> I'm surprised more people don't know who the yakuza are, but OK.
Before the '80s, practically nobody outside Japan knew what the Yakuza was. Business development over that decade popularized its existence, so (American) writers picked it up, but after the cyberpunk wave (which abused it), it has largely fallen from favour as a narrative device outside Japan. Ironically, this mirrors somewhat the power the Yakuza can actually wield nowadays: after the Lost Decade of Japanese stagflation, and the rise of Eastern-European gangs (the real bosses of the globalized criminal network, at least in terms of raw "wetwork"), the Yakuza was significantly diminished.
Before the '80s, practically nobody outside Japan knew what the Yakuza was. Business development over that decade popularized its existence, so (American) writers picked it up, but after the cyberpunk wave (which abused it), it has largely fallen from favour as a narrative device outside Japan. Ironically, this mirrors somewhat the power the Yakuza can actually wield nowadays: after the Lost Decade of Japanese stagflation, and the rise of Eastern-European gangs (the real bosses of the globalized criminal network, at least in terms of raw "wetwork"), the Yakuza was significantly diminished.