Japan – what can we learn? - Construction Labour Research

workers belong to enterprise-based unions. The enterprise-based unionincludes all regular workers at the enterprise irrespective of their jobcategories and no matter whether they are white-collar or blue-collarworkers. This form of organisation helps to coordinate particularinterests of white- and blue-collar workers and facilitates unionisationof white-collar workers. But this form of unionisation in many casesexcludes part-time workers and other irregularly employed workersfrom union membership. Since irregular workers, subjected tosubstandard working conditions, are on a rapid increase, theirunionisation is a major task facing Japanese trade unions. It should benoted that the enterprise-based union has to be strictly distinguishedfrom the so-called "company union" in that the former is voluntarilyorganised by workers and maintains independence from management.The Japanese enterprise unionism is a historical product. Besides,various efforts have been made to overcome the major weakness ofenterprise-based unionism: its scattered, centrifugal disposition. It iswrong to assume that Japanese unionism can be explained away byenterprise unionism alone.1.2 Decentralized structure and low union density in SME’sUnion organizations stay scattered and progress in organising atmedium and small enterprises remains slow. Generally, individualunions are small in size and unrelated to one another. Anothercharacteristic is that unions are concentrated on large enterprises. Asof 2005, Japanese unions had an aggregate membership of 10,138,000(18.7% of the total of employees) who were organized into as many as28,279 unions. Unions are thinly dispersed over society. The rates oforganisation differ widely between large enterprises on the one handand medium and small enterprises on the other. While the rate oforganization is 47.7% in large enterprises with 1,000 or moreemployees, the rate goes down to 15% in enterprises with 100-999employees and to a meagre 1.2% in small firms with less than 100employees. Since 70% of Japanese workers are working in enterpriseswith less than 1,000 employees, they are one of the major targetgroups for unionisation drives.RENGO is tackling this task through organising drives run by itsOrganisation Bureau. It also set up the Centre for Small & MediumEnterprise Workers. This is to strengthen the unions' say in labourrelations at medium and small firms.CLR News No 2/200652