and on activities that I shared with employees, as well as my own ideas and reflections comprise an important part of the primary data. A secondary source of data involves formal written documents of the various companies regarding management policies and procedures, and informal documents such as a company’s employee newsletter. I also relied on government documents, articles in the press, and the secondary literature on the subject during the fieldwork.