賀川豊彦の「労働者保護」への視点 (聖学院大学名誉学長金井信一郎先生記念論文集)

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One of the main fields of activity in which Toyohiko Kagawa(1888-1960) engaged was that of the Japanese labour and union movement. His most active period of involvement was from 1917 to 1921. Kagawa's main aim was to make society realize that labourers and labour are not commodities. He considered labour a part of the worker's personality and wanted society to adopt this way of thinking. In those days the working and living conditions were very hard. Many workers had to live in slums because of the lack of a welfare system. Kagawa, who himself spent several years in the Kobe slums as a preacher and social worker, regarded the organization of trade unions as a means of preventing poverty. In his view, one reason labourers became poor was that they ware not sufficiently protected by law. He demanded, therefore, two things; revision of the Japanese Factory Law, and the the realization of "industrial democracy." Kagawa sharply criticized the Japanese Factory Law. This law came into effect in 1916, five years after its final draft had been enacted and thirty years after the first discussions about the need for such a law had begun. In Kagawa's opinion this law was made for the capitalists rather than for the workers, as there ware too many concessions that benefited factory owners. He criticized the law for protecting only female workers and children - and this only under special circumstances. Many essential problems, such as night work, unemployment, and working hours for adult male workers, were not mentioned at all. Influenced by the concept of industrial democracy, one version of which had been propounded by Sydney and Beatrice Webb, Kagawa saw the realization of an industrial democracy, understood as workers participation in the decision-making processes of management, as a way to make society realize that a worker is not a commodity but a person with a human character. Kagawa outlined five stages of development that would lead to the realization of industrial democracy. These stages were graded according to the degree of worker's rights. The final aim of this development was to be that fact factories would become the factories of the working class. In Kagawa's view, the industrialists had far too much power not only within their factories but also in political matters. He compared them with the former feudal lords of Japan, who had never had such power. One reason the capitalists gained such far-reaching power, Kagawa held, had to do with the increasing "power of money". He regretted that the world had changed into a world where money was the most important thing, and charged that money had come to be appreciated more than human life, i.e. the life of factory workers. It has to be mentioned that one of the distinctive characteristics of Kagawa's way of life was his rejection of any kind of violence. Though he made many demand for the improvement of labourers' working and living conditions, he never considered violence as a means for the attainment of these aims.
聖学院大学の論文
1995-01-30

賀川豊彦の「労働者保護」への視点 (聖学院大学名誉学長金井信一郎先生記念論文集)

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賀川豊彦の「労働者保護」への視点 (聖学院大学名誉学長 金井信一郎先生記念論文集)

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賀川豊彦の「労働者保護」への視点 (聖学院大学名誉学長金井信一郎先生記念論文集)