[asia-apec 334] "Globalization" and the Flexibilization of Labor in South Korea
bayan
bayan at mnl.sequel.net
Mon Jan 27 17:38:52 JST 1997
Dear Friends,
am forwarding one workshop paper presented at the BAYAN sponsored People's
Conference Against Imperialist Globalization, held at the time of APEC in
Manila, November 1996.
The workshop resolutions can be directly requested from BAYAN at
<bayan at mnl.sequel.net>.
Mario
Dear Friends,
Solidarity greetings from BAYAN and the Secretariat of the Peo-
ple's Campaign Against Imperialist Globalization. We will now
send you the papers presented in the various workshops held
during the People's Conference.
We start with the GABRIELA-sponsored Women's Workshop since
one of the papers, "'Globalization' and the Flexibilization
of Labor in South Korea," is of current significance. It was
presented by Marie Rhie Chol Soon of the Korean Women Workers
Association United. By giving us a view of the situation of
workers in South Korea, even if focussing on women workers,
we can understand more the struggle that the workers' movement
there is now waging.
We encourage the participants in the People's conference and
Caravan to give support to our South Korean sisters and brothers
by issuing statements and possibly holding pickets at the Korean
Embassy and other forms of mass actions based on your capabili-
ties.
Please furnish us a copy of your statements and write-up about
mass actions so we can share them with our South Korean friends
and comrades and with the other participants of the People's
Conference and Caravan.
People's Campaign Secretariat
----------------------------------------------------------------
"GLOBALIZATION" AND THE FLEXIBILIZATION OF LABOR IN SOUTH KOREA
by Maria Rhie Chol Soon
Korean Women Workers Associations United
Seoul, South Korea
History of Economic Development of South Korea
The process of South Korean economic development focused on
exports and intensive capitalization through the government's
active involvement since the national economic development plan
started in 1962. A notable phenomena that accompanied rapid
industrialization has been economic concentration in a few peo-
ple. These few people are the famous jaebul. The jaebul's
(about 30 hands) dominance in the Korean economy is not confined
to the manufacturing sector or to production. Their extensions,
like the legs of an octopus, cover almost all kinds of business:
department stores, banks and other financial firms. Although the
economic development policy was converted from the processing-
trade-based light industry to heavy industry since the heavy
industrialization declaration in 1973 and symptoms of an economic
crisis in the late 1970's, there was basically no change in an
economic development strategy based on exports. The economic
development led by exports was quite successful relatively. Total
export from 1960 to 1985 contributed about 40% of South Korean
economic growth.
In the process of South Korean economic development, weak eco-
social conditions produced a strange politico-economic structure.
For economic growth and development in a capitalist society,
there must be several conditions such as capital supply, means of
production, enough labor power, and available market . But,
South Korea had only widespread cheap labor and a repressive
political body to keep a low-wages policy. The rest of the condi-
tions for economic development were subordinate to foreign capi-
tal.
What became the main features of South Korean economic develop-
ment were: increase in foreign debt; introduction of foreign
capital; dependence on foreign countries for technical develop-
ment and development of other means of production; and gover-
nment's special support to a handful of monopolistic enterprises
for the promotion of export. These features were derived from an
unbalanced economic situation in the country. Also, these
features made economic dependency on the U.S. and Japan a neces-
sary condition for national economic development and growth.
The mid-1980's proved that an economic development strategy,
which allowed employers' and government control over the economy
and which depended on low wages and long working hours, was not
suited anymore. The pattern of economic development based on a
politico-economic relations between capital and an authoritarian
political system changed. Government and the dominant capitalists
responded to the crisis of the established development structure
through the Rearrangement of Industrial Structure in the 1980's.
There was a demand for privatization and a relaxation of adminis-
trative controls over the economy. The government started call-
ing for "internationalism" and "globalization" as an ideology of
social unity while the contradiction among capital was increasing
due to the protectionism of world market and trade conflicts.
There was a change in the state's involvement in the economy. It
was the strong opinion that the state's over-intervention was a
real hindrance in developing efficiency and international compet-
itiveness in the economy. An open-door policy was suggested for
international relations. This open-door policy and the easing of
restrictions as a result of the Uruguay Round (UR) trade talks
generally forced sacrifices from the agricultural sector and the
small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
The new economic development policy espoused by the government
and the dominant capitalists is a new hostile challenge that the
workers and the ordinary people of South Korea have to overcome.
In the present South Korea, there exist a deficient social wel-
fare system, worsening environmental pollution, limited labor
laws and a notorious national security law maintained by an
authoritarian political system.
"Globalization"
The accelerated growth of capitalism in some parts of Asia has
been facilitated by the intervention of the developed capitalist
world, and closely guided by the World Bank, the International
Monetary Fund, etc. It is they who directed the industrial and
agrarian policies of Asian governments and lured them with mas-
sive foreign loans and aid.
In the past two decades, most Asian countries have adopted an
export-led development policy aimed at bringing in foreign in-
vestments to produce goods for export to the developed countries.
This economic policy was characterized by the establishment of
Free Trade Zones/Export Processing Zones (FTZs/EPZs), where
special incentives were given to investors, specially multina-
tional corporations (MNCs). FTZs/EPZs basically mean that a
country opens its doors to foreign investors directly for the
setting-up of MNC subsidiaries, with very little restrictions.
The most distinctive characteristic of FTZs is that they are
exempted from the customs duties and other controls normally
imposed on imports into and exports from the principal custom
territory.
It is also interesting to note that the majority of labor force
employed in FTZs/EPZs in Asian countries are women.
The "globalization" process has been accelerated because the
miracle economies of so called NICs (newly industrializing coun-
tries) have given rise to an "Asian model of development." Under
these positive images from the late 1980's on, the NICs have had
an overwhelming influence in the Asian setting.
The growth of NICs was first fuelled by the setting up of EPZs.
NICs such as South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong established their
EPZs in the late 60's and early 70s. However, in recent years,
many MNCs/TNCs and other enterprises have transferred some part
of their capital from East Asia to other Asian countries where
cheap labor is more available and where labor control is still
very strong. This has taken place mainly in labor-intensive
small- to medium-sized industries.
Unstable Employment of Workers
Korean women workers are suffering from discrimination not only
in gaining employment but also in all aspects of working condi-
tions, such as wages, promotions, etc. Management's discrimina-
tion against women workers is still strong although there has
been meager improvements pushed by an activated labor movement
since 1987. Particularly in the area of employment issues, women
workers are still considered as marginal workers. Job problems
that women workers currently face can be classified into three
categories.
1. Retrenchment/Unemployment
In recent years, plant closures are implemented as manage-
ment's way of preventing workers from organizing and of accessing
cheap labor. Companies move their plants to the rural areas in
the same country or simply move out and transfer overseas.
Job loss is common for South Koreans due to company shut-
downs or relocation of production facilities. Concrete effects
are mass lay-offs and unpaid compensation.
Since 1986, the impact of the structural adjustment programs
(SAPs) which the government has been undertaking, especially
since the late 1980s when labor conflicts were at their height,
has become increasingly serious. Declining industries (textile,
clothing, shoes) are relocated abroad, while growing industries
(steel, petrochemicals, electricity, electronics, automobiles,
shipbuilding, machinery) are given many incentives to develop.
As women workers are usually concentrated in labor-intensive
industries, it is usually women's jobs which are lost under
economic restructuring.
Unemployment occurs mostly among those working in light
industries, mainly women workers, due to lay-offs and dismissals.
The main causes of lay-offs and dismissals are: withdrawal of
foreign capital joint ventures and their transfer to other coun-
tries; the temporary suspension of operations and permanent
closures of SMEs; and the systematization of subcontracting.
In Pusan, where the shoe industry sated in 1990-94 five-year
period, 217 companies declared bankruptcy and 768 firms closed
shop. The number of shoe industry workers which had been 164,000
at the beginning of 1988 decreased to 31,395 in 1993. In Seoul,
the Kuro Export-processing complex reduced personnel from 74,466
in 1987 to 43,357 in August 1995. In the Masan Free Export Zone,
47% of the employees were dismissed from 1987 to 1992.
Dismissed workers received no training to enable them to
obtain other employment nor did they get any other support to
guarantee their livelihood. The women workers who ended up
unemployed were pushed into the service industries or to work as
housekeepers.
2. Irregular Employment
Recently changing employment configurations with the growth
of part-time, dispatch, temporary, provisional, service-related
and contingent jobs have diffused women's importance, so that on
the whole, women's occupational formation has worsened. In
reality, such irregular types of employment are discriminatory
against women workers because they are not covered by the condi-
tions of equality in regular employment such as equivalent work
hours and equivalent workload (irregular employment offers 60% of
the wages of regular employment, and does not cover entitlement
to various holidays and vacations as well as welfare benefits of
regular employment).
Specifically in manufacturing industries, the number of
regular women workers has been steadily decreasing since 1989.
In the textile, garment and leather industries, the number of
women workers has decreased 44.6% since 1987. Also, 82.9% of
women workers are employed on regular and temporary basis while
17.1% are employed on a daily basis. One out of five women
workers in the mining and manufacturing industries are employed
on a day to day basis. Furthermore, facing the threat of dismis-
sal, women workers are prevented from joining labor unions.
Temporary workers in the manufacturing sector in South Korea
usually work the same number of hours as fulltime workers, but
get less wages and nominal benefits. Although the Department of
Labor index designates part-time employment as working 30.8 hours
or less a week, if the hourly wage worker in Korea were to work
the identical hours of regular employment, this would for the
most part take up all the nominal hours. Most of the women work-
ers are older, subcontracting workers who have no choice but to
enter as part-timers because of their childcare responsibilities.
Among part-time workers, women now comprise 64.9% compared to
45.9% in 1990.
Another reason for the increase in women part-time and
temporary workers in South Korea, is industries' increasing need
for a flexible work force. The employers are able to reduce its
expenses by paying women workers less as casual workers aside
from using such a set-up to divide the workers and prevent them
from joining together to fight. Job loss as a result of indus-
trial restructuring has also forced retrenched women workers to
accept part-time or temporary jobs even though they are much
lower paid and offers no job security.
Dispatch workers, presently with the exception of workers in
harbors and docks, law enforcement, janitorial and service sector
and temporary workers, is illegal under existing laws. Neverthe-
less, the law is disregarded and there is no monitoring of these
illegal service jobs. There was an estimated 300,000 workers in
3,000 service enterprises in 1995. In the case of service corps
labor, there were 400,000 such workers in 1992 of which 51.2%
were women. They are concentrated mainly in the manufacturing,
banking, and insurance industries, but are spreading to all
industrial sectors.
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