Papers - Mihara, Ryotaro

A coming of age in the anthropological study of anime? Introductory thoughts envisioning the business anthropology of Japanese animation

Mihara, Ryotaro

Journal of Business Anthropology 9 ( 1 ) 88 - 110 2020

Research paper (scientific journal), Single Work, Accepted

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This article highlights how Anglophone anthropological studies of Japanese animation (anime) have overlooked its businesspeople (such as producers, investors, merchandisers, and entrepreneurs) by formulaically advocating anime creators and fans as crusaders subverting the global dominance of Euro–American global entertainment capitalism. Contextualising such orientation as an example of what Gayatri Spivak calls “strategic essentialism”, the article further explores how to break out of this essentialist impasse of analysis in the anthropological approach to anime. The article suggests that a potential exit might exist through envisioning the business anthropology of anime, i.e. by casting an ethnographic focus on anime’s businesspeople as the legitimate interlocutors for anthropological inquiries into anime. The author further explores the preliminary theoretical implications of this analytical turn through his own business ethnography of an international start-up venture of anime merchandising.

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Involution: A perspective for understanding the Japanese animation’s domestic business in a global context

Mihara, Ryotaro

Japan Forum 32 ( 1 ) 102 - 125 2020

Research paper (scientific journal), Single Work, Accepted

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This article proposes the concept of ‘involution’ as a perspective to understand the socioeconomic dynamics of the domestic business practices within the Japanese animation (anime) sector in relation to its overseas performance. There is a counterintuitive gap between the prevalent assumption that anime is globally popular and its weak overseas performance. Leaving the detail of anime's business aspects relatively unexamined, the literature on anime has particularly failed to address the ‘inward-looking’ feature of the business of the Japanese anime sector. Based on long-term fieldwork of the business players in the Japanese anime sector in Tokyo, this article suggests ‘involution’ as a key concept to fill this void. This concept, developed by anthropologist Clifford Geertz, refers to the process by which a group develops internally by sticking to existing modes of operation rather than by opening up to the outer world. This article depicts how we might understand the socioeconomic dynamics of the Japanese anime sector's mainstream domestic market centrist mode of operation in the context of involution. It also explores how the concept could catalyse us to envision the alternative future of anime, other than assuming anime's global popularity: the involuting Japanese anime sector might be allowing Euro-American and Chinese internet conglomerates to intervene and take over, turning the Japanese anime sector into one of their subcontractors from which they can exploit the sector's creativity.

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Brokering Anime: How to Create a Japanese Animation Business Bridge between Japan and India

Mihara, Ryotaro

 2017

Doctoral thesis, Single Work, Accepted

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This thesis ethnographically examines the globalising of the Japanese animation (anime) business in the context of the creative industries, of Japan’s politico-economic position in Asia, and of brokerage. Influencing the world’s entertainment, creators, and youth culture, anime is one of the crucial lenses through which one can examine Japan’s presence in the world. Despite the prevalent assumption that anime is globally popular, this thesis highlights the precarious performance of the anime business overseas, and examines it through an entrepreneurial anime business project trying to bridge the Japanese anime business into the Indian market. The ethnography of the project centres on its founding entrepreneur, focusing on how he tried to ally with insiders in the Japanese anime sector and the Indian market. The thesis’s 12-month fieldwork accompanied his business in Japan (Tokyo) and India (Delhi), revealing a perspective of the entrepreneur as a broker who intermediates between the discrepant positions of his stakeholders to keep his business afloat. It also highlights the two most critical discrepancies: the dichotomies of art versus commerce (one of the central topics in creative industries studies) and the ‘Japanese’ versus ‘Indian’ ways of doing business (one of the prominent topics in Japan’s political economy vis-à-vis the Asian region). The ethnography found the entrepreneur’s liminal dual agency in bridging, blurring and reorienting the dichotomies was a driving force carrying his business forward. This thesis counterbalances previous anthropological studies on the creative industries (including anime) that tend to advocate the centrality of creators and fans, by focusing on the businessperson in a creative project. It also suggests that the broker is a crucial point of reference when examining how to create workable compromises between art and commerce, and allowing Japanese and Asian businesspeople to get along. The thesis also enhances our understanding of entrepreneurship by revealing most of its function as brokerage.

How an animation production studio survived the pandemic: The case of Graphinica, Inc.

Hirasawa, Nao and Ryotaro Mihara

Journal of Business Anthropology 11 ( 2 ) 225 - 234 2022

Research paper (scientific journal), Joint Work, Last author, Corresponding author

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The following account has been generated through an interlocution between Ryotaro Mihara, an anthropologist, and Nao Hirasawa, the CEO of Graphinica, Inc. Graphinica is a Tokyo-based computer graphics (CG) animation production studio. It is well recognized among the global animation community for a number of popular animated titles, including Expelled from Paradise (Seiji Mizushima, dir. 2014), Hello World (Tomohiko Ito, dir. 2019), and Netflix original Record of Ragnarok series (Masao Ookubo, dir. 2021). Hirasawa is also the founder of Arch Inc., an animation planning and producing company. Mihara has been conducting his fieldwork at Arch since 2018, observing their works of developing animation projects as well as participating in them, especially their attempts to expand their business scope outside Japan, as Arch’s “Global Business Advisor.” Leveraging this connection, Mihara interviewed Hirasawa regarding his experience in leading Graphinica in the midst of the pandemic, and discussed the implications on the future of the animation business. Hereinafter, subject “I” refers to Hirasawa and “we” refers to Graphinica, unless otherwise stated. The following account is, however, a co-authored work: Mihara wrote the English draft, as well as its Japanese translation, for Hirasawa’s review, and revised the text with Hirasawa, through which Mihara enhanced his understandings on the mechanics of anime production. Hirasawa, on the other hand, also developed his thoughts through the revision by remembering relevant events in response to Mihara’s comments and agreeing (and disagreeing) with Mihara’s suggestions regarding how his experience should be contextualized (especially in an academic context). The authors, in this regard, produced a collaborative ethnographic account, written jointly with an anthropologist and his interlocutor (cf. Van Maanen 1988) in the context of business anthropology.

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An essay on the relationship between Cool Japan and trade policy

Mihara, Ryotaro

RIETI Discussion Paper Series (13-J-051)  2013

Research paper (bulletin of university, research institution), Single Work

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現在経済産業省において推進されているクール・ジャパン政策はその多くが輸出振興政策で構成されているが、通商政策関連の論点との関連性はこれまであまり論じられてこなかった。本稿は、クール・ジャパン政策に係る輸出振興政策の概要（背景・定義、目的、方法論、代表的な政策、評価等）を俯瞰するとともに、今後我が国が当該輸出振興政策を推進する際に直面すると予想される通商政策関連の論点を整理することを通じて、両者のインターフェースにつき考察することを目的とする。具体的には、（ １ ） 我が国のライフスタイル・価値観を世界の消費者へ浸透させるというクール・ジャパン政策に係る輸出振興政策の「意図」が輸入国側から問題視されるのではないか、（ ２ ）「自由貿易の推進」と「文化多様性の保護」は必ずしもトレードオフの関係にはなく、日本はクール・ジャパン政策に係る輸出振興政策の推進により両者と異なる「第三極」の形成を主導できるのではないか、（ ３ ）クール・ジャパン政策に係る輸出振興政策の分野においても「コーポレート・フォーリン・ポリシー」の構築が必要なのではないか、等の論点につき考察する。

The Ouroboros strip, or an essay on anime orientalism

Mihara, Ryotaro

Hitotsubashi Business Review 58 ( 3 ) 68 - 85 2010

Research paper (scientific journal), Single Work

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北米における日本アニメの語られ方、研究のされ方、受容のされ方は、かつてエドワード・サイードが「オリエンタリズム」というセオリーで批判した、西洋におけるオリエントに関する言説のあり方と驚愕すべき類似が見られる。北米現地で日本アニメのあり方を実地に観察した結果、とりわけ顕著だったのは、「自己充足的・自己補強的な性格を持つ閉じられたシステムとしてのオリエンタリズム」の日本アニメ版とでもいうべき事態である。北米における日本アニメについての研究や言説等は、彼らのなかだけでの閉じたフィードバック・ループ（「ウロボロスの環」）を形成している側面があるのではないか。