Abstract
Social movement unionism (SMU) is a concept of unionism that commits to fighting for broad social and political issues, such as social justice, human rights, and so on, instead of limiting its role to bargaining for the economic interests of existing union members. Though among developed countries the United States is particularly known as a country where SMU is vigorous, recently social movement unionism is also growing in Japan as an important concept for the revitalization of the labor union movement. However, this unionism is regarded as an immature phenomenon in this country and theories, tactics and strategies of SMU should be imported from the US and other countries by a considerable number of researchers and union activists in Japan. In other words, famous old Japanese leftist unions (All Japan Congress of Industrial Unions (CIU/Sanbetsu Kaigi), General Council of Trade Unions of Japan (Sohyo) etc.) are not recognized as organizations committing to SMU. This view is supported by many researchers for two reasons: First, the main force of CIU and Sohyo unionism was essentially exclusive male workers who were interested mainly in acquiring corporation memberships. Second, CIU and Sohyo unionism should be defined as political unionism but not as SMU. However, both ideas are incorrect. The former view, which is based on essentialism and disregards discourse on movements, fails to grasp the 'social' character of those Japanese leftist unions. The latter view provides few reasons to distinguish between 'social' and 'political' unionisms. Therefore, we should consider the historical leftist labor unionism in Japan, such as that involving CIU, Sohyo and so on, as a fertile tradition of SMU in Japan. Furthermore, exhuming the tradition, studying it with critical eyes and trying to inherit its best elements are the keys to making a new history of SMU in Japan and revitalizing labor unionism in Japan.
