An Exploration of the History of Cross-cultural Negotiation: The First U.S.-Japan Trade Negotiation before Commodore Perry's Arrival

Abstract

This working paper treats a relatively new and as yet largely unexplored area of research: The coming of the first Americans to Japan, on two merchant vessels, Lady Washington and Grace, sailing from Massachusetts in 1791, an attempt by the United States to establish commercial relations with the Japanese through negotiations some 60 years prior to the arrival of Commodore Perry in 1853, it describes how the first contacts were made between the Americans and the Japanese within a framework of the history of cross-cultural and cross-national negotiation. Incidental to the investigation, this paper also focuses upon: 1), conceptions held by the Americans and the Japanese with regard to the term negotiation and the connotative meanings attached to it; 2) aspects of behavioral patterns adopted by the Japanese and the Americans during the negotiation process; and, 3), whether the effects of cross-cultural differences inherited from the past are (and have been) pervasive and continual.