Japanese Management Scholars and English Journal Publications

Abstract

This essay discusses how the Japanese academic community of management should deal with the evaluation system of a global standard based on publications in prestigious academic journals in English. Firstly, the essay argues that the main mission of management scholars is to send “good academic messages” to the society—be it local or global—and that while it is important, writing for English journal publications is not the only means. Secondly, the essay proposes that the Japanese academic community of management, with an internationally middle-sized scale and a relatively large national economy/industry behind it, should adopt a hybrid system of sending good messages both locally and globally with local-global loops of knowledge creation and adoption, rather than continuing to be totally local or becoming a component of the global management academic platform based on uniform evaluations by English journal publications. Lastly, the essay proposes that the Japanese academic community of management, including universities and associations, should systematically support its members who challenges international journal publications, younger scholars in particular, considering such barriers that many of them may face as language, methodologies, locality of themes and data collection.