Students of Japanese business development have long debated the question of what has been called “community-centered entrepreneurship.” Most often, the debate has involved two groups: one which has contended that Japanese businessmen put the public interest ahead of personal gain, and another which has argued that profits from private enterprise were so large that public interests could be served without imperiling private profits. In this article Professor Fruin examines the concept of community-centered entrepreneurship in terms of the Noda soy sauce industry as it evolved from the period of entrepreneurial capitalism of the nineteenth century to the managerial capitalism of the twentieth. While analyzing this important early industry in Japan within the context of ongoing institutional and ideological change, Fruin not only offers substantial evidence to support one side of the controversy surrounding community-centered entrepreneurship, but also draws some interesting parallels between the philanthropic endeavors of Japanese businessmen and their counterparts in the West during this era.
