Operationalising Laclau and Mouffes Discourse Theory

as a Practical Method for Text Analysis

Discursive struggle and contested signifiers in the arenas of

education policy and work skills in Japan

By

David Rear and Alan Jones

School of Arts and Sciences
Shibaura Institute of Technology
drear@sic.shibaura-it.ac.jp

Department of Linguistics
Macquarie University

alan.jones@mq.edu.au

The final definitive version of this article has been published in:
Critical Policy Studies 7 (4), 375 - 394. (2013)
By Taylor & Francis

An electronic version is available here: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rcps20/current#.Usj2vEGCiUk

This article is a post-review corrected version, and is the final version prior to publisher proofing.
Readers are advised to refer to the published article for accurate citation.

Discursive struggle and contested signifiers in the arenas of

education policy and work skills in Japan
This paper examines changing discourses of work skills in twenty-first century Japan, which, in the
face of globalised economic competition, have begun to receive much attention in government and
business circles. It operationalises the Discourse Theory of Laclau and Mouffe in the form of a
practical analytical technique by combining it with the construct of intertextuality, commonly
employed in textually-oriented Critical Discourse Analysis. It argues that, despite the
epistemological differences between the two approaches, they offer conceptual tools that can be
used in conjunction with one another to trace relationships between micro examples of discourse
and macro-level representations of the wider socio-political world. Conducting a close analysis of
texts produced by the Ministry of Education and the Japan Business Federation, it identifies areas
of discursive struggle which can be described at the level of key lexical items or signifiers within
the texts.

Keywords:

Discourse Theory, Critical Discourse Analysis, intertextuality, hegemony,

work skills, education policy, Japan

Authors Note
This paper is part of a wider study of contemporary Japanese discourses on education policy and
work skills, which seeks to combine Laclau and Mouffes Discourse Theory with Faircloughs
Critical Discourse Analysis to operationalise Discourse Theory as a practical method for the
discursive analysis of texts.

Please see the following paper for an introduction to Discourse Theory and Critical Discourse
Analysis, which suggests how their key analytical constructs might be combined:

https://www.academia.edu/2912341/Laclau_and_Mouffes_Discourse_Theory_and_Faircloughs_Cr
itical_Discourse_Analysis_An_Introduction_and_Comparison
2

Introduction
The present paper identifies and partially deconstructs two conflicting discourses that are shaping
public representations of education policy, employee skills and attributes and, indirectly, identities
in twenty-first century Japan. A discourse is here defined as a particular way of representing certain
parts or aspects of the world, whether physical, social, or psychological. A discourse thus forms an
important strategic resource for those interested in either reproducing or challenging the social,
political and economic status quo. In defining discourse in this way we are essentially following
Fairclough (1992, 2005). However, in conceptualizing the nature and structure of a discourse we
depart from Faircloughs theoretical framework and draw instead upon the work of Ernesto Laclau
and Chantal Mouffe particularly with regard to the role of key signifiers.
In this paper, discourses are seen to be made up of articulatory moments each of which
subtly modifies (or renegotiates) the structured totality of that discourse (Laclau and Mouffe 1985,
1987). What it means in concrete terms is that every instance of use of a key signifier we assume
the existence of multi-word signifiers can be viewed as an attempt by the agents of a discourse to
subtly transform or renegotiate meanings of that term as it is concurrently used by the agents of
another, competing discourse. It is, we assert, at the level of the individual signifier that crucial
contests over meaning take place, often with far-reaching consequences for entire discourses qua
structured wholes. An articulatory moment as we interpret it is thus simultaneously a location, a
time and an event, the critical nexus of contingent social forces, when the function of a given
signifier in a particular discourse is momentarily fixed.
Very similar insights and indeed extensive analyses of key or salient cultural terms have
previously appeared, embedded in a variety of theoretical frameworks. We should mention
Faircloughs analysis of tendentious uses of the term enterprise (1992, p. 187-190), though in
more recent work (Chiapello and Fairclough 2002) he has focused more on themes and tropes, and
on discourse genres and their syntactic realizations, rather than individual signifiers. Urciuoli (2003,
2009, 2010) has analyzed discursive and interdiscursive uses and appropriations of key terms like
culture, diversity and race. Her work is carried out in terms of social ideologies and
differential entextualizations of the terms at issue and, as with Fairclough (1992), it is permeated by
a keen consciousness of the strategic goals and functions of lexical appropriationi. Within a
Discourse Theory framework, Howarth (2010) and Howarth and Griggs (2006) have examined the
practice of rhetorical redescription (Skinner 2002) focusing on uses of the term sustainable by
supporters of aviation expansion. Meanwhile Leitch and Davenport (2007) also investigated
3

discourses of sustainability, this time in the context of biotechnology. Finally, Sum (2009) has
analyzed the concept of competitiveness as a nodal imaginary in the production of hegemonic
policy discourses, and Glasze (2007) has traced the differing use of the term Francophonia as an
empty signifier in discursively constructing former French colonies as a geocultural entity,
spanning the globe.
A discourse does not exist solely at the level of knowledge structures, or indeed
ideologies; it possesses an ontological hardness (Watson 2000) in that it actively contributes to the
creation and transformation of social reality and through that the material conditions of human
beings (Foucault 1972, Fairclough 1992). In recent years, much attention has been paid to the role
discourses play in processes of social, organizational and political change (see, for example,
Fairclough 1992, Bazerman 1999, Faber 2003, Chreim 2006, Howarth 2010, Schmidt 2011).
Bazerman has shown that, in order to effect lasting change on the material plane, social agents
must operate first on a discursive level by creating significant and stable meanings within the
terrain they are competing for (Bazerman 1999, p. 335). Karlberg uses the phrase discourse
intervention to describe change-making that is deliberate or ideological, meaning by this phrase
an effort to change our social reality by altering the discourses that help constitute that reality
(Karlberg 2005, p. 1). When discursive change-making is espoused or promoted by the powers that
be, and is aimed at reinforcing the status quo, it can more properly be called hegemonic
intervention (Gramsci 1971, Laclau and Mouffe 1985, 1987).
One of the major areas in which hegemonic change has been effected in postmodern
Western societies is

the discursive terrain of the New Work Order (Gee et al. 1996) or

post-Fordist production system (Bagguley and Lash 1988). Both of the foregoing labels implicate
a new discourse of skills and attributes demanded of workers in the knowledge-based global
marketplace. In what Boltanski and Chiapello (1999) have termed the new spirit of capitalism, a
fresh representation of the firm has emerged, featuring a flexible, project-based organization in
which information flows in a horizontal as well as vertical direction. Workers in corporations
so-conceived must be able to think and act for themselves, make decisions independently, and
communicate their ideas across hierarchies and divisions. In many ways, workers are rendered
simultaneously more visible and more accountable, incidentally saturating subject-positions with
ambiguity and dislocating established identities (Iedema 2003).
This paper examines changing discourses of work skills in twenty-first century Japan,
which, in the face of globalised economic competition, have begun to receive much attention in
4

government and business circles.ii It operationalises the Discourse Theory of Laclau and Mouffe
(Laclau and Mouffe 1985, Laclau, 1990, 1993, 1996, Mouffe, 1993, 2008) in the form of a
practical analytical technique by combining it with the construct of intertextuality (Kristeva 1986,
Fairclough 1992), commonly employed in textually-oriented Critical Discourse Analysis
(Fairclough 1989, 1992, 1995 etc.). It argues that, despite the epistemological differences between
the two approaches, they offer conceptual tools that can be used in conjunction with one another to
trace relationships between micro examples of discourse (texts) and macro-level representations of
the wider socio-political world. The paper can be regarded as an extension of similar efforts by a
number of researchers in recent years (see, for example, Chouliaraki and Fairclough 1999, Phillips
and Jorgensen 2002, Carpentier and de Cleen 2007, Sjolander and Payne 2011). Specifically, we
employ major Discourse Theory concepts such as articulation, hegemony, nodal points, floating
signifiers, and chains of signification together with the CDA constructs of intertextuality and
interdiscursivity (Kristeva 1986, Fairclough 1992, Candlin and Maley 1997, Candlin 2006, Bhatia
2010) to develop an analytic framework that is empirically grounded but potentially more powerful
than either of the aforementioned theories on their own. Our focus is on the essentially contested
concepts (Gallie 1956, Collier et al. 2006, Boromisza-Habashi 2010) that Laclau and Mouffe
(1985) term floating signifiers.
The texts examined using this approach are documents produced in both English and
Japanese by the Office of the Prime Minister, the Ministry of Education and the Japan Business
Federation on the subject of work skills and education policy. The paper theorizes policymaking as
an arena of struggle over meaning (Taylor 2004, p. 435), in which discourse plays a primary role
in mediating settlements between the competing interests of various policy players (Paul 2009,
Howarth 2010). This post-positivist view of policymaking contrasts with the rational model,
which assigned a false functionality to the workings of society, making the assumption that society
is underpinned by a value consensus and that the various institutions in society contribute to the
ongoing stability of the whole (Taylor et al. 1997, p. 24). The post-positivist view, in contrast, sees
society as a locus of conflict in which diverse groups, with their own priorities and values, compete
to set agendas in different policy areas. Politics concerns the process of prioritizing those values
(Clarke 2012, p. 298). Thus, in order to understand the origins and processes of policies, we need
to identify the discourses that dominate in them, how they come to do so, and which discourses
are excluded and marginalized in the process (Paul 2009, p. 243).
In the case of Japanese education, these policy players consisted in the first decade of this
5

century of politicians in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, bureaucrats in the Ministry of
Education, and representative organizations of big business, like the Japan Business Federation. It
identifies two distinct and antagonistic discourses within these texts through the presence of
intertextually-linked signifiers: a neo-liberal discourse stressing individuality, creativity and
self-reliance and a moral conservative discourse emphasizing traditional Japanese values such as
collectivism, self-sacrifice and obedience to society and state. It shows how these ideologically
unaligned discourses can be seen within nominal groups in the form of pre- and post-modifying
elements surrounding a head noun. The syntax of the nominal groups renders the tension between
these competing discourses semi-invisible, but a close intertextual reading reveals the potential for
significant tension, which places potentially conflicting demands on the identities of Japanese
workers.
The paper begins with an introduction of the major concepts of Discourse Theory and how
they can be operationalized in a critical analysis of a corpus of selected texts. In more detail, it then
discusses the concept of hegemony and how hegemonization can be achieved through the fixation
of meaning of contested signifiers. From there, it examines texts on work skills produced by the
major policy players in Japanese education. The analysis comes in two sections. First, we identify
distinct discourses apparent in the texts, tracing how these discourses are constituted through the
use of certain key signifiers. Second, we present a more detailed intertextual analysis of ten official
policy texts issued by the Japanese Ministry of Education from 2001 to 2010, showing how
antagonistic discourses are combined within the structure of nominal groups. The paper concludes
with a discussion of the implications of this discursive struggle for Japanese society and institutions
as a whole.

Key signifiers and the constitution of discourses

Before we attempt to marry concepts from Laclau and Mouffes Discourse Theory (hereafter DT)
with those of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), we must first acknowledge the epistemological
differences that exist between the two approaches. Fundamentally, while Laclau and Mouffe view
the social world as being wholly constituted by discourse, CDA distinguishes between discursive
and non-discursive social practices. What they share in common is the emphasis DT places on the
contingent nature of discourses and thus of social practices. While Fairclough and others have
argued that Laclau and Mouffe overestimate the ability of social groups to bring about change
through the rearticulation of elements into new social orders (Mouzelis 1990, Coombe 1998,
6

Chouliaraki and Fairclough 1999), they acknowledge that:

Laclau and Mouffe provide valuable resources for theorizing and analyzing the openness and
complexity of late modern social life - they capture the instability and flux of social practices and
identities, and the pervasive dissolution and redrawing of boundaries, which characterize late
modernity.... We regard Laclau and Mouffe as providing valuable conceptual resources for the analysis
of change in discourse - in particular their conceptualization of articulation and equivalence /
difference (Chouliaraki and Fairclough 1999, p. 124).

The concept of articulation dissolves the strict demarcation between the three dimensions
used in Faircloughs CDA of text, discursive practice and social practice (Chouliaraki and
Fairclough 1999, Phillips and Jorgensen 2002). It brings together shifting elements of the social
and stabilizes them into more or less relative permanences as moments within a particular discourse
or social practice. Moments are themselves transformed through articulatory processes by being
brought into new combinations with each other. Equivalence / difference, meanwhile, describes
how signifiers are linked together in intertextual chains to produce more or less stable discourses.
To Laclau and Mouffe, a discourse is an attempt to fix a web of meanings within a particular
domain. The constitution of a discourse involves the structuring of signifiers into certain meanings
to the exclusion of other meanings, and can be seen, therefore as an exercise of power (Howarth
and Stavrakakis 2000). All other possible meanings excluded by a particular discourse are known
as the field of discursivity. Thus:

Any discourse is constituted as an attempt to dominate the field of discursivity, to arrest the flow of
differences, to construct a centre (Laclau and Mouffe [1985] 2001, p. 112).

Since no discourse can fix a web of meanings completely or permanently, the field of
discursivity makes possible the articulation of a multiplicity of competing discourses (Torfing 1999,
Howarth 2005). A signifier that is allocated a certain meaning in one discourse may acquire another
meaning in a different discourse, and since signs (form-meaning pairs) derive their meaning from
their relation to one another, all other signs within the discourse will be configured differently as a
result. This means that an articulation is, in linguistic terms, a predication it is an assertion that
establish[es] a relation (Laclau and Mouffe [1985] 2001, p. 105).
Discourses fix webs of meaning in relation to nodal points. A nodal point is a central
7

privileged signifier or reference point (points de capiton as Lacan 1977, terms them), which binds
together chains of signification and are thus capable of assigning meaning to other signifiers within
a discourse. In and of itself, a nodal point possesses no density of meaning quite the opposite, it is,
in ieks words, an empty signifier, a pure signifier without the signified (iek 1989, p. 97).
However, it acquires meaning through its positioning relative to other signs, a process that occurs
through what is called articulation. Through this partial fixity of meaning, a nodal point unifies a
given field, constitutes its identity (iek 1989, p. 95).
Nodal points and the key moments they structure offer an empirical way in which
discourses can be identified, mapped, interpreted and invoked. Working from the general
standpoint of discursive psychology, Antaki et al. (2003) point to the circular discovery of
discourses as one of the six analytical shortcomings of some discursive analyses. By the circular
discovery of discourses, they mean that the identification of a particular discourse in the text under
analysis is taken as proof that such a discourse exists in other contexts. Phillips and Jorgensen
(2002, p. 143) too warn that sometimes it seems as if anything at any level can be a discourse.
Fairclough (1992), in devising his own influential conceptual framework, carefully avoided using
discourse as a countable term referring loosely to the elements of a configuration of discursive
formations. Hence, in attempting to identify the mixture of discourses drawn upon, either
consciously or unconsciously, by the producer of a text, we need to be able to demonstrate the
existence of such discourses beyond the text under investigation.
One way that this can be achieved is by highlighting the presence of nodal points and
moments within the text, which can be traced to related, prior texts - i.e. through intertextual
analysis. The notion of intertextuality (originating with Bakhtin 1981, 1986, and popularized by
Kristeva 1986) was operationalized by Fairclough in his seminal 1992 volume Discourse and
Social Change. Fairclough gives the following basic definition:

Intertextuality is basically the property texts have of being full of snatches of other texts, which may be
explicitly demarcated or merged in, and which the text may assimilate, contradict, ironically echo, and
so forth (Fairclough 1992, p. 84).

If discourses can be identified (partially at least) through the use of particular key
signifiers, as adumbrated by (for instance) Bourdieu and Wacquant (2001), it follows that
discursive struggle might be identifiable through analysis of how the meanings of these signifiers

are represented, negotiated and effectively contested within the texts. Such analyses are relatively
rare within mainstream CDA, but important work has been carried out in other fields on terms of
particular importance, frequently referred to as keywords, that are demonstrably representative of,
and performative of (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 2001), a particular discourse (cf., e.g. Williams
1985, Leitch and Davenport 2007, Urciuoli 2009, 2010).
Under Laclau and Mouffes terminology, a keyword would have two technically defined
varieties: a signifier that encapsulates an entire discourse (a nodal point) and a key signifier within
that discourse (a moment). For example, if we accept that there is a discourse of neo-liberalism,
the term neo-liberalism itself would be a nodal point, effectively identifying the discourse, while
terms such as freedom and choice would be moments within that discourse, whose meanings are
fixed by their articulation with the nodal point and with each other.
Discourse Theory also has a term for words whose meaning is fundamentally contested,
referring to these as floating signifiers. A floating signifier may be a particular signifier within a
discourse, or it may be a nodal point. By tracing the chain of signification established by a nodal
point, it should be possible to analyze how the meanings of floating signifiers are configured in
different discourses, and thus how articulatory processes (such as framing, reportage,
presupposition, negation, metadiscourse, irony, metaphor and so on) contribute to the
reinforcement or dissolution of hegemonic practices. This is dealt with in more detail in the next
section.

Contested signification and discursive hegemonization

The representation of discourse as a structuring of meaning within a particular terrain led Laclau
and Mouffe, following Gramsci (1971), to their concept of hegemony, which has been taken up by
many other researchers working within CDA. In DT terms, hegemony is the expansion of a
discourse, or set of discourses, into a dominant horizon of social orientation and action by means of
articulating unfixed elements into partially fixed moments in a context crisscrossed by antagonistic
forces (Torfing 1999, p. 101). When discourses become hegemonic, the social practices they
structure can appear so natural that we fail to see they are the result of political hegemonic
practices. They reach the level of common sense, in that their origins and intrinsic contingency
are forgotten (Laclau and Mouffe 1985, Deetz 1992):

The practices of articulation through which a given order is created and the meaning of social

institutions is fixed, are what we call hegemonic practices. What is at a given moment accepted as
the natural order, jointly with the common sense that accompanies it, is the result of sedimented
hegemonic practices (Mouffe 2008, p. 4).

Discursive hegemony is achieved, when it is achieved, by means of a relatively stable

fixation of the meanings of polysemous and contested signifiers around a nodal point. It proceeds
in terms of articulatory moments in each of which the relational signification of the nodal point
i.e. the way in which it articulates with other signifiers in a relatively stable configuration is
reconstituted. Some of these signifiers may have had different and even diametrically opposed
meanings, hitherto, in competing or antagonistic (mutually exclusive) discourses. But
hegemonization works best on signifiers that exist simultaneously in different discourses and
different social or institutional terrains, and that are thus inherently ambivalent. Such signifiers are
ubiquitous and invisible and their ambivalence normally troubles no one. As Urciuoli (2010, p. 48)
puts it:

people routinely use what seem to be the same referring expression in reference to what appears to be
the same thing in ways that are often incoherent, sometimes even contradictory, though users rarely
seem to notice. In large part, this is due to the varying ways in which referring expressions get
sedimented as they travel along different discursive paths in different discursive fields. Such semiotic
disconnection is especially likely to happen when circulating referring expressions are entextualized,
particularly in institutional discourses, and when the phenomena in reference to which they are used are
complex, fluid and indeterminate.

We will thus distinguish between relatively polyvalent signifiers and signifiers that have
relatively fixed associations (i.e. those that tend to be associated in talk and texts with certain other
signifiers and to appear in particular types of statements, such as attributions) by virtue of their
being recurrently entextualized in well-established discourses with coherent and distinctive
value-systems, or ideologies. This means that the key moments in a discourse will consist of
relatively stable signs while there will usually be a wider discursive field in which floating
signifiers predominate. The latter will be up for grabs in the sense that different hegemonizing
discourses may attempt to conscript and appropriate them, usually by using them, tendentiously
and opportunistically, in contexts that constrain their inherent meaning potential and align it with

10

the broader values and interests of the discourse and the discourse community or interest group that
it serves (Swales 1990).
The terms tendentiously and opportunistically above are not meant to imply that the
uses made of floating signifiers stem from conscious decisions made by social agents, even though
these uses may be recognized, retrospectively, as strategic. As Bourdieu (2000, p. 138) puts it,
social agents generate strategies that are appropriate and effective without express intention or
calculation. Eisenberg (1984, 2007), who has written so much on the strategic uses of ambiguity,
is often rather vague on this point; however, at times he explicitly states that individuals can use
ambiguity purposefully to accomplish goals (Eisenberg 2007, p. 7) and many of his followers
seem to believe that that ambiguity is a type of manipulative discourse practice, even a rhetorical
device. Menz (1999), however, represents a position in which ambiguity is seen as naturally
occurring and as having multiple positive effects. According to this kind of thinking, organisations
should tolerate or encourage ambiguity in order to generate new ideas and keep options open
(Menz 1999). For Eisenberg (1984, 2007), the main function of ambiguity is to avoid open conflict
in organizations and promote unity in diversity.
At the same time, strategic ambiguity lends itself to the preservation of privilege
(Eisenberg 1984, Iedema 1998), and facilitates top-down initiatives for social, organisational and
institutional change below the threshold of public awareness (Fairclough 1992). These functions
generally coincide with the hegemonizing aims of established interest groups. And, as Urciuoli
(2010, p. 48) remarks, such initiatives work best when the negotiated terms are complex, fluid and
indeterminate. Such terms, on the surface, often seem simple and ideologically neutral; but they
can possess a latent meaning potential that is complex and multifaceted. A hegemonizing discourse
will attempt to pull such terms into its orbit and conscript them to its cause. A domain made up of
contingently relevant terms of the type just described is what we call a field of contested
signification.

Key signifiers in discourses of work skills and education policy in Japan

In the following section, we introduce some of the key discourses, nodal points and moments that
have been espoused over the past two decades by the major policy players in Japanese education on
the subject of work skills and education. Our sources come from policy documents from the
Ministry of Education (MEXT), policy speeches by successive prime ministers, and major reports
issued by the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren). Although space constraints prevent a
11

full intertextual analysis, we will attempt to trace key signifiers through the chain of texts, drawing
out the chains of signification constituted by discoursal nodal points.

Neo-liberal discourse
Byron Marshall (1994), in his study of Japanese political discourse on education, quotes from a
significant report on education issued by the Japan Federation of Employers Associations (since
amalgamated into the Japan Business Federation, or Nippon Keidanren) in 1983:

We must try to maintain the Japanese workers diligence and group consciousness which have been so
crucial in helping to push up the nations economy. Thus it is vitally important that the schools guide
students in such a way that they have a proper outlook on society and work (Marshall 1994, p. 235).

Coming from what is generally considered to be the most conservative, as well as

influential, of Japans major business organizations, such a statement would not have been
surprising in the political and economic climate of the time. In that period, confidence in Japans
economic system was high. It was bolstered by the popular discourse of nihonjinron (theories of
Japaneseness) which emphasized the uniqueness of Japanese culture and society, contrasting the
group-centered values of Japan with the individualist attitudes of the West. Befu (2001) wrote
about the hegemony of homogeneity, based largely on this notion. In terms of employee skills,
personality-based traits such as kychsei (cooperativeness), nesshin (enthusiasm), tairyoku
(stamina), and kunrenkan (trainability) were said to be the most desirable qualities, with
corporations able to invest considerable time and resources in in-house training programs
(Nakamura 1991).
In the 1990s, however, Japan went through a series of tumultuous shocks induced by the
collapse of the bubble economy, which rocked the nations self-confidence. Since then, new
pressures of hyper-competition have led to a re-examination of what the nation as a whole and
Japanese corporations in particular need to do in order to succeed in the new environment. The
most pervasive discourse apparent in Japanese work skills and education policy since that time has
been a neo-liberal philosophy emphasizing independence, self-reliance, creativity and diversity in
both the education system and Japanese society as a whole. Pushed strongly by representatives of
big business, it places the individual at the centre of society, with citizens and workers expected to
act as self-governing and self-directed individuals willing and able to take on responsibilities
12

previously performed by the state or corporations.

Kosei (individuality) is the nodal point that binds this neo-liberal discourse together, with
other polysemous signifiers acquiring particular meanings through their association with it. The
following example from a Ministry of Education White Paper in 2002 is typical:

One of the main pillars of the educational reforms is the principle of respect for individuality (kosei
jshi) and, in school education, reforms to promote individualization and diversification are being
implemented. However, since Japanese society is strongly oriented to homogeneity, lock-step mentality,
school education was apt to place too much emphasis on conformity. It is necessary to provide
well-tailored education so that each and every child can develop his or her individuality and ability,
while flexibly and proactively responding to social changes (MEXT 2002, p. 6).

In policy terms, what the Education Ministry is actually pushing here is the diversification
of Japans egalitarian education system to introduce free-market competition, reforms vigorously
opposed by teaching unions and in fact pursued only reluctantly by the Ministry itself (Cave
2001, Hood 2003). Individuality, therefore, is not meant as an aspect of human character so much
as a marker of neo-liberal free-market economics, a connotation strengthened further by its
collocation with the term diversification. It is contrasted with signifiers such as homogeneity,
conformity and lock-step mentality, depicted as a strength of Japanese corporations in the 1983
report from Nippon Keidanren but here represented as a weakness of both Japanese institutions and
society as a whole. Individuality also acquires a skill connotation through the phrase
individuality and ability - individuality is something that can inculcated through education and
put to use in the workplace.
This skill connotation is strengthened further in neo-liberal discourse by its frequent
association with the term creativity, as in this policy speech by Prime Minister Ryutaro
Hashimoto in 1996:
As we look to the 21st century, we will continue to pursue a policy stressing individuality and creativity
(Hashimoto 1996, p. 3).

Here, the meaning of creativity is both limited and made ambiguous by its association with the
nodal point. It could be taken to mean either the fostering of creative minds or the creation of
schools able to exercise creativity in the marketplace, or both - yet in either case, its inclusion
13

within a discourse of individuality suggests that creativity is only attainable through a school
system based on free market principles.
Nippon Keidanren have extended the discourse of individuality beyond the education
system and into a vision of society as a whole. They have argued that education needs to provide
employees with a broader set of skills than in the past:

Corporate employees must develop sophisticated judgment and problem-solving skills based on a
broader perspective than before. Young people also need the creativity and reformist approach to
create new business models that take an outside the box approach (Nippon Keidanren 2003a, p. 4).

In the same year, they produced a report entitled Japan 2025, which provided a vision of
how Japanese society should look in the near future. The following extract came under the heading
Vibrant Diversity:

Communities of self-reliant individuals with clearly-defined values will form the core of the Japan of
2025, and people must wean themselves away from the business-centered culture that compels
uniformity if they are to play a role in these communities.... As Japan moves forward, though, it will
have to shift societys center of gravity from the interests of corporations to the lives of individuals. The
Japanese will identify themselves less with the companies for which they work and more with their
own personal talents and interests. In short, the Japan of 2025 will be powered by individuals and the
communities they form. And these communities need not be bound by national borders - foreigners in
Japan and Japanese active overseas will be a key element of this diverse, vigorous society (Nippon
Keidanren 2003b, p. 5 - 6).

Here individuality is associated with other signifiers, such as self-reliance, personal

talents and interests, communities, vigor and diversity. Self-reliance is presented positively as
a way to place people rather than corporations at the centre of society, but viewed more critically, it
can be seen as a repudiation of the ideals of lifetime employment in which companies were
expected to care for their employees on a long-term basis. This, of course, reflects a similar but
somewhat earlier trend in the US, the UK and Australia (see Urciuoli 2008).
The signifier diversity can be regarded as a nodal point in itself, encapsulating a socially
radical, albeit business-focused, discourse of internationalization and immigration. The discourse
of internationalization (kokusaika) in Japan has often been regarded as a nationalistic ideology,
emphasizing the homogeneous nature of Japanese society and the uniqueness of its culture
14

compared to other countries (Nakamatsu 2002, Burgess 2004). Faced with a demographic crisis
caused by an aging population and falling birth rates, Nippon Keidanren, however, are making an
explicit call to invite large numbers of immigrants into the country, placing it under the banner of
diversity. By placing diversity in this context, they are extending its meaning beyond the narrower
connotation of the diversification of Japans education system. Diversity and individuality will
bring vigor to Japans communities, the latter being another key signifier whose meaning is
altered from how it would traditionally be defined in Japan. These discoursal associations are
significant, since they clash strongly with the second major discourse of education policy in
contemporary Japan: that of what we label moral conservatism.

Moral conservative discourse

The first decade of the twenty-first century saw the revival of a discourse of moral conservatism,
which provides a very different representation of the type of attributes the education system should
inculcate in its pupils. In 2006, Prime Minister Shinz Abe pushed through a controversial revision
of the 1947 Fundamental Law of Education that had been drawn up during the American
occupation. Arguing that the law had been imposed upon an unwilling Japan by a foreign power,
Abe set about creating a break from what he termed the post-war regime by advocating a return to
patriotism and traditional Japanese values. He called for the reintroduction of patriotic education
(aikoku kyiku) into the curriculum, contending that children should be taught:

values such as public service (kky no seishin), self-discipline (jiritsu), morals (dtokushin) and
attachment to and affection for the community and country where we have been born and raised
(Abe 2007, p. 6).

Although Abes abrupt fall from power (until his dramatic re-election in late 2012) led to a quiet
dropping of the controversial term patriotic education, his reforms to the Fundamental Law of
Education remained. Furthermore, his call for instilling patriotism in young people survived in the
guidelines issued by the Ministry of Education for the teaching of moral education (dtoku kyiku)
in Japanese schools.
The specified textbook for moral education in junior high schools, entitled Kokoro no
Nto (Notes for the Heart), pushes the nationalist values of the ideology of nihonjinron (theories
of Japaneseness), which contrasts the beneficial group-centered values of Japan with the harmful

15

individualist attitudes of the West (Befu 2001). In Kokoro no Nto, as in nihonjinron generally,
Japan is presented as a monolithic entity, with its values and culture homogeneous and uncontested.
Moreover, the title of the book evokes a nodal point of moral conservative discourse, that of
kokoro (heart) which Befu (2001, p. 32) describes as an example par excellence of the Japanese
ethos. Kokoro appears frequently in education policy texts, as in this extract from a speech by the
ultra-conservative Prime Minister Mori in 2000:

Still, our performance in terms of instilling our people with compassion for others, a spirit of dedication
to the betterment of others (hshi no seishin), respect for the culture and traditions of our nation and
other elements of what it takes for us to be rich in spirit as Japanese (nihonjin to shite motsu beki
yutaka na kokoro), as well as the fostering of principles and ethics, has not necessarily been as
exemplary (Mori 2000, p. 3).

The extracts from Mori and Abe are loaded with signifiers from moral conservative
discourses that can be traced through numerous policy texts. Public service, a spirit of
dedication, self-discipline, morals, respect for culture and traditions, rich in spirit,
principles and ethics - these terms acquire quite specific meanings from their intertextual links.
Morals, for example, are of a certain and specific kind related to group-based, hierarchical values.
A spirit of dedication refers to dedication to the aims and aspirations of the nation as a whole,
rather than ones own personal ambitions. Affection for the community where we have been born
and raised also evokes a quite different vision of community than that of the Nippon Keidanren
extract above. Jiritsu, meanwhile, is a floating signifier, often used in neo-liberal discourse and
translated as self-reliant, as in the extract from Nippon Keidanren (2008b) above, but here
appropriated into moral conservative discourse and translated as self-discipline, where it is listed
as a value along with public service, morals and patriotism.

Contested signifiers: hybridity in education policy texts

In the next section, we examine education policy documents produced in both English and Japanese
by the Ministry of Education in Japan from 2001 to 2010. This was a period in which the Ministry
found itself caught between two conflicting demands: calls for individual expertise and independent
thinkers by Japans business community and appeals for traditional group-based values from
conservative political leaders. The Education Ministry itself, although a powerful and influential
body in its own right, has tended towards a natural conservatism, attempting to preserve a degree of
16

consensus in order to enable the education system to function without overt conflict (Schoppa 1991).
These antagonistic demands, therefore, placed a strain not just on policy choices but also on the
ways in which these policy choices were articulated discursively.
The typical solution was an attempt to meld the two discourses together, tying individuality
and creativity to the needs of Japanese society and state. Within this hybrid ideology, individuality
is desirable only in the context of Japanese citizenship. The following excerpt from the Basic Plan
for the Promotion of Education produced in 2008 contains signifiers that are strongly reminiscent of
neo-liberal individuality (unique personality development, acquisition of independence, lifelong
pursuit of a happy life), but places them in a context of service to the country as a whole (relevant
phrases are in bold):

Education is essential to building character through unique personality development, improvement of

abilities, acquisition of independence and lifelong pursuit of a happy life. At the same time, education
takes on a mission to nurture the citizens who form the country and society. It is necessary to put
greater emphasis on the mission of education to develop the ability of individuals to participate in
society voluntarily, support other people and fulfill their respective responsibilities as members of
society (MEXT 2008a, p. 4).

The use of the transitional phrase At the same time at the beginning of the second
sentence suggests that the author of the report is aware of the latent tension between the two
discourses, as if education has two equal but separate goals: development of individual traits and the
nurturing of responsible citizens. This both ..., and ... construction is found frequently in this type of
discourse where the hegemonic aim is to appropriate signifiers, often linking dissimilar or
semantically antagonistic items.
The excerpt given above also contains an example of systematically distorted discourse
(Habermas 1976, Jones 2009) with the phrase: the ability of individuals to participate in society
voluntarily. Two layers of institutional agency are represented as acting upon individuals, i.e.
MEXT itself (It is necessary ...) and education, in order to develop an ability that these
individuals will then exercise voluntarily. Participation in society is portrayed, in the first place, as
depending on an inculcated ability inculcated presumably through moral education. But the
word voluntarily reminds the reader that such participation depends on the individual having a

17

certain disposition, based on values freely held. Indeed, when one examines a range of MEXT
documents, it becomes possible to recognize a discursive pattern or trope in which abilities are
inculcated and the willingness to apply them presupposed. That is, individual agency is
tendentiously presumed to be aligned with institutional goals. This produces a distorted syntax in
which the juxtaposition of ill-assorted signifiers renders the sense of predications indeterminate.
They often have an effect of cognitive dissonance due to the attempted unification of signifiers that
derive from disparate if not antagonistic discourses, in the construction of novel, hegemonizing
signs, but these signifiers unfortunately often have too much intertextual baggage attached for the
project to succeed.
Elsewhere in the report, there are similar attempts to bind the two discourses together,
hegemonically appropriating a discourse of individuality and free-market economics for one of
social development and moral conservativism. The sentence below uses a very symptomatic phrase
in speaking of individuals as citizens, implying that individuality is only acceptable within the
context of a persons duties as a Japanese national:

Compulsory education is meant to foster the fundamental strengths of individuals as citizens. (MEXT
2008a, p. 6).

We next review key signifiers that appeared in the 2006 White Paper which is particularly
rich in hybridity and tension. In the opening two sentences of the summary of key points, the
authors describe the anticipated outcomes of a rebuilt education system as a particular type of
human resource (an expression that itself attempts to draw together two signifiers from quite
disparate discourses):

Human resources are indeed the foundation for the development of a nation. Japan needs warmhearted
and robust human resources with abundant individuality and creativity in order to be an affluent country
that will continue to have the vitality for growth into the future (MEXT 2006, p. 1).

The last italicized phrase in the extract above can be represented analytically as:

Premodifiers

Head

Postmodifier

18

(coordinated epithets)

(Classifier + Noun)

(prepositional phrase)

warmhearted and robust

human resources

with abundant individuality and creativity

kokoro yutaka takumashii

jinzai

yutaka na kosei to szsei

Here the head, a compound nominal, indexes and unites two disparate discourses. The first
premodifying epithet (warmhearted kokoro yutaka) is a signifier in the discourse of moral
conservatism, evoking social conformity and traditional Japanese morality. Its use with the term
human resources is incongruous, and the two postmodifying terms individuality and creativity
add to the confusion.
A similar confusion is evident in a later section in the White Paper in which the overall
aims of education are set out. The nominal expressions that refer to the targeted human values are
highlighted in bold, while conjunctions and relative pronouns that signal an attempted coordination
and fusion of more or less discordant value systems are in italics. Following the extract is a table in
which the expressions are characterized according to the discourse in which their meanings are
structured.

Education is aimed at the perfection of human character and at the same time it plays an important role
in fostering individuals who are full of vitality and kindness and cherish freedom and self-discipline,
and in pursuing the happiness of the people. In addition to the existing principle of cultivating capable
human resources who are spiritually rich and full of creativity, it is important to once again rethink
the value of traditional social norms that have long been treasured in Japan, as well as
public-mindedness. (MEXT 2006, p. 1)

Table 1 The Discursive Terrain of a Ministry of Education Text in Japan

Economic-business

Contested signifiers

development (neo-liberal)

Social-moral development
(moral conservative)

perfection of human character

individuals
cherish freedom

full of vitality
self-discipline
happiness of the people

19

(full of) kindness

spiritually rich

capable human resources

full of creativity

traditional social norms

public-mindedness

The signifiers pertaining to the two discourses have specific meanings acquired through
their association with that discourse, to the extent that their nuances cannot truly be understood
without knowledge of the contexts from which they are derived. Almost certainly the producers of
the text would themselves have been aware of their intertextual roots, and their use can, therefore,
be seen as a deliberate attempt at discursive compromise, balancing the viewpoints of two powerful
interest groups.
The presence of the two conflicting discourses makes the meaning of several signifiers
used in the extract unclear. Since the discourses of individuality and moral conservatism offer such
differing visions of what Japanese society and culture should be like, we cannot say for certain
what the perfection of human character, happiness of the people, vitality, and self-discipline
mean in this context. Even the meaning of the word individuals is contested, as in one discourse
individuals are represented as the ideal basic unit of society while in the other their needs and
ambitions are subservient to those of the group.
The overall effect of this hybridity is a confusion of both language and educational aims.
While there has been some attempt to meld the two conflicting discourses together by linking
individuality to duty as a citizen of the state, the process is not strongly developed. What has
emerged is not a new discourse that reconciles the conflict, but a mixture that serves more to
highlight it.

Conclusion
This paper began by characterizing policy texts as an arena of struggle over meaning (Taylor
2004, p. 435) in which policies are the outcomes of struggles between contenders of competing
objectives, where language or more specifically discourse is used tactically (Fulcher 1989, p.
7). Wodak (2000) calls the process of producing a policy text one of moving from conflict to
consensus, and critical discourse analysis can help to reveal this process by documenting multiple
and competing discourse in policy texts, in highlighting marginalized and hybrid discourses, and in

20

documenting discursive shifts in policy implementation processes (Taylor 2004, p. 433). Likewise,
Discourse Theory in accordance with its emphasis on the contingency of discourses, and of social
life qua discourse views the policy process as dynamic and marked by a continuous
contestations about meanings (Paul 2009, p. 243-4).
In attempting to document competing visions of the skills and attributes that the Japanese
education system should inculcate, we have argued that intertextual analysis can be enhanced
through the employment of major concepts drawn from Laclau and Mouffes Discourse Theory. In
particular, the terms nodal points, moments, floating signifiers, articulation, and chains of
signification can be used to show how discourses construct the meanings of key signs and structure
them into more or less stable configurations. By tracing key signifiers through a chain of texts, we
can identify privileged signifiers, or nodal points, through which other signs within a discourse
acquire specific meanings, often to the exclusion of other meanings. Furthermore, we can identify
points of intersection between discourses where a struggle over meaning takes place. This allows
us to make empirical interpretations of texts, pinpointing signifiers that signal the use of a
particular discourse.
In the White Paper policy texts issued by the Ministry of Education from 2001 to 2010,
distinct discourses can be identified: neo-liberal discourses emphasizing individuality, creativity
and diversity on both a personal and societal level; and moral conservative discourses calling for a
return to traditional morality, group-based values and patriotic service. Each discourse is marked by
signifiers which are structured around nodal points such as kosei (individuality), taysei (diversity),
and kokoro (heart).
These signifiers appear in texts repeatedly, and only with knowledge of context can their
significance be understood. When the Education Ministry uses these signifiers in official policy
texts, it is doing so with full awareness of the intertextual baggage they carry with them. Placed
side-by-side in single propositions and linked, somewhat crudely, with conjunctive expressions,
they are a deliberate and to those involved in the policymaking process manifest attempt to
bring together diverse viewpoints into a single vision. They are, in other words, the outcome of the
process of moving from conflict to consensus.
The problem for policymakers is that the two competing discourses differ in such
fundamental ways that any attempt to produce a hybrid discourse coherent enough to build and
maintain hegemony is laden with difficulty. In other contexts, semiotic coherence might be
achieved through indexical ordering (Silverstein 2003), when the denotational parameters of
21

related terms are reset (see Urciuoli 2003, for an example). In face-to-face interactions semiotic
coherence (validation) is (re-)constituted through glossing episodes (i.e. repair), as recently
pointed out by Duncker (2012). However, when parties with divergent interests, commitments and
premisesiii come to debate meanings publicly and formally, semiotic negotiation and indexical
re-ordering are rarely observed and contestation remains the norm (Silverstein 2004, Collier et al.,
2006).
One method by which it might be achieved in education policy discourses is through
widespread use of strategic ambiguity, in which the meanings of floating signifiers are blurred to
allow them to be appropriated into a new discourse. Eisenberg (1984) suggested that one function
of strategic ambiguity was to avoid overt conflict in the interests of organizational unity, and
El-Sawad et al. (2004) referred to double-think as an essentially functional device, i.e. as a
means of containing contradiction and of ordering the individuals experience. The nodal point of
individuality, for example, is well-positioned for this, in light of its structuring in Japanese
neo-liberal discourse as a utilitarian quality that can be put to use in the workplace. The frequent
collocation of individuality with creativity positions them both as skills that can be acquired
through education. This fits into the general moral conservative philosophy that the citizenry of
Japan have a duty of service toward society and state individuality as a skill that can be used to
expand national economic power. Other terms in common use as desirable skills for graduates and
workers, such as communication skills (komyunikshon nryoku), teamwork (chmuwku), and
flexibility (jnan-sei) can also blur the differences between the two conflicting discourses.
Communication skills, for example, might equally well be articulated as the ability to express ones
own opinions in a persuasive manner (discourse of neo-liberal individuality) or as the ability to use
language appropriate to the context and ones own hierarchical position (discourse of moral
conservatism).
We can visualize such a situation diagrammatically, as represented in Fig. 1, with the
meanings of the middle terms still actively contested and in a sense up for grabs from moment to
moment.

Figure 1. The Discursive Terrain of Education Policy and Work Skills in Japan

22

Independent
thinking
Individual
freedom, rights
Identify own
priorities

Communication
skills

Patriotism,
loyalty

Individuality
Individual
choice
Selfreliance

Flexibility

Enthusiasm

Proper outlook

Floating
Signifiers

Respect
for others

Public service
Morality

Selfdiscipline

Take initiative
Teamwork

Traditional
norms

Critical thinking
Creativity

Discourse of individual skills Field of contested signification Discourse of collective values

and independent thought

(floating signifiers)

and moral conservatism

On a fundamental level, however, the two discourses are incongruent. Most significantly,
neo-liberalism takes the individual as the basic unit of society, while moral conservatism takes the
group. It is true that this view is not universally accepted. Some scholars have argued that it is
wrong to see Japan in terms of individualism versus communitarianism, and that the basic principle
underlying Japanese society is that of kanjinshugi or relationism (Clammer 1995). Under this
view, individuals see themselves as interdependent with no clear boundary between self and society.
If we accept that this idea or ideal runs deep in Japanese society, we would expect it to be
possible to blend the two discourses described in the body of this article (and the political stances
they embody) in a more sophisticated and seamless manner than they appear in the policy
documents examined in this study (see, for example, Ikegami & Campbell 1998). Indeed, there
should be no real contradiction between them at all.
However, the discourse of moral conservatism is not oriented towards consensual goals
and the unification of competing voices but rests on the harder ideology of nihonjinron, which
depicts Japanese society and Japanese values as homogeneous, unique, superior and unchanging.
Indeed, the revivification of moral conservative discourse can be regarded as an effort to restore the
hegemony of that nationalistic point of view, which has been steadily eroded with the decline of
23

Japanese economic power over the past two decades (Rear 2011). Within the nihonjinron vision,
there is no room for diversity, and foreign viewpoints introduced through immigration are regarded
as a threat rather than a benefit.
Finally, there is a mismatch in pedagogical implications between the discourses. If
creativity and outside-the-box thinking are to be major objectives of education, it would appear
counter to that aim to stress a course such as moral education in which Japanese culture and
traditions are depicted as ideal and unchanging in their present form. If students are denied the
opportunity to look critically at their own society, or indeed are actively discouraged from doing so,
one wonders how they will be inculcated with both the ability and disposition to create business
models that run counter to the prevailing climate.
It also places potentially conflicting pressures upon the self-identities of Japanese workers
should they challenge the organization to change its working practices when this seems
appropriate or should they quietly acquiesce in the status quo? Cases of such conflicting pressures
have been well-documented in workplace studies in the West, albeit in different circumstances (see,
for example, Watson 1996, Iedema 2003, Clarke et al 2009). In Japan, the ambivalent attitude
toward critical and creative thought produces a faultline that runs through Japanese education
policy and, as the need for constant innovation proceeds around the world, it is an issue that
policymakers in Japan must surely get to grips with.

References

List of the MEXT texts used as data

MEXT, 2001. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2001 [online].
Available from: http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hakusho/html/hpac200101/index.html> [Accessed
20 Jan 2013].
MEXT, 2002. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2002. [online].
Available from: http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hakusho/html/hpac200201/index.html [Accessed
20 Jan 2013].
MEXT, 2003. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2003. [online].
Available from: http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hakusho/html/hpac200301/index.html [Accessed
24

20 Jan 2013].
MEXT, 2004. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2004. [online].
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MEXT, 2005. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2005. [online].
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2013].
MEXT, 2006. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2006. [online].
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MEXT, 2007. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2007. [online].
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MEXT, 2008a. Basic plan for the promotion of education.[online]. Available from:
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MEXT, 2008b. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2008. [online].
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MEXT, 2010. White paper on education, culture, sports, science and technology 2010. [online].
Available from: http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hakusho/html/hpab201001/1326588.htm
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Silverstein (2003, 2004) and Agha (2007) tend to emphasise the indexical nature of key terms/key signifiers, i.e. their
role in identifying social groups. While this is an important function of such terms, indeed a criteria one, it is not one
that concerns us centrally here. Meanwhile several of Anna Wierzbickas publications (1997, 2006, 2010) contain
insightful analyses of the cultural and ideological work that is done by key cultural concepts.
ii
An anonymous reviewer points out that the discursive struggles taking place in the arena of education and
employability resonate with similar struggles in the field of health care and health-care policy. Seeleib-Kaiser (2002)

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provides a useful comparative study of Japanese health and welfare policies in relation to political discourses; Iedema
(2003, 2007) has analysed conflicting discourses of health care within the more concrete context of health care
provision (e.g. in hospital administration).
iii
Silverstein (2004) points to the knowledge schemata that anchor some cultural concepts and (by implication)
discourses; Boromisza-Habashi (2010) gives the same status to a communitys moral universe (moral norms).

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