Private Disagreement Archives - understand-culture

Leaving the Room

The General Council of the Liberal Democratic Party decides by unanimity, as a matter of custom. A 2016 paper by the political scientist Nishikawa Shin’ichi gives examples of how dissent has been handled. In 1974, two dissenting members were asked to leave their seats voluntarily, so that the council could adopt the Japan-China aviation agreement “unanimously.” In 2015, a member who opposed the security bills left before the vote, and the decision counted as unanimous.

On June 28, 2005, the council’s chair, Kuma Akio, broke the custom. He put an amendment to the postal privatization bills to a vote by show of hands.

Not Speaking Their Minds

In January 2024, Persol Research and Consulting surveyed full-time employees aged 20 to 64 online. As reported by the news site TECH+, 41.6 percent said that they did not speak their true feelings at all in one-on-one meetings with their supervisor. In team meetings, the figure was 43.0 percent.

Unable to Speak Up

In a report dated August 1, 2022, a special investigation committee described how Hino Motors had falsified engine certification data. Its summary says that developers could not speak up to say that fuel economy needed further improvement. They could not tell developers in other departments that the earlier figures had been inflated. At one development meeting, the fact that fuel economy fell far short of its target was not reported.

The news site Kuruma News summed up the problem in one phrase: ue ni mono ga ienai, unable to speak to those above.

Waigaya

Honda describes waigaya as a culture of its own. People discuss dreams or what their work should be, nenrei ya shokui ni torawarezu, without regard to age or position. The name imitates the sound of a noisy discussion.

Honda adds that waigaya is not a place for compromise and adjustment in order to reach agreement. It is a place to clash opinions in earnest, honki de honne de, and create new value.

Speaking Candidly to the Boss

In October 2024, the consulting firm Scholar Consult surveyed 5,161 employees of companies with 100 or more staff. In one-on-one meetings with their boss, 55.6 percent of general employees and 70 percent of managers said they could speak candidly. In the everyday workplace, 53.2 percent of general staff and 62.6 percent of managers said they could speak candidly to their boss.

The Vocabulary of Objection

Ikan (遺憾): regret. A dictionary defines it as feeling regret because something did not turn out as expected or intended. The government uses the phrase ikan no i, an expression of regret, when it protests the actions of another country.

Okotoba o kaesu yō desu ga (お言葉を返すようですが): it may seem that I am returning your words. A phrase placed before disagreeing with someone’s opinion.

Sen’etsu nagara (僭越ながら): though it is presumptuous of me. Another phrase used in the same place.

Delayed Responses

A study published in 2016 in a bulletin of Hiroshima University examined how speakers reach agreement in discussion. When native speakers of Japanese gave a negative response, they used demo or kedo, but, only once, and almost no other connecting words. They often delayed their responses instead. The study suggests that they delayed in order to prompt the other person to adjust their opinion.

In one example from the study, a native speaker softens a rejection with nanka, a filler, and a pause, and then proposes an alternative instead of stating the disagreement.

Sixteen Ways

In 1974, the scholar Ueda Keiko described sixteen ways in which Japanese speakers express refusal.

Among the ways she described are a vague answer that is neither yes nor no, an excuse, “yes, but,” and a delayed answer such as kangaete okimasu, I will think about it.

Unfinished Refusals

Chotto… (ちょっと…): a little… A sentence left unfinished, as in Sono hi wa chotto…, that day is a little…

A Japanese study of refusals calls such forms iisashi, sentences left unfinished. It explains that leaving the end of the sentence unsaid keeps one’s opinion from striking the other person directly. Among the unfinished forms in the study, chotto stood out as especially frequent.

Grass Pillow

Natsume Sōseki’s novel Kusamakura (Grass Pillow) appeared in September 1906 in the magazine Shin Shōsetsu. It opens: Chi ni hatarakeba kado ga tatsu. Jō ni sao saseba nagasareru. Ikiji o tōseba kyūkutsu da. Tokaku ni hito no yo wa suminikui.

“Work by reason, and corners stick out. Pole along on feeling, and the current sweeps one away. Insist on one’s own will, and life grows cramped. In any case, the world of people is hard to live in.”