Labour Union Activism

Abstract

The Great Workers’ Struggle of 1987 marked a critical juncture in the transformation of South Korea’s authoritarian labour regime. This chapter examines the political and historical development of the country’s unique labour activism. That militant unionism has contributed to the improvement of the economic and social status of the working class. However, it has also turned out to be one of the main causes of organized labour’s deepening social and political isolation. As a result, labour market inequality has been further exacerbated by the combination of enterprise unionism and a social insurance system that prioritizes protection for regular workers. This suggests the limits of South Korean labour activism, which has neither established an encompassing union structure, nor extended the protection of universal citizenship to non-regular workers.