Japanese Labor Unions Dissolved

Japan 1936-1940

Synopsis

The early liberalism of the Japanese labor movement of the 1920s fell victim to internal and external pressures. Internally, the infighting between socialist, communist, and fifth column quasifascist factions undermined the unity of the movement and left it open to the ravages of an increasingly militarist and nationalist imperial government. Prewar mobilization spurred the bureaucracy to insinuate control over business, labor, and production. This effort culminated in the 1940 dissolution of the All-Japan Federation of Labor, or Sodomei, an act that coincided with the advent of the Sanpo, or Industrial Patriotic Societ, state-controlled organizations that brought mainly labor but also management under their umbrella.

Timeline

• 1919: With the formation of the Third International (Comintern), the Bolshevik government of Russia establishes its control over communist movements worldwide.
• 1924: In the United States, secretary of the interior Albert B. Fall, along with oil company executives Harry Sinclair and Edward L. Doheny, is charged with conspiracy and bribery in making fraudulent leases of U.S. Navy oil reserves at Teapot Dome, Wyoming. The resulting Teapot Dome scandal clouds the administration of President Warren G. Harding.
• 1929: The Lateran Treaty between the Catholic Church and Mussolini's regime establishes the Vatican City as an independent political entity.
• 1935: Germany annexes the Saar region after a plebiscite. In defiance of Versailles, the Nazis reintroduce compulsory military service. The Allies do nothing, and many Western intellectuals maintain that it is only proper for Germany to retake its own territory and begin building up its army again.
• 1940: Hitler's troops sweep through Western Europe, annexing Norway and Denmark in April, and in May the Low Countries and France. At the same time, Stalin—who in this year arranges the murder of Trotsky in Mexico—takes advantage of the situation to add the Baltic republics (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia) to the Soviet empire, where they will remain for more than half a century.
• 1940: Winston Churchill succeeds Neville Chamberlain as British prime minister in May. A month later, he tells Parliament, "We shall not flag or fail. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender." In November, German bombers begin air strikes against Britain.
• 1940: NBC makes the first official network television broadcast.
• 1945: At the Yalta Conference in February, Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin make plans for Germany after its by now inevitable surrender.
• 1950: North Korean troops pour into South Korea, starting the Korean War. Initially the communists make impressive gains, but in September, the U.S. Marines land at Inchon and liberate Seoul. China responds by sending in its troops.
• 1955: African and Asian nations meet at the Bandung Conference in Indonesia, inaugurating the "non-aligned" movement of Third World countries.

Event and Its Context

Setting the Scene: The Depression, Nationalism, and War

The piecemeal dissolution of the Japanese labor movement in the 1930s was an outgrowth of the feverish and dense military-nationalist atmosphere of the Japanese social, political, and historical context from the late 1920s onwards. The demise of the labor movement must be seen as the grim, sorry, yet not inevitable consequence of these conditions. The most important immediate causes of this Japanese descent into what scholars have called the "dark valley" were the depression, which manifested itself in Japan earlier than in the West; the mobilization for war; and the reactionary momentum caused by the beginning of what one commentator termed the "Fourteen Years' War" (1931-1945). The more long-range causes underpinning these destructive political and economic forces included the military build-up that started in the 1920s; the lapsing of the Anglo-Japanese alliance and the perceived unfairness of the new dispensation in the form of the Washington conference of 1921-1922, exacerbated by the London naval conference of 1930; and imperialist competition for economic control of or access to markets in an increasingly politically disunited, fragmenting, and unstable China (spurred by its long history of foreign imperial intervention). The final contribution was the general grievance with the self-serving political and diplomatic agenda of the leading Western imperial powers both on the part of Japanese elites and among wide swathes of the Japanese population at large.

A Failure of Democracy in Japan

One of the domestic causes of the shift toward a more nationalist or military outlook arose, however, from the failure of a budding Japanese democratic movement (or Taisho democracy) to plant sufficiently deep roots, especially when the relatively liberal winds of change appeared to favor it in the 1920s. There was a powerful residue of conservative, nationalist, and authoritarian strength, even at the height of the Taisho democracy (exemplified by the achievement of universal male suffrage in 1925, at the same time as the passing of the new repressive Peace Preservation Law). One distinguished academic advanced the theory that the Taisho era gathered the ambivalent forces of democracy and imperial loyalism under the broad umbrella of "imperial democracy," two strands that are closely intertwined ideologically in Japanese traditions of Odo, the Righteous Kingly Way. This outlook constitutes an important step forward in the literature. It suggests that the democratic movement at this time had the potential to run aground or to be deflected toward nationalism or right-wing populism, which in fact did begin to insinuate itself into the rhetoric of many sections of the labor movement.

The Strategic and Ideological Failure of Japanese Labor Unionism

A deeper malaise developed apace in the 1930s, namely the defensive yet ultimately myopic and suicidal tendency on the part of Japanese unionism to extricate itself from its historical relation to politics and socialism. The approach at that time was instead to adapt gradually to the ever-shifting yet increasingly nationalistically charged reality in Japan. This took the form of assertions of patriotism, proclamations of the righteousness of the war in Manchuria or later in China proper, and so on. This tendency had its origins in the mid-1920s in Akamatsu Katsumaro's theory of "realist socialism," which became what historian Stephen Large called "the 'new' ideology of the Sodomei in 1924." Even before the change in direction, the Sodomei (more properly, Nihon Rodo Sodomei, or the All-Japan General Federation of Labor) was a rather bureaucratic and conservative organization that was then governed by three oyakata or feudal heads. These labor oyakata each had factions in the Sodomei, which enabled them to control the policies and orientation of the union or at least to exert a form of metaphorical subinfeudation (or the subletting of land by a feudal tenant or vassal to another, who becomes the vassal) whereby they controlled union policies in the areas around Tokyo.

In the early to mid-1920s, however, both anarchists and communists attempted to win control of the Sodomei. This achieved only the decline and eventual defeat of anarchism in the Sodomei and later caused the serious splits between reformist, gradualist socialists, and the revolutionary communists of the Sodomei. The effects of this kind of infighting in dividing the left and the labor movement more generally are tragically self-evident. These divisions undermined working-class and labor unity and in turn left the labor movement more exposed to pressure from Japanism and patriotism in subsequent decades. The capitulation that this ultimately represented—for example, in the policy of "sound unionism," which was increasingly bereft of any expression of resistance to the state or socialist politics in the 1930s and 1940s—was a dire outcome of the weaknesses of the movement in the 1920s.

The Military and the Logic of War

The Manchurian incident, in which the Japanese army occupied the Chinese province of Manchuria in 1931, was a crucial turning point in the power configuration of prewar Japanese politics. It may be seen as a military assault on the top level of Japan's complex and informal prewar power structure. The outbreak of war had a political and economic logic and a dark potential of its own that would, in time, suggest, to Japanese elites in the bureaucracy and the military especially, a new mode of organizing the Japanese state. It was, in addition, a clear signal that Japan's foreign policy would be from that time forth much more self-assertive, power-oriented, and expansionist. It heralded, therefore, the ambition of military elements (sometimes in combination with civilian right-wing groups outside the government or, more frequently, simply within the confines of the establishment) to flex their muscles on both the international and the domestic front.

Consequences of the Early Failure to Resist

The impact on the labor movement of this growth in militarism and nationalism in the mid-to-late 1920s cannot be underestimated. The attacks upon, and the rounding up of, communists by the Japanese government in the late 1920s were a presentiment of things to come. Repressive state activities further narrowed political freedom of expression and were a loss for all Japanese people. The failure to contest, organize against, and defeat the growing strength of the authoritarian or incipient totalitarian trends in Japan at this time only made it harder for resistance to succeed later on. By 1931-1932, the military and the civilian right wing—in a climate of terror and assassination—clearly had momentum on their side. By 1933 leaders of the labor movement had issued statements of support for the takeover in Manchuria. Former leading communists such as Sano Manabu and Nabeyama Sadachika had shocked their comrades with a retraction of their communist allegiance and their confession of national socialism under the Tenno (emperor). In addition, by the early 1930s Akamatsu Katsumaro had once more reiterated the ideological basis of his commitment to "realist socialism" by explaining that "'scientific Japanism' rested simply on the proposition that for socialism to flourish in Japan, it would have to be combined with Japanese nationalism" (Large, 1981). This was a dangerous position for any working-class movement, for it asserted the primacy of emperor and nation over class.

Social Policy

In the 1920s, before the army occupied Manchuria, social policy legislation and initiatives pursued by the Home Ministry bureaucrats represented a relatively liberal phase in Japanese public policy. This changed beginning in the early 1930s with the failure of laissez-faire capitalism to deal with the world economic and political crises. Since the Meiji period (1868-1912), Japan had had a state-led, top-down political-economic orientation. With the perception that the more totalitarian states were coping much better with the challenges of the depression, Japan's bureaucrats more and more looked for suitable or instructive models for Japan that also fitted in with their sense of the trends of the times.

In departing from the more liberal social policy that had prevailed until the 1930s, one crucial model from which the Japanese bureaucracy learned was that of Nazi Germany. Some scholars have argued that this was more extensive than has previously been thought; some have referred to the system that prevailed in Japan at this time as a variety of fascism called "imperial fascism." Certain Japanese bureaucrats, such as Minami Iwao, were influenced in their selection of policies by their study of the Nazi Labor Front in Germany in 1934. Minami was fascinated by its "Strength through Joy" program, the intention of which was to raise the morale of workers by holding inexpensive entertainment for them and sponsoring group travel. In 1936 Minami finished his plan, which he called the "Policy for the Adjustment of Labor-Capital Relations." This formed the core of the Social Bureau of the Home Ministry's "Japanese labor union bill" as well as the plan for the "industrial patriotic" movement that was to follow.

The plan may have been more Nazi-inspired than it might seem at first glance. The plan would dissolve all unions and employers' associations. Like the Nazi Labor Front, it intended to rescind past collective agreements and allow managers to represent workers on the plant discussion councils (which often remained in the form of the existing factory councils of the large companies). The proposal would also delimit the power of employers. In short, it extended the arm of the bureaucratic state into the running of private companies and subordinated private capital to the interests and preferences of a dictatorial military state.

Steps Toward Dissolution

With parliamentary government on the back burner starting in 1932, the tide of authoritarian bureaucratic and military government continued fundamentally unchecked. Under the Hirota cabinet of 1936, labor took a step backward. Hirota Koki had come to power as prime minister in the wake of the 26 February incident (an attempted coup d'etat by young officers in right-wing military elements) of the same year. Although labor and the socialist party had not been involved in the February event, Hirota decided to use the martial law directive that had been imposed during the revolt to ban May Day demonstrations so as to maintain "public order." The remonstrations of the leaders of organized labor fell on deaf ears.

In September 1936 Hirota dissolved the General Federation of Work in Japanese Government Enterprises. The majority of the unions of this federation were located in military arsenals. Because of this, the War Ministry, which was overtly opposed to labor unions in these kinds of military-related workplaces, had initiated the order to disband, as it regarded unions as barriers to the military's plans to take over industrial production for war purposes. Naturally, the labor movement was upset about this order and feared that the next step would be the outlawing of all labor unions. The war minister firmly denied this assertion. As nothing could be done to prevent the dissolution of the federation, on 23 September 1936 it became the first moderate labor organization in Japan to be suppressed directly. This was a crucial moment in the struggle for the existence of independent unions in Japan.

The New Order

Historians disagree as to the extent to which the Nazi Labor Front inspired the Japanese bureaucrats (and in particular Minami Iwao) in their formulation of the Sangyo Hokoku Kai (orSanpo, meaning Industrial Patriotic Society). Some have argued that there is a common ideological and organizational core among the two labor systems that included a classless national community. Both cultures replaced unions with universal plant advisory councils, and both espoused the "organic harmony and unity of an industrial 'shop community' based on mythic village, folk, or family models." Totally rejecting laissez-faire liberalism or ideas of class struggle, the ideology embraced a corporate view of the enterprise as a "functional community where each member, equal before the Emperor, had a vocation (shokubun), and where labor and capital fused together into a 'single body' (ittai)."

The rationale for launching the Sanpo program was the increased social unrest that gripped Japan in 1937 and 1938. The worry was that the strife would feed communist agitation and sow confusion. Although the employers would lose a certain degree of autonomy in this process of ever-encroaching state management (despite the reassurances of the bureaucrats), the resistance from business was not all in vain. Employers managed to water down some aspects of the bureaucrats' far-reaching plans, and thus they did not lose as much as labor did in the process.

The socialist Aso Hisashi assessed the working-class disillusionment with socialism as an opening for the possibility that Prime Minister Konoe Fumimaro's New Order of the late 1930s and early 1940s might furnish a route by which to implement socialism from above. In 1934 Aso seems to have flirted with the idea of bringing socialism to Japan at the muzzle of the army's gun, as he felt then that the army could be a "progressive" force. Konoe had links to certain ultranationalists in the civilian bureaucracy and the military and a hawkish foreign policy. Given Aso's prior political predilections, it thus comes as no surprise that at the end of the 1930s he began to put his trust in Konoe to transform the Japanese political landscape. This was not a change in tactics on Aso's part, but rather a similar approach to that of Akamatsu of jumping on board a Japanist train and steaming in the direction of the conservative, authoritarian, or even so-called radical right.

One concrete way in which Aso supported Konoe during his first tenure as prime minister (1937-1939) was to support the National Mobilization Bill of 1938. Aso and his supporters in the Shakai Taishuto (or Social Masses Party) saw in Konoe the definite contours of a progressive and thus had been very vocal in backing this bill, which granted extensive wartime powers. Another labor leader, Nishio Suehiro, while advocating the strengthening of the National Mobilization Bill in the Diet, once caused a stir when he waxed lyrical about the march of totalitarianism and how it represented the wave of the future, and how individualism would become a relic of the past. In his enthusiasm, he added, "Prince Konoe should lead Japan … like Hitler, Mussolini or Stalin!" The problem was not his prototalitarian attitude but his assumption that Japan might learn from Stalin; Nishio was eventually expelled from the Diet for this unconscionable faux pas.

The jury is still out on whether Japan turned fascist in this period. The Japanese context may well be so removed from the Nazi and fascist institutions and ideologies that it is impossible to place prewar Japanese systems in quite the same box. The comparison between Japanese "fascism" and these others political systems dissolves in the face of the relative domestic benignity of the Japanese case. One of the unique features of Japanese is that it wreaked most of its violence and death abroad as a byproduct of the aggressive expansionism at the core of the Japanese Empire. The sociologist Bai Gao considers fascism an influential variable in the transformation of Japanese capitalism before and during the war. Although he believes that Japan was fascist, he also believes that Japan borrowed policies from Nazi Germany. This makes Japan a coconspirator in the international march of fascism, but it does not follow from this that fascism is necessarily the best label for Japan domestically during this period.

The Dissolution

The New Order and the Sanpo were intended to harmonize labor-management relations to create a climate of industrial peace in which war production would remain on course and uninterrupted. The only leader who seemed to be concerned about the New Order was Matsuoka Komakichi. He was attentive to the possibility that the unions might be pressured into dissolving their independent existence to become a kind of Labor Front. Matsuoka realized that Sanpo constituted a real threat to the existence of autonomous trade unionism and to the Sodomei, of which he was an important leader. Matsuoka did all that he possibly could without actively resisting or reinvigorating the link to socialist politics. There was no leverage he or any other labor organization could bring to bear without actively fighting for their independence in a wider political struggle for the independent interests of the working class. Matsuoka and the other labor leaders instead had passively latched onto an accommodation to the politics of patriotism after the occupation of Manchuria.

It would be inaccurate to say that Sanpo forced the final dissolution of the labor movement in Japan. In fact, both organized and unorganized workers flocked to the Sanpo of their own will (although it is difficult to say whether that will was exactly free). The extent to which the unions had been won over is apparent in one indication of these leaders' attitudes. All of the moderates (the labor leaders Nishio, Matsuoka, and Aso) believed that Sanpo could be accepted and that it might improve the conditions of the workers. Thus there was no contradiction for them between abiding by Japan's unique national polity, emperor worship, and cultural myths on the one hand and gaining real advances for the working classes on the other. Even Matsuoka, who otherwise did not wish to dissolve these well-established autonomous organizations of the working class, was willing to adhere to a formula of dual membership in a union and in Sanpo. The pressure to dissolve the unions, both from above in requests from the state and from below or within, however, was tangible. The Sodomei could not staunch the flow of its members and member unions that were all the while leaving in droves for the Sanpo.

Finally, the Social Masses Party, which might have been expected to remain firm, dissolved itself and entered the Sanpo. This left the Sodomei on its own, striving to maintain its independence, without support from inside or outside. It was, as Stephen Large put it, in these depressing circumstances that the Sodomei central committee decided to dissolve the federation on 8 July 1940.

Conclusion

How did the Japanese labor movement come to this sorry pass? What essentially undercut the potential for the labor movement to develop along a truly democratic path was its failure to remain in contact with its organic political twin, the socialist party movement. The old adage about strength lying in unity is a sober note to finish on, especially when both the communists and the socialists were at loggerheads and handed the momentum to the forces of the establishment to divide and hence puncture their combined power. The communists were picked off and the socialists conformed, and this marked the beginning of the end for the labor movement and the socialists. Even if they had all stood solid together, victory still was not assured, as the opposition loomed large and powerful. Disunity among the labor factions became the chief weapon of the opposing forces of the military and the bureaucracy. Ideological prostration and organizational infighting compromised the intellectual and spiritual as well as the material unity of the Japanese working class. The only road after this was a slow and painful ideological and organizational death. In 1940 the Sodomei experienced the demise of what had become a barely warm corpse, so desperately had it lunged toward the onrushing Japanist express.

Key Players

Aso, Hisashi (1891-1940): Aso was an intellectual in the Shinjinkai (the New Man Society), which was based at Tokyo Imperial University, under the watchful eye of its patron, the famous intellectual Yoshino Sakuzo. Later he made his way into the Japanese labor movement.

Hirota, Koki (1878-1948): Hirota was prime minister from 9March 1936 until 2 February 1937.

Konoe, Fumimaro (1891-1945): A prince of the noble Fujiwara clan and prime minister from 4 June 1937 until 5 January 1939 and again from 22 July 1940 until 18 October 1941, Konoe was a charismatic leader, famous for his brain trust (called the Showa Research Association), in which many intellectuals and bureaucrats participated.

Matsuoka, Komakichi (1888-1958): A worker leader in the Yuaikai (the Friendly Society, Japan's first lasting national labor federation), who had worked his way up to the top, Matsuoka had been at the Muroran Steel Works, where he had some kokata, or feudal subordinates.

Minami, Iwao: A key bureaucrat in the Home Ministry, Minami was originally a labor manager before he became a bureaucrat and an advocate of Nazi programs following a visit to Germany. His book Germany on the Rise was published in 1938.

Nishio, Suehiro (1891-1981): Nishio was a grand old man of the Sodomei. He was a worker leader, like Matsuoka.

Suzuki, Bunji (1885-1946): Suzuki was the founder of the Yuaikai, which developed from a 15-man group into a national organization of 30,000 members in eight years, laying the groundwork for potentially building a strong, long-lasting, and successful union movement in the post-World War I era.

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—Nik Howard