ABSTRACT
There was a sense at Hyundai Heavy Industries of failure and disillusionment stemming from the breakdown of the “understanding” surrounding the election for a new union president in April 1989. Sang Myong Ju served for eight months as president of the HHI union — what was left of the term of his vanished predecessor — and then trouble began to brew. The new union president, Lee Yon Hon, was arrested soon after his election, and his deputy was arrested several days before the next walkout actually began. They were accused of agitating to bring about an illegal strike on April 25,1990—a charge that showed how little both sides were committed to keeping the truce hammered out the year before after the disastrous 128-day walkout.
