ABSTRACT
Japan’s pre-war labour organizations split and regrouped amid repeated crack-downs by the authorities. The labour movement had been virtually banned since 1937, before all labour organizations were disbanded in 1940. Independent unions were replaced in 1938 by Sangyō Hōkokukai (the Movement of Industrial Service to the Nation), which were collaborative associations of employers and workers. Sangyō Hōkokukai became the nation’s only legal workplace organizations and were actively enlisted to support the war effort.
