Labor politics in Japan during ‘the lost fifteen years’: from the politics of productivity to the politics of consumption

Abstract

This article aims to unravel the nature of the various dilemmas faced by Japanese labor unions, exploring why unions have not succeeded in revitalizing the labor movement despite the fact that neoliberal reforms have created a constituency that needs and desires such revitalization. It argues that the politics of productivity all but disappeared from Japanese policy-making in the mid 1990s, to be replaced by ‘the politics of consumption’. The politics of consumption takes place at two levels. First, workers are treated as consumers or clients, which results in existing labor laws and employment protection becoming outmoded and irrelevant. Second, the majority of the public consumes politics passively instead of actively engaging in politics through civil society organizations, thus becoming an attractive target for the mobilization efforts of populist politicians. Taken as a whole, the politics of consumption veils distributional conflicts aggravated by previous reforms. The new mode of democracy discredits the legitimacy of unions as labor representatives, thereby making it even harder for the Japanese labor movement to reclaim an active role in the policy-making process.