Masao Miyamoto

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Masao Miyamoto (宮本 政於, Miyamoto Masao^?) (1948 - July 18, 1999) was a Japanese psychiatrist, cultural critic, and one-time deputy director for Japan's Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.

Miyamoto graduated from Nihon University Medical College in Tokyo in 1975. He then moved to the United States and spent three years studying psychiatry and psychoanalysis at Yale University. Upon completion, he took the position of assistant professor at Cornell University and later at New York Medical College. In 1986, he joined the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare as Deputy Director of the Mental Health Division.

In 1992, he began writing a series of articles critical of Japan's bureaucratic culture for the monthly magazine Gekkan Asahi. These were later published in the best-selling book Oyakusho no Okite ("Code of the Bureaucrats"), which was later published in English under the title Straitjacket Society. Following the publication of his articles, he experienced a series of demotions and was finally fired by the Ministry in February 1995.

He spent the remainder of his life giving lectures on Japanese society and the Japanese bureaucracy.

[edit] References

• Japan Policy Reaseach Institute. Group-Think Meets Individualism: The Saga of Dr. Masao Miyamoto and the Japanese Bureaucracy. in JPRI Critique. Dec 1995.