The Legitimacy Acquisition Process of Shinkansen Speeding Up

: Novel ideas tend to be resisted within existing organizations. Mobilizing resources requires that legitimacy be secured in some form. In the case of the development of JR Central’s 300-series Shinkansen, Japan National Railway, which had existed to date, was broken up and privatized, and JR Central, which generated most of its revenue from the Shinkansen, was established, limiting players and allowing the company to gain the approval of most internal organizations. In other words, the company was able to acquire legitimacy by increasing the ratio of supporters rather than the absolute number of supporters.


Introduction
In the post-war era of high growth, Japan introduced and improved foreign technology, thereby achieving economic growth. Later, research and development investment began to exceed the amount invested in plant and equipment (Kodama, 1991), and in recent years, it has come to be a cliché that Japanese firms bring about innovation. However, intra-organizational isomorphism (Sakakibara, 1995) brings with it growing resistance to novel ideas as has been noted by Baer (2012), and it becomes difficult to implement those ideas. Therefore, acquiring legitimacy is critical toward securing resources for realizing innovation (Takeishi, Aoshima, & Karube, 2012).
According to Kikuchi (2016), it was difficult to bring about improvements to the operating speed of the Tokaido Shinkansen during the period of Japan National Railway (JNR). Figure 1 shows a summary of the test car speed; the actual operational speed; and the scheduled speed of the Shinkansen. 1 The speed of test cars is the technically possible speed, which acts as a proxy variable for technical limits (Takahashi & Kikuchi, 2017). Conversely, the actual operational speed and scheduled speed show the speeds in actual operation. This figure shows that there was a time lag between the improvements made to technical limits and the improvements to operating speeds.
Since it began operation in 1964, the Tokaido Shinkansen was constrained in its operational speed for more than 20 years, and no time shortening was achieved in the route between Tokyo and 1 The test car speed is the highest recorded speed reached in advanced testing using test cars. The actual operational speed is the fastest speed between operating locations. The schedule speed is the speed calculated by dividing the distance between operating locations by the time required except time spent stopped in stations.
Osaka. The significant increase in speed was achieved after JNR was split and privatized in 1987. In the process of privatization, JR

Period of Japan National Railway
The Railway Technical Research Institute (RTRI), which existed in the time of JNR, conducted experiments to increase speed using two test cars (Akiyama, 2012). The first was a 951-series test car, which was used in February 1972 to achieve a record of 286 km/h. The second was a 961-series car. It was made in 1973, but the timing coincided with the oil crisis, and the experiment had to be shut down for a while for the purpose of energy conservation (Kotsukyoryokukai, 2015). However, this car was used again in later speed tests, setting a speed record in 1979 of 319 km/h (Akiyama, 2012). From the results of these tests, RTRI found that there were no fatal obstacles up to 330 km/h and that stable operation could be undertaken in the future (Sokudokojokenkyukai, 1982).
Despite that, speed improvements were not made because of multiple factors during the JNR period. First, the decision making of JNR was not done by its top management, and there was a need to get approval from the Diet to implement any proposals. However, at the time, politicians had much interest in creating new railways in their districts, with budgets funneled to new railway construction. 2 New construction of local railways became a way for Diet members to bring money into their districts, and after a railway was completed in one area, in the following year, budgets would be allocated to new railway construction in the other districts of other Diet members. Also, although decades had passed since the Tokaido Shinkansen began operation, causing it to become deteriorated; there was no problem for ordinary operation in that line; and it functioned as a profit-generating cash cow, no major investments were budgeted for it. The profits of the Tokaido Shinkansen were used to balance local lines running at a loss, in accordance with the internal subsidy system used by JNR (Mitsuduka, 1984;Yayama, 1987). In addition, the bulk of executives' attention was given to labor issues. Board meeting agendas prioritized labor union relations at the expense of technology development, and meetings ended with nothing being done with such development. On the human resources side as well, those with superior abilities were used to deal with labor unions and not assigned to technology development. Consequently, aggressive investments were not made at the time (Yamanouchi, 2008).

The number of customers using airliners between Tokyo and
Osaka decreased in 1964 with the opening of the Shinakansen, and that competition on the Tokyo-Osaka route was entrenched. The "Hikari" train was the fastest service on the Tokaido Shinkansen at the time, and took three hours and ten minutes to traverse the Tokyo-Osaka route although airliners could make the same trip, including wait times and connection times, in about two-and-a-half hours.
If JR made no move, it was certain that the passengers on that route turn to airliners because of the increased convenience of using airlines, such as the expansion of the Haneda Airport and opening of the Kansai International Airport. Such a decrease in the number of customers endangered the management of JR Central. Hence, to deal with such a problem, the company set a goal for the top speed of the

Shinkansen to be 270 km/h and the transit time between Tokyo and
Osaka to be two-and-a-half hours. This figure was estimated through a belief that the Shinkansen could steal customers away from air travel if air travel times, including wait times and connection times, between Tokyo and Osaka were greater than two hours. Increasing the speed of the Tokaido Shinkansen came to be viewed as an extremely important issue for JR Central management (Kondo 2010;Otsuki, 1994;Tokairyokakutetsudo, 2007).
Through splitting and privatization, in 1988, the "Shinkansen Speed-up Project Committee" gained legitimacy; was kicked off within JR Central; and led to the development of 300-series cars and the development of the "Nozomi" train. Problems with operational stability caused by speed increases had already been solved, but further research was necessary to solve environmental issues tied to speed improvements. Consequently, JR Central achieved an operational speed, and a maximum speed, of 270 km/h, and moreover, it created a 300-series Shinkansen that resolved environmental issues. This new car cut Tokyo-Osaka travel times down to two-and-a-half hours (Otsuki, 1994).

Discussion and Conclusion
In the era of JNR, the Tokaido Shinkansen was no more than a route operating in a certain area under the national organization. The need to make speed improvements was seen only by certain organizations. More than this, the construction of regional lines was viewed as being a more important issue of the national railways as a whole, leading to resource mobilization and justification for the construction and deficit covering of local railways. Hence, initiatives such as speed improvements to the Tokaido Shinkansen were not legitimized.
However, the breaking up and privatization of JNR in 1987 resulted in the creation of JR Central, which was the main operator in the That said, Takeishi, Aoshima, and Karube (2012) proposed the idea of creative legitimization after securing the resources needed to realize innovation. The process of creative legitimization is one that aims to capture resources required to achieve goals by providing generic reasons for innovation that begins with specific reasons-all this in the process of chasing after revolutionary ideas that begin with individuals championing an innovation. This process can take three possible routes. The first route is to acquire more supporters as a specific reason is given. The second route is to acquire more supporters by working toward a specific reason. The third route is to mobilize more resources as the number of supporters is given.
Although the interest is mainly in the absolute number of supporters, in reality the relative ratio of supporters as a variable is the heart of the matter. In actuality, in the case of the development of the 300-series Shinkansen treated in this paper, the splitting up of an organization created fewer players, which contributed to the Tokaido Shinkansen by allowing research and development related to the Tokaido Shinkansen to gain legitimacy and by enabling resource mobilization.
In other words, the splitting up of the organization limited the number of people with the ability to make decisions on certain innovations; creating a majority of people supporting those innovations; and thereby, legitimizing those innovations and enabling the mobilization of resources. A similar phenomenon has been seen in the breakup of Sony in 2014, with the VAIO Corporation focusing on PCs and PC-related products. The key point here is the ratio of supporters, rather than the absolute number of supporters, and the acquisition of legitimacy by increasing that ratio. This is borne out by the "creation of a small-scale organization" prescription described in the Innovator's Dilemma of Christensen (1997). 3