System Emergence at Toyota History

Abstract Chapters 2 and 3 analyze the historical aspects of the Japanese automobile manufacturing system as an evolutionary process (see figure 2.1). The main purpose of this analysis is to demonstrate that Toyota’s manufacturing capability building process can be described as multipath system emergence, and thereby to highlight the top layer of Toyota’s distinctive competence-its evolutionary learning capability. The present chapter describes a brief history of the Toyota-style manufacturing system, and the next chapter reinterprets it from the system emergence point of view.