Grammar › No Choice & Difficulty
かねる — “cannot bring myself to, find it hard to”
A polite, formal way to say you're unable to do something, often for tact or business reasons
Verb ます-stem + かねる is a formal way of saying an action is difficult or impossible to carry out — often used in polite refusals (お答えしかねます — I'm unable to answer that) rather than blunt できません. Its opposite-feeling cousin, ます-stem + かねない, warns that something bad “might well happen” — a risk, not a wish.
How to form it
| Pattern | Example |
|---|---|
| Stem + かねる (polite refusal) | 賛成しかねます — I'm afraid I can't agree to that |
| Stem + かねない (risk warning) | 無理をすると倒れかねない — Push yourself too hard and you might well collapse |
Example sentences
| Japanese | Reading | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| その質問にはお答えしかねます。 | そのしつもんにはおこたえしかねます。 sonoshitsumonnihaokotaeshikanemasu。 | I'm afraid I can't answer that question. |
| 一人では判断しかねますので、上司に確認します。 | ひとりでははんだんしかねますので、じょうしにかくにんします。 hitoridehahandanshikanemasunode、joushinikakuninshimasu。 | I can't decide on my own, so I'll check with my supervisor. |
| このままでは事故になりかねない。 | このままではじこになりかねない。 konomamadehajikoninarikanenai。 | At this rate, it could well lead to an accident. |
🔊 Tap any Japanese sentence to hear it; kanji link to their study pages.
Watch out
かねる (hard to do, a polite refusal) and かねない (might well happen, a warning about risk) look almost identical but point in opposite directions — one declines an action, the other predicts a bad one might occur.