Journal of Group Dynamics
Online ISSN : 2187-2872
ISSN-L : 2187-2872
Volume 32
Displaying 1-6 of 6 articles from this issue
Editorial board and editorial policy
Special contribution
  • Control Processes by Leadership
    Nobuo Sannomiya
    Article type: Special contribution
    2015 Volume 32 Pages 3-58
    Published: December 28, 2015
    Released on J-STAGE: April 04, 2015
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
       An organization of university is constituted by faculty members, students and clerical employees. Both faculty members and students are supposed to act freely depending on their own individual values. However, in recent years, activities of university have come to be affected by evaluations and decisions made by outsiders surrounding the university.
       A university is an organization for higher education in which it is aimed at to explore truth by research activities and disseminate the truth into the society by educational activities for students. The mission is appreciated generally inside and outside the university but various different demands are proposed due to its freedom for specific problems. That is, faculty members and students demand freedom of activities based on their individual values while people outside the university tend to demand high efficiency in goal achievement of the university. It is a critical role of a president to reconcile those demands especially since national and local public universities were transformed into independent agencies.
       The author played a role of president of a local public university for nine years after engaging in research and education as a professor of national university for many years. During the presidency, he was expected to exert leadership to promote the organizational reform in the face of a huge environmental change of the university. This paper was written based on the many formal messages he sent to the faculty members. His opinions on how organizational dynamics can be controlled by leadership function were described while referring to many experiences as a president.
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Japanese papers with English abstract
  • Hisatoshi Mori
    2015 Volume 32 Pages 62-86
    Published: December 28, 2015
    Released on J-STAGE: June 12, 2015
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
       This paper reported a grass-roots activity of screening a documentary film named ‘Himeyuri' at Matsue city, Shimane prefecture, Japan in 2008 and discussed it depending on the concepts of ‘wildfire activities' and ‘stigmergy.' The activity was initiated by Mr. T who had been asked to show the film by his friend. A group of people he organized to achieve the goal did not only show it but also run an attractive exhibition on the film and furnished financial assistance for a high school in Shimane prefecture to screen it. The team scattered when all activities above were finished, but these activities triggered new screening activities or relevant activities.
       A concept of networking that has been used so far in the analysis of grass-roots activities is not taken as appropriate because the activities often change membership but spread like a wildfire. Engeström (2008) conceptualized such activities as ‘wildfire activities,' which pop up in unexpected locations at unexpected times and expand very rapidly. The wildfire activities are maintained and expanded by ‘stigmergy' that is a mechanism of spontaneous, indirect coordination between agents or actions, where the trace left in the environment by an action stimulates the performance of a subsequent action, by the same or different agent. The concept of stigmergy makes it possible to understand the process of grass-roots activities in which complicated but sophisticated cooperation is achieved without prior organizing and planning.
       We discussed the grass-roots activities of screening as following: (1) Meaning of screening was revised by the activity and the revised meaning became a trigger of a new activity as a trace of the previous activity; (2) Verbal communication through an electronic mailing list facilitated participation of new members and also development of activities; and (3) In addition to an electronic communication, face-to-face communication enhanced cohesion of participants and promoted goal attainment.
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  • A Case Study on the Osaka Nature School
    Chihiro Mizoguchi, Akiko Rakugi, Toshio Sugiman
    2015 Volume 32 Pages 88-102
    Published: December 28, 2015
    Released on J-STAGE: December 25, 2015
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    <br>   Nature has receptive power to encompass people equally without any discrimination as is said ‘in the heart of nature's bounty’ in Japanese. Nature never tells a lie and is never obsequious to the great. Humans have no ways other than becoming a part of nature. People can meld each other by melding nature. <br>   This paper reported activities of a citizen group called the Osaka Nature School that had given children opportunities to play in natural environment for several decades, based on the authors’ intensive fieldwork. In the School, people who used to participate in the activities when they were children a long time ago play a role of leader now. It was found that the School was a place where nature, children and leaders (adults) melded each other, which articulated their world semantically in their own way and continued to attract participants to the School.
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  • YB. Cahya Widiyanto, Toshio Sugiman
    2015 Volume 32 Pages 104-313
    Published: December 28, 2015
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2015
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    <br>   This study describes the process in which a certain community of farmers in Indonesia tried to overcome a crisis caused by rapid penetration of free market economy into agriculture. In the crisis, farmers were marginalized economically and socially and their community was declined by losing togetherness and cultural traditions. In such a situation, a community revitalization movement was initiated by the author in 2008 and carried out by a group of farmers in Daleman, a sub-district located in Bantul, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. This paper reported the process of the movement during 2008-2013, though it is still going on. <br>   The movement had two major characteristics. First, a strategy called creative return to the past was emphasized. Specifically, regaining the togetherness and cultural traditions that they had maintained until the penetration of market economy is regarded as the return to the past. But, it is almost impossible to ignore market economy in our globalized world and thus the return to the past is possible only by utilizing market economy creatively. Second, an ethnography was written by the author not just for an academic purpose but also for contributing to the movement by facilitating reflective dialog among participants. In this sense, it is called engaged ethnography. <br>   The group of farmers was gradually convinced that the crisis was brought by their passive attitude toward market economy and finally reached a future vision to start organic farming as a major pillar of their activities. Organic farming had been conducted by all farmers until they began to use chemical fertilizer and pesticide to increase the rice production to meet market demand. In the process of development of the vision, the author used the ethnographies he had produced concerning the crisis until then to help the farmers understand that the crisis was not just a tragedy of their own community but was a nation-wide prevalent problem caused by market economy and that it would be possible to overcome it if they stand up together and start to do something new actively. <br>   Fortunately, organic farming was appreciated in the market while the farmers regained togetherness and cultural tradition in their community. However, the success also led the community to confusion and even a conflict in 2011-12. The conflict was so serious that neither the farmers nor the author could find any future prospects. It was the engaged ethnography the author wrote in 2008-10 that helped them resolve the conflict and regain solidarity. By the ethnography, they could recollect the process in which they once struggled with development of their solidarity and future vision and convince themselves of how they should proceed to the next step.
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