ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to identify and explain in broad terms some of the underlying values of the political cultures of Britain and Japan. It emphasizes three process value dimensions, which are especially significant for illuminating and comparing the political cultures of Japan and Britain. The first of these is the individualist/collectivist dimension. The second, conflictual/consensual dimension, concerns the relative expectation and tolerance of conflict in the normal political process. The third, universalistic/particularistic dimension, concerns the extent to which either a rigid framework of interdependent values—that is, an ideology—or a flexible framework of loosely connected values, is applied to the definition and resolution of political problems. Each of the above three process values has been shaped or sustained by dynamic, historical influences. One of these most suggestive of the contrast between Japan and Britain has been the extent to which the development of the polity was organic or nonorganic.
