Structure of Confederation the General Confederation of Labour

Abstract

In France, after the May 1968 demonstrations, trade union activities in companies were recognized. In particular, the General Confederation of Labour （Confédération Générale du Travail, CGT） had strongly demanded freedom of labor union activities within companies since shortly after the end of the Second World War. Today, in pursuit of “decentralization”, CGT has made company- or workplace-based organizations the basic units of union organization （syndicats）. When we focus on this point, it would seem that CGT has an organizational structure similar to that of national trade unions in Japan, which are composed of in-house unions. On the other hand, in terms of institutional conditions and ideas of unionism, the existence of nationwide collective agreements, and, in particular, pluralism, syndicalism has made a great difference. In addition, the rate of organized labor is about 8％ in France, which is lower than in Japan, where the rate has declined in recent years, but the French labor movement is more active than its Japanese counterpart in terms of indicators such as the number of labor disputes. In particular, CGT is well known in France for developing strong movements in the workplace and at the regional level. In this report, I would like to consider how the CGT movement takes the organizational form of “company unions”, while also referring to research on labor unions in postwar Japan.