The author sketches the reception of psychoanalysis in Japan before and after World War II with special regard to the accomplishments of the "pioneers," the medical group surrounding the psychiatrist Marui and the nonmedical group around Otsuki. With some exceptions, psychoanalytic therapy has not taken hold despite the Americanization of Japan of the last thirty years. The nonindividualistic culture, shaped by Japanese Buddhism, has developed the ideal of the harmonious integration of the person into the group, society, and nature. This culture is alien to psychoanalysis which is oriented toward individual autonomy and thus characteristically occidental. This view is supported by the typically Japanese morita and naiken therapies as well as by the "Buddhist school" of psychoanalysis.