(sometimes also translated as "corporate bouncers", "meeting-men", or "corporate blackmailers") are specialized racketeers unique to Japan, and often associated with the yakuza, who extort money from or blackmail companies by threatening to publicly humiliate companies and their management, usually in their .
If a company does pay , the will work to prevent others from embarrassing the company, either through intimidation or by disrupting the meeting so they cannot be heard.
The number of has decreased over the years, and in 2023 there were only about 150 , of whom 30 worked in groups and 120 worked alone.
History
originated in the late 19th century. At this time, the unlimited liability of the management put the managers' personal fortune at risk in case of rumors and scandals. Hence the management hired protection, called , to reduce the risk of such rumors. Even after the Japanese laws included a limited liability, hence reducing the personal risk to the managers, these continued to prosper, and were often used to quiet down otherwise difficult meetings. In that respect, they have even been compared to corporate lawyers in America.
In 1984, the law made first steps to reduce the threat from by establishing a minimum number of holdings (¥50,000) in order to be allowed into the shareholder meeting, leading to a slow decline of the number of . In response to this, the formed fake , announcing embarrassing company secrets, fictional or not, from loudspeakers mounted on trucks in order to extort money from companies.
Activities
Disrupting shareholder meetings
Individual acquire enough stock from multiple companies in order to gain entrance to a shareholders' meeting. There, they disrupt the meeting (and embarrass the company) until their demands are met. For this, the often research the company in detail beforehand to uncover incidents of misconduct or other company secrets, and then blackmail the management so that these issues are not raised in the shareholder meeting or elsewhere. Often, they also invent fictional issues that the company would have difficulty disproving.
Modern have developed other, similar methods to accomplish their goals. One less subtle example is the , who disrupt business places with their cries of and praise of the Emperor until they are quietly paid to leave.
Other disruption
also form fake groups, announcing embarrassing company secrets, fictional or not, from loudspeakers mounted on trucks in order to extort money from companies. In this atmosphere, the are able to prosper. However, with the trend for more deregulation in the Japanese market the business environment for is getting more and more difficult.
Companies that have bribed
Major Japanese companies that have been found guilty of employing include but are not limited to:
- Mitsubishi, resulting in a number of arrests
- Daiwa Securities Group
- Tokyo Electric Power Company
- Meiji Seika