New Japan prefers the colours of Shibuya and Shinjuku to the west, where young Japanese shop and hang out. Everything about Japanese business and society is supposed to conspire against the entrepreneurial spirit. The cosy practices of big, established companies leave no room for small firms to grow. They are confined instead to subcontracting, living off the scraps that the big companies toss them. Getting rich quick is deemed to be vulgar.
Individual success is frowned upon.
The Japanese think of themselves as lacking initiative, creativity and individuality. Mass production requires scale economies, and scale economies require standardisation. When education is standardised and homogenous, when student abilities are all little round circles, it is easy to sort the circles out by size. This is all true, and not very encouraging, says Kenichi Ohmae, a Japanese management guru. Five years ago Mr Ohmae set up a Japanese school for entrepreneurs, called Attackers.