This week, we cover the Miike coal mine strike of 1960. As labor and management do battle over the future of the mines, how will the future of the country be shaped by their clash?
Sources
Gerteis, Christopher. Gender Struggles: Wage-earning Women and Male-dominated Unions in Postwar Japan
Hyde, Sarah. The Transformation of the Japanese Left.
Golden, Miriam. Heroic Defeats: The Politics of Job Loss.
Kawanishi, Hirosuke. The Human Face of Industrial Conflict in Postwar Japan.
Images
Miners in protective gear sitting in during the protests.Housewives in Miike meet in support of the strike.Strikebreakers like the ones here were deployed by Mitsui to attack the workers. Some were affiliated with the yakuza, and one of the strikers was killed during these confrontations.The entrance to the main Miike mineshaft as of 2016. The mine was shuttered in the 1990s.The death of Asanuma Inejiro, broadcast live on NHK, became a sort of symbolic stand in for the death of the old Japanese Left.
2 thoughts on “Episode 245 – The Summer of Rage, Part 2”
What types of protections does Japanese law provide for organized labor? Is the right to collectively bargain recognized in Japan? I’m wondering if there are parallels to things in the US like the National Labor Relations Board or laws that set up the boundaries as to what employers may or may not do as well as what unions may or may not do?
If so, how did those come about?
Now that you’ve done Anpo and the Miike coal strike, will you now do the Zenkyoto protests? That whole situation, the alliances involved, geba sticks, and what they exactly wanted is confusing to me. I’m sure you have thoughts on Nihon University’s “Nihon Auschwitz.”
What types of protections does Japanese law provide for organized labor? Is the right to collectively bargain recognized in Japan? I’m wondering if there are parallels to things in the US like the National Labor Relations Board or laws that set up the boundaries as to what employers may or may not do as well as what unions may or may not do?
If so, how did those come about?
Now that you’ve done Anpo and the Miike coal strike, will you now do the Zenkyoto protests? That whole situation, the alliances involved, geba sticks, and what they exactly wanted is confusing to me. I’m sure you have thoughts on Nihon University’s “Nihon Auschwitz.”