Gesellschaften im Umbruch? Aspekte des Wertewandels in Deutschland, Japan und Osteuropa (Societies in Upheaval? Aspects of the Transformation of Values in Germany, Japan, and Eastern Europe)

Central to the DIJ research project on the “Transformation of Values in Post-War Japan” was the question of whether Japan’s modernization involved the same transformation of values that can be observed in modernization processes in Western societies. The result was that Japanese attitudes and values in the central domains of life show configurations of value patterns similar to – but not identical with – those in Western industrialized societies. The image of the Japanese as individuals thinking and acting strictly in relation to their group and firmly bound to hierarchical social structures could be refuted once again.

This volume documents a symposium on “Transformation of Values in Industrialized Nations: A Comparison between Germany, Japan, and Eastern Europe” held in April 1995 in Bonn. The event was intended as a first step towards comparing and contrasting the results of research in this field.