James L. Watson (anthropologist)

Integrating the invention of cleanliness, which traditional restaurants did not prioritize, the McDonald's brand exceeded customers’ expectation in the 1980s. This suggests the idea that the restaurant was a catalyst to a new cleaning standard. With this new standard of cleanliness, "McDonald’s…[was] more than just a restaurant, it…[was] an oasis, a familiar rest station, in what is perceived to be an inhospitable urban environment". Overall, the company emphasized its priorities on the importance of clean facilities as one of their main qualities.

Western values of consumer discipline gradually implemented into Hong Kong's society. Consumers have accepted key elements of the American fast food formula, but with localized adaptations. The establishment of an American-inspired model of customers queuing was introduced. Queue monitors were sanctioned in order to encourage the formation of orderly lines at McDonald's, which later became an in-restaurant norm by the 1980s.

Before 1975, hamburgers, fries and sandwiches were presumed as snacks. McDonald’s saw it as their duty to construct a franchise and positively enforce the notion that their food could be considered a full meal. Western values of fast food were not a significant cultural phenomenon in Hong Kong until the early 1980s, when young consumers slowly changed the eating habits of their elders from consuming traditional Chinese food to eating fast food.

Watson grew up in a small farming town in Iowa. As an undergraduate at University of Iowa he received support from the government to study Chinese, and graduated in 1965. He and his wife Ruby decided to go to Berkeley, where she finished her undergraduate degree and he took his Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, in Anthropology in 1972.

James L. Watson (born 6 August 1947) is Fairbank Professor of Chinese Society and Professor of Anthropology, Emeritus, Harvard University. He taught at the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies, University of Pittsburgh, University of Hawaii, and University of Houston, and, since his retirement, at Knox College. Among his interests are Chinese emigrants to London, the subject of his doctoral work and first book; ancestor worship and Chinese popular religion in present-day and in history; family life and village organization; food and food systems in East Asia. He is best known outside academia for his edited book, Golden Arches East: McDonald's in East Asia (1997, 2006).