Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 16:55:33 -0400 (EDT) From: louisgodena-AT-ids.net (Louis R Godena) Subject: M-I: Japanese trade unions at loose ends Japanese unions, like unions in virtually every capitalist society, are finding the road to hell is paved with the broken promises of social democrats. And Japanese workers, like workers in virtually every industrial society, are discarding their erstwhile political mentors in droves. Coupled with declining memberships, this political disarray is having profound changes in the way in which Japanese trade unionists are conducting political business. Since the late 1980s, unions have been attracting fewer younger workers, while older members are being retired early or scrapped altogether as more and more companies break the unwritten taboo against firing people to cut costs. Those being replaced are being increasingly done so by part-time workers, who not only cost less to employ, but who are situationally difficult to organize, as well. Overall, the unions continued their slow but inexorable decline in 1996, falling from 12,613,582 to 12,451,149. The ratio of union members to the total work force has been falling for more than twenty years, reaching a record low of 23.2 per cent in 1996. That figure has dropped fully 10 percentage points in the past two decades. To make matters worse, the Japanese Trade Union Confederation (Rengo), the main union umbrella group, is experiencing an internecine struggle among its member unions over which political party to support. The Social Democratic party, which for years could count on the unquestioned support and finances of the main trade unions and their privileged bureaucracies, is now, politically, a dead dog. The Communist Party has all but replaced it as the main opposition force on the Left, and a number of industrial and service unions have either opened links with the Communists or are seriously exploring the possibilities of doing so. The split with the Social Democrats (formerly the Socialist Party) became irreversible last spring when the party's political plenum urged unions to abandon their practise of winning large wages. Instead, Social Democratic leaders urged trade unionists to direct their efforts toward "monitoring management and securing better wage structures in line with ability and achievement, rather than seniority". This proved too much for the overblown trade union bureacracy which has fattened itself for years on Japan's paternalistic political-economic system. Since, for these people, an alliance with the Communists is out of the question, they have browsed among the new crop of emerging right-of-center political parties. Many private-sector unions back the rightist New Frontier Party, where many conservative socialists ended up at the end of the Cold War. Zenkin Rengo, a 330,000-member machinery and metal-trade union, and Zensen Doumei, which represents more than 600,000 textile, distribution, food and service workers, have all opted for the New Frontier, though support for the Communists is growing among the rank in file, particularly in Tokyo. There is a growing split between member unions of the Japan Automobile Workers' Union, as the Left moves toward the Communists, while the right hankers after the centrist Democratic Party of Japan. A number of smaller parties are also vying for the loyalty of the recently disbanded General Council of Trade Unions of Japan (Sohyo), which recently produced a still-born "Conference of Democratic and Liberal Unions", to combat growing "radical" [Communist Party] influence. A few have even approached the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, until recently anathema to virtually every wing of Japanese labor. It is instructive, in a way, to watch the maneuverings of trade union bureaucrats desperate to avoid becoming tainted with the brush of "Communism". At a time when slow economic growth has all but vitiated big pay raises, and the unwritten social contract between worker and employee has been all but officially junked, there is little that holds the rank and file union member to the bosses. And the bugaboo of anti-Communism is losing its appeal in a society already jaded by years of economic stagnation and decline. Louis Godena *Nikkei Weekly*, August 4, 1997; *Japanese Economic Almanac*, August 1997; *Asian Trade Union Review*, July-August, 1997. --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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