The curtain to the 21st Century has opened, accompanied by epoch-making changes.

The Japanese trade union movement has developed throughout the 20th century, but it was especially during the half century period following the Second World War that it played a major role in improving working conditions and supporting democracy. Today, new changes are forcing trade unions to take on a whole slew of new challenges. We must look hard at the undercurrent behind these transformations, including globalization, the IT revolution, the declining birth rate and aging population, and global environmental problems, and we must build a new social system, without inheriting the negative legacies of the past.

During the final decade of the 20th century, the Japanese economy suffered from a protracted recession following the collapse of the bubble economy. In the midst of changes to the industrial structure and reorganizations of corporate structures carried out to cope with economic globalization, unemployment surged upward, the system of stable long-term employment stumbled, and in its place we saw an increase in the number of highly mobile part-time and temporary workers. Most of these workers are beyond our reach, and as a result a world without workers’ rights and entitlements, and without clear work rules, has been spreading. The dogma of the almighty market has spread, contributing to the widening of economic and social disparities and facilitating social collapse.

Trade unions today face a clear challenge. Rebuilding the framework of labor and living, and overcoming the current social crisis, are tasks that demand the strength of trade unions to cope with.

The future blueprint of the society that we are working to materialize is a “welfare society centered on labor.” That is a society which places the most important value on work, where all people are assured of the opportunity to work under fair working conditions, and which is equipped with social safety nets that allow people to take up the challenge of self-development with a sense of security. Thus, we are promoting the building of a framework for a more human way of working and living.

In this context, it is essential for RENGO and our affiliates to develop new work rules. While long-term employment should remain the foundation, both regular and irregular workers must be provided with equitable treatment in order to provide guarantees for workers in a diversity of working patterns. Since workers have the right and are entitled to the provision of appropriate compensation and status in return for their occupational capabilities and skills, trade unions must establish transparency and fairness in personnel systems. Also the new work rules must be the ones responsive to the needs of societies, families and the community in the Twenty-First century; including both the development of “family-friendly workplaces,” that allow workers to meet both work requirements and the need to sustain their families, and the development of a system for employment, working and retirement that matches our long-lived society, with its average life expectancy of 80 years or more.

The structuring of a “welfare society centered on labor” is a challenge that will affect the entire state of the economy, society and culture. The RENGO movement will cut open a path to overcome our current social crisis, by changing working patterns and lifestyles.

Trade unions also face the urgent challenge of self-reform.

The Japanese trade union movement, which is characterized by company-based unions, has developed a specific form of industrial democracy which includes, for example, the system of labor-management consultation. However, today we must overcome the flaws in these specific systems, which make them prone to compromises with the interest of corporate society, and build new industrial relations for a new era. Trade unions must strengthen their monitoring functions toward corporate management, and pursue management practices that place importance, in harmony with social progress, on improving the lives of their employees, and at the same time fulfill our social role and responsibilities as trade unions.

The source of power for trade unions ultimately derives from their membership, and so their influence depends above all on the growth of organized labor. For this reason, it is essential for trade unions to concentrate their resources on unionizing efforts, not to neglect part-time and temporary workers, and to embrace retired workers within their great circle of solidarity. To this end, initiatives for “cyber unions” and “life-time union membership” must be materialized. Furthermore, we must work to unify all the forces working under our umbrella.

Historically, the labor movement has developed along courses from “resistance” to “demands” and then to “participation.” Today we are working to achieve "social partnership", by developing social dialogues among the government, labor and management, to build a national consensus and to assume responsibility for implementing these initiatives. In addition to our “demand” type campaigns, we have launched the “RENGO Work Net", a RENGO version of Hello Work (the government’s employment agency),” as a “self-sustaining” type campaign, to take the first step in an effort toward self-reform initiated by the RENGO movement.

As the body representing the long-term interests of Japan’s working people, and taking responsibility for determining the country’s development course, we will strengthen our "campaign power", “organizational power,” “political power” and “power of international solidarity,” and actively address the challenges posed by the 21st century. We will serve as a guiding light for the good of all working people, and strive hard to carry out the required reforms.

With resolve to open a new era, we make the above declaration.

January 2001
Japanese Trade Union Confederation (JTUC-RENGO)