Japanese Bosses, Chinese Workers: Power and Control in a Hong Kong Megastore

This text, the result of two years of fieldwork in the Hong Kong subsidiary of a Japanese supermarket, is a cross-cultural study within Asia by an Asian anthropologist. Rather than large generalizations about the cultural bases of the success of Japanese companies, attention is drawn to the micro structures of power and resistance within these companies, as revealed by the fieldwork. The author examines the ways organizing work, rank, compensation and promotion inside the company reveal the socio-economic base of managerial control. By exploring how the categorical difference between Japanese expatriates and Hong Kong Chinese staff is produced, the hidden aspect of the control by a monopoly of identity formation is made visible.